Rick Allen

But it's funny that now I'm in such a happy situation, I look more objectively at my own past and see what others have seen for a long time and I'm just so glad I've been able to get to this point.

My situation should have been a lot worse. By rights I shouldn't have survived the crash.

Before my accident I was a little too... selfish and self-absorbed and for me, to now be at the place where I can kinda give back and inspire people. I'm blessed. I'm really blessed.

But unfortunately, in my unrelenting drive to get back on that drum stool, the major casualty in all of it was that I really forgot about me.

But I think that the most important thing was to really stop drinking.

I wanted to be as far away from everybody as I could be. I found it difficult to be close to anybody, not just the guys in the band.

Cause I felt I didn't have anything else to prove as a musician... and boy was I wrong about that one.

But the irony is that because the band isn't the focus any more, it allows me the chance to enjoy being a member of Def Leppard much more.

At the end of the day, they're happy if you do the obvious songs towards the end of the set and you've got to try and make yourself happy by doing certain songs at the front end of the set.

I was happy in Dublin because it is very cosmopolitan.

Chasing the sensation. Whether it was drugs or sex or whatever. Those things had become my main focus in life.

I think my perception of my own life is different and the fact that Lauren and myself are together. I've never felt this free or happy and so that permeates onto my onstage persona and to my working environment.