Jeff Giles | Ultimate Classic Rock

Whatever else happens on Def Leppard‘s summer tour with Kiss, we can at least be sure that Lep guitarist Phil Collen is having fun.

Collen’s flair for road shenanigans surfaced recently on the Kiss Facebook page, where the band posted a picture of their tour mate all gussied up in Kiss bassist Gene Simmons‘ trademark costume while also wielding his distinctive axe. The photo was taken during the July 6 stop in Chula Vista, Calif. for the tour, which started June 23 in Salt Lake City, Utah and is scheduled to wrap up Aug. 31 in Texas.

Good as Collen might look as the Demon, don’t expect him to trade his Leppard spots for greasepaint anytime soon — once they wrap up this round of tour dates with Kiss, Def Leppard will get right back to work on their next album, their first since 2008′s ‘Songs from the Sparkle Lounge.’ And although the new record was initially supposed to be an EP, Collen says once the songwriting sessions started, the new material just kept flowing.

“We’re actually blown away, ’cause it normally takes us about five years to write 10 songs, and we’ve got 15 songs already — not finished, but we’re gonna have an album out next year,” he recently enthused. “So for us, that’s our big goal. Next year’s gonna be a really important year. We’ve got this great album. The recording has been really going fast and flowing, so we’re ultra-excited about that.”