DEF LEPPARD guitarist Vivian Campbell has supplied an replace on his well being after he was pressured to overlook the band’s final two concert events resulting from his ongoing most cancers battle.
The veteran British rockers performed their first live performance of 2025 on Saturday, January 18 at Feria Estatal De León in León, Mexico. As was the case with the band’s October 14, 2024 non-public present in Nashville (as a part of the Daimler Truck Buyer Appreciation Occasion),Vivian was unable to hitch his bandmates on the León gig and was changed by John Zocco, who’s Phil Collen‘s guitar tech.
On Thursday (January 23),Vivian launched the next assertion by way of social media: “Thanks for all of the current messages and assist. As you all might know, I used to be recognized with Hodgkin’s lymphoma a number of years in the past. I just lately had a bone marrow transplant as a part of my remedy plan, and it is secure to say that to this point it has been a really profitable transplant! I simply must preserve my head down and my spirits up for the subsequent 100 days of major restoration.”
Throughout a November 2023 look on the “Lymphoma Voices” podcast, Campbell spoke about his battle with Hodgkin’s lymphoma, with which he was recognized in 2013. The now-62-year-old musician stated partially: “I am nonetheless coping with the lymphoma. It is type of like — it is an American expression — whac-a-mole. You beat one thing again after which it pops up elsewhere. Nevertheless it’s been a reasonably constant battle, nevertheless it hasn’t been too tough for me. I cope with it effective. I have been capable of stay my life. I have been capable of proceed touring. For the majority of these 10 years, I truly was doing immunotherapy. Beginning in June of 2015, I began taking a drug known as pembrolizumab. I did that as a part of a scientific trial. We mentioned just a few choices. And I would heard about this immunotherapy, and it was a really nascent remedy and I used to be actually pushing for doing it. I bear in mind on the time my medical doctors needed me to do radiation and perhaps a mix of radiation and chemo. And I simply thought, ‘Nicely, let’s simply do this immunotherapy factor. Let’s have a look at if this works.’ So I managed to get on the trial. I am joyful to say that it labored properly for me. So from June of 2015 till primarily the top of 2022, I used to be capable of, nearly as soon as a month, go in and do an infusion of pembrolizumab and simply go about my life, and it was very, very straightforward for me to do. Truthfully, the toughest half was scheduling with all my journey. There have been very, very refined, very benign unwanted effects. For me, I tolerated the remedy very, very properly. And that was working nice. Nevertheless it type of misplaced its efficacy a 12 months, 12 months and a half in the past. And we may inform within the scans. I’d do scans each three to 4 months simply as a matter of protocol anyway to see what was taking place. And my oncologist now had been telling me for primarily the final two years that the pembrolizumab was not being as efficient because it as soon as was and that we had been gonna have to contemplate completely different therapies. So anyway, in November of [2022], we did a mix of pembrolizumab with three chemo medicine. You must forgive me ‘trigger I can’t bear in mind the names of the chemo medicine. However anyway, so I did a course of remedy, six cycles of that mixture remedy of the three chemo medicine and the pembrolizumab. Sadly, it did not put me into remission; we fell a little bit bit wanting that. So I only recently, on the finish of July [of 2023], began doing six cycles of a mix remedy of a chemo drug known as brentuximab and an immunotherapy drug known as nivolumab. I am midway via that. I’ve carried out cycle three. I do cycle 4 early subsequent week. To date, so good. I needed to go and get this beautiful haircut yesterday as a result of the brentuximab does have hair loss as a facet impact. So I may begin telling within the final couple of weeks, each time I touched my hair, it was popping out. So, I am a little bit bit extra proactive by going and slicing it tremendous, tremendous quick.”
Requested if he has gotten used to his a lot shorter haircut, Vivian stated: “10 years in the past, after I first began doing the ABVD chemo, that is when my hair first fell out. And in order that was tough. It was largely tough for me as a result of I would had lengthy hair my total grownup life. I actually began rising my hair lengthy after I was about 11 or 12 years outdated, and it is simply gotten longer and longer. And it turns into a part of your identification when it is round for thus lengthy, particularly as a guitar participant. And to be sincere, it was a comforting factor to me as a result of it gave me one thing to cover behind after I was on stage. I’m naturally a really shy individual and I establish with being a musician. I do not establish very a lot with being a performer, regardless that, if I am being sincere with myself, that is actually sort of what we do in DEF LEPPARD. Yeah, we’re musicians and we’re songwriters, we write songs and we make data and we report music, however after we go on tour, we’re performers, and that is a part of it. And my hair gave me one thing to cover behind. It was a giant a part of my identification for a lot of my life. So it was tough letting go of it the primary time once more.’
He continued: “I used to be residing in L.A. on the time, and I went to a theatrical wig maker after they first informed me my hair was gonna fall out. They took footage and measurements of my hair earlier than it fell out. And so they made a really, very real looking wig for me. It was very costly and it was very real looking. And I may have transitioned to that, and folks may not have seen — apart from the load loss. I imply, I undoubtedly was dropping a number of weight, so I used to be a bit extra gaunt wanting. However the wig factor simply did not really feel proper to me. And I do know that it is completely different for everybody else. I actually wore that wig, I believe, for about 12 or 13 minutes driving residence after visiting the wig man and getting fitted for this. And I pulled over. My spouse was with me and. And I simply took it off my head and I by no means put it again on since. And I made a decision to only go public about my most cancers prognosis’
Campbell added: “I used to be capable of converse on to DEF LEPPARD followers by way of social media and type of inform them, ‘Nicely, that is what is going on on with me. I’ve had this most cancers prognosis. And my hair is gonna fall out. So that you’re gonna see me on tour. I am not gonna have a lot hair. Do not be too shocked.’ In order that’s type of helped that I used to be capable of put it out to anybody who cared or was earlier than truly simply occurring stage as bald as a cue ball. And, and it did get to that stage, that my hair utterly fell; I did not even have eyebrows. However in a manner I discovered the entire course of considerably cathartic, as a result of I did not have this mane of hair to cover behind. I had nothing to supply on stage however my abilities as a musician, as a guitarist, as a singer, as a songwriter. And in a manner, it was considerably liberating for me. And I spotted that it is in all probability simpler for me than for lots of different individuals, as a result of presently I used to be already in my early fifties. I do not assume I’d have dealt with that as properly if I had gotten this most cancers after I was 20 years outdated, versus 50 years outdated, so I had a unique mindset about it.
“So it is a really private factor, “Vivian stated. “However for me, I attempted to look on the constructive facet of it. I did not see any disgrace in it. There isn’t any disgrace in having most cancers. There isn’t any disgrace in going via remedy and sporting the consequences of your remedy bodily, and even being in a really public place as I used to be, occurring tour with DEF LEPPARD and enjoying in entrance of tens of hundreds of individuals. Like I say, there was there was one thing sort of actually liberating about it. It is not my first selection, however you sort of go along with it and also you personal it and also you make the most effective of it. And for me as a musician, like I stated, there was one thing that simply allowed me to go on stage and simply give attention to the essence of who I’m as a musician and as an individual and to only put all of it on the market.”
Campbell — who earlier than becoming a member of DEF LEPPARD in 1992 was well-known for his work with DIO and WHITESNAKE — went public along with his Hodgkin’s lymphoma prognosis in June 2013.
Vivian underwent three separate spells of chemotherapy and a stem cell transplant, just for his Hodgkin’s lymphoma to return.
Six years in the past, Campbell underwent backbone surgical procedure.
Vivian and his DEF LEPPARD bandmates had been lastly inducted into the Rock And Roll Corridor Of Fame in March 2019 — 14 years after the British rockers first grew to become eligible.
DEF LEPPARD‘s newest album, “Diamond Star Halos”, arrived in Might 2022 by way of UMe.
An replace from Viv:
“Thanks for all of the current messages and assist. As you all might know, I used to be recognized with…
Posted by Def Leppard on Thursday, January 23, 2025