Def Leppard: X

By RUSSELL BAILLIE

(Herald rating: * )

It sounds like a possible subplot from a Spinal Tap sequel — once-huge English hard-rock band who haven't had a hit in the best part of a decade get in the Swedish producers best known for sticking various teen pop divas and various boy bands to the world's charts. The former Brit-metallers have been about super-sheen AOR pop since the mega-selling 1987 album Hysteria, and to get the Stockhom hit factory likes of Max Martin, Andreas Carlsson and Per Aldeheim to sprinkle pop fairy dust across a couple of tracks would seem to be their effort at keeping up with the times.

It is disconcerting to think "'N Sync" when Now opens proceedings, or "Ronan Keating" when the lushly upholstered Everyday gets all breathless, "Go West" when the You're So Beautiful chugs in, seemingly from 1986.

After a prolonged slow start, Def Leppard start to remember they were once a rock band, well, a poodle-metal one on the likes of Four Letter Word and Torn to Shreds, both sounding like Hysteria off-cuts, while singer Joe Elliott tries this new-fangled thing called "rap" on Gravity. Yes, it's resolutely awful, though intriguing for its air of utter desperation and its cover photos showing Elliott's locks curiously now also look like Britney hand-me-downs.

Label: Mercury