Post by bartman2001 on May 8, 2014 15:21:51 GMT -5
rocksquare.com interview from 2012:
www.rocksquare.com/community/featuredartists/1488
Aerosmith is back in the saddle—and not a moment too soon. On Tuesday, the Boston-based band releases Music from Another Dimension, its first studio record since 2004’s Honkin’ on Bobo (an excellent album of blues cover versions)and its first album of original material since Just Push Play (2001).
It’s a miracle the album happened at all. Over the past four decades, Aerosmith has survived drug addictions, a series of serious injuries, a brief lineup change, and a collaboration with ’N Sync at the 2001 Super Bowl halftime show. But things started going really badly for the band around 2009. To recap: Aerosmith embarked on an extensive tour that was plagued with more accidents than a Broadway production of Spider-Man. First, guitarist Joe Perry blew out his knee and had to undergo replacement knee surgery. A few months later, guitarist Brad Whitford hit his head getting out a car and had to sit out a number of dates. Soon after, Singer Steven Tyler injured his leg, which led to several shows getting canceled. Worse, bassist Tom Hamilton, who has battled throat cancer off and on since 2006, had to take a brief hiatus for unspecified surgery. Then, disaster: Tyler fell off the stage during a show in South Dakota and broke his shoulder.
The fallout of Tyler’s tumble was a band torn asunder. The supposedly long sober singer had been videotaped purchasing alcohol at a liquor store that summer. Anonymous sources inside Aerosmith told the Boston Herald that Tyler’s fall was a result of “partying hard” ahead of the show. Tyler and the rest of Aerosmith were barely on speaking terms. In a portent of things to come, Tyler even had his own manager separate from the band. By the end of that annus horribilis, the singer was boasting that he was developing “Brand Tyler.” Soon after, Tyler entered rehab. The band had made several attempts at writing and recording a 15th album since 2007. Now it seemed headed for a permanent vacation.
One month later, however, Aerosmith made it known that they were about to do the unthinkable: replace Tyler with another singer. A flurry of activity by lawyers and managers seemed to put the band back together for another series of live dates. The subsequent tour was akin to inviting J.R. Ewing and Bobby Ewing over for a backyard BBQ at Southfork ranch. First, Tyler bopped Perry in the head with his microphone stand then, a few nights later, Perry nudged Tyler so that he toppled offstage. Worse, the singer signed up to be a judge on American Idol without informing his bandmates, a move that Perry blasted as one step above the Teenage Mutant Turtles. Tyler used the reality show as a launch pad for his first solo single, “(It) Feels So Good.” Could brand Tyler coexist with Aerosmith?
By that point, public feuding between the Toxic Twins, aka Tyler and Perry, had reached a point of such rancor that not even Madeleine Albright would’ve been able to negotiate a truce. Yet, to everyone’s surprise, a public reconciliation unfurled during an episode of the 2012 season of American Idol when Perry made a surprise appearance to sing “Happy Birthday” to the frontman. Aerosmith later guested on the show’s season finale. All the while, the band persisted in its marathon-long effort to finally finish its 15th album by recruiting Jack Douglas, producer of four of the band’s classic 1970s records, including Toys in the Attic and Rocks.
Against such formidable odds, Aerosmith’s Music from Another Dimension is something of a triumph. The 15 track album plays a like a greatest hits album that touches on just about every aspect of Aerosmith over multiple eras. Those yearning for the band’s raw rockers from the 1970s will be thrilled with the likes of “Street Jesus,” “Freedom Fighter,” “Something” (featuring Perry on lead vocals and Johnny Depp on backing vocals), and the Rolling Stones-like “Oh Yeah.” On the frantic “Lover Alot,” Joey Kramer plays whack-a-mole drums, Hamilton thrashes a baritone bass and Tyler unleashes his lusty mojo. It’s topped off by a Joe Perry guitar solo that twists and turns like a wild magic carpet ride.
Much of the album sounds like cryogenically unfrozen material dating back to the polished studio sound of Aerosmith’s ’90s commercial renaissance. The band has once again roped in songwriters for hire such as Marti Frederiksen, Diane Warren and Desmond Child for the epic ballads “What Could Have Been Love,” “Another Last Goodbye,” and “We All Fall Down” (during the latter, the 64-year-old Tyler unleashes a tonsil scraping scream that shows that he’s lost none of his range during these many seasons of wither). There’s even a modern country style duet featuring Carrie Underwood called “Can’t Stop Loving You.” The acoustic ballad “Tell Me” is less likely to appeal to Aerosmith’s Harley’s Angels fanbase than it is to their wives and girlfriends.
Music from Another Dimension includes a number of ’90s style rockers, too. “Out Go the Lights” boasts a strutting guitar riff, cooing female backing vocals and, in the immortal words of Christopher Walken, “more cowbell.” The Tyler/Perry co-write has so many hooks that its bridge is almost as catchy as its chorus. “Legendary Child” consists of a stampede of drums, a Jimmy Page-like riff, sitars, Tyler’s patented tongue-twisting verses, and a sinuous chorus that snakes its way into one’s memory forever. If “Beautiful” had been released in the mid ’90s when radio still mattered, it would probably have been a number one hit.
It may be a stretch to call this stuff Music from Another Dimension given that it hews closely to familiar Aerosmith tropes. But talk about a tune up—the bad boys from Boston sound thoroughly rejuvenated and the melodies are mostly killer.
Rock Square recently got on the phone with guitarist Brad Whitford to talk about the making of Music from Another Dimension.
First, before I go any further, I want to tell you that I loved your guitar playing on Joe Bonamassa’s Driving Towards the Daylight earlier this year.
What a fun project to be a part of. Joe and I are friends and he does all his albums with Kevin Shirley, who is also a good friend. I got the phone call and went out to Las Vegas. I love working with Kevin and Joe because they know how to work. No downtime. There’s nothing worse than being in the studio with your thumb up your butt, so to speak! Every single day we did two tracks and every single morning, we had no idea what we were going to do. In some cases, not even a song title. A few hours later, we had a finished track.
Is recording with Aerosmith quite long and protracted by contrast? It’s been a long time between Just Push Play and Music from Another Dimension.
Yeah, I think we all had doubts in the back of our minds whether we could get this record done and how it was going to happen. We actually had a few attempted false starts with the record, which yielded us nothing, pretty much. Something sort of clicked at one point. We decided to have a little writing session and went out to Marti Frederiksen’s studio in California. And, boy, just right out of the box it started rolling. We wrote about eight different things there and several months later we moved into our studio in Massachusetts and just started rolling. The ideas started rolling fast and furiously. It was really a great working environment. I think if we’d had the time to stay in there, we’d have been able to do a second record! The work vibe was a lot of fun.
People talk about the healing power of music. Did the recording sessions help heal the rifts inside the band?
Oh, I would say, “Absolutely, yes.” The music definitely has that power to it. We’re all just huge fans of our band. We hadn’t been together in that setting in quite some time and everybody was in a great mood and in a very creative mood. So I think it definitely put our eye back on the ball.
All great rock bands seem to have a tension between the lead guitarist and the singer. For example, Keith Richards and Mick Jagger, Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey, Jimmy Page and Robert Plant each seem to have a friendship at the same time as they have a rivalry and competitiveness. Would you say the same is true of Joe Perry and Steven Tyler?
Yeah, for some reason that dynamic seems to be pretty standard for guys like that. I think a lot of it is they’re naturally very competitive guys but they also have the ability to work with one another and create pretty amazing volatility that goes along with those relationships. I mean, you take years and years, in some cases before they finally figure it out. It doesn’t have to be quite so difficult. Guys don’t have to live together, all they have to do is get into the studio and get on stage and do what they do best. Steve and Joe are on and off. They’re really the front guys in all these bands we’re talking about. That adds pressure, of course. It’s a tough world. You’ve got to keep your ego in check but you also don’t want to dump that.
Out of that tension comes great music.
I think that’s a huge part of it. That tension and that fire are really a big part of what that music is. So much of it is an emotional experience, whether you are listening or playing.
Did you set out with a certain type of sound in mind for this album?
We did not have a plan. We find that plans sort of corrupt our process. It’s really best just to leave it one song at a time and whatever direction it takes, it takes. That, I think, resulted in a more natural-sounding Aerosmith record. We have a wide variety of influences in this band.
How did Aerosmith hook up with Carrie Underwood?
Carrie is a friend of ours. Steven had performed a song with Carrie at the Academy of Country Music Awards so, one night, we just thought, “This might be a great song to see if we could get someone like Carrie Underwood,” which we considered a longshot at the time, because we had no idea where she was or what she was doing. So, we put the phone call in and it just so happened that we were in L.A. She was in L.A. for one more day and she said she would love to. I think they sing great together.
You reunited with producer Jack Douglas for this record. What was the impetus for that and what did he bring to the new album?
Around here we call him the sixth member of the band. Right from the very earliest days working with Jack, he seemed to have a real understanding of the band. We first met him in 1973, 1974. We were looking for producers at that time. Jack came up to Massachusetts to see us play in a high school gym and really it was the perfect place to see Aerosmith and see what we do. I think he had this understanding of who we are and what we’re trying to do. We all became instant friends and have stayed that way. So, the timing was right. We thought it could turn out great. He’s very easy to work with and he knows how to light a fire underneath us and I think he gets the best out of us musically.
Do you have any lead guitar parts on this record or just purely rhythm?
I’ve always played lead parts on all our albums. But we were never adamant about “lead player 1, lead player 2.” That was never really part of the deal.
What are your favorite guitar parts on the new album and what are your favorite tracks on it?
One of my favorite things is a solo I did on a song Tom wrote called “Tell Me.” We were working on that record one day in the studio and Jack said to me, “Why don’t you do some George Harrison sort of thing?” He gave me a mini computer and a mini stereo and locked me in a room for about two-and-a-half hours. He said, “Don’t come out until you’re done.” I went back into the studio and we tracked it and we had it. It’s a little different but I quite liked that one, quite proud of that one.
You co-wrote a song with Steven Tyler called “Street Jesus.” Tell me about that one.
That was another lick, actually, that I’d been carrying about for quite some time. For some reason, we’d never sunk our teeth into it. So, basically, it was something that we’d pretty much jam on at soundcheck and rehearsal studio. We were kind of fooling around with it in the studio and, suddenly, Steven picked up his legal pad and began scribbling away. And then he’d say, “Stop, play that again.” Sure enough, we had a new song. I’d been sitting on that one for a while, so, basically, I came up with one new part for it and the rest of it fell together. I felt it could be a real high-powered rocker. Now it’s done!
“Legendary Child” is also a 20 year old song. Why hadn’t that emerged before now?
Again, the basic lick has been around for some time but we didn’t have much more than that. We had no idea what it was going to be. Not a clue. We started to toss it around in the studio and see what we could make happen with it. It’s another one that just came together in the studio. We’ve been jamming on that one for a long time, too, but it never went much further than, “That’s cool,” and then on to the next. Sometimes you look back and think, “Why didn’t you finish this?”
Many reviewers of your current tour say that these are among the best shows Aerosmith has done. What is the current mood in the band?
We’re very excited about the new record. I think we feel like it may be some of our best work ever. We’re definitely, 40 years later, starting to improve! We’re having some great live shows and everybody’s really at the top of their game playing-wise. It makes it that much more fun to get out .
www.rocksquare.com/community/featuredartists/1488
Aerosmith is back in the saddle—and not a moment too soon. On Tuesday, the Boston-based band releases Music from Another Dimension, its first studio record since 2004’s Honkin’ on Bobo (an excellent album of blues cover versions)and its first album of original material since Just Push Play (2001).
It’s a miracle the album happened at all. Over the past four decades, Aerosmith has survived drug addictions, a series of serious injuries, a brief lineup change, and a collaboration with ’N Sync at the 2001 Super Bowl halftime show. But things started going really badly for the band around 2009. To recap: Aerosmith embarked on an extensive tour that was plagued with more accidents than a Broadway production of Spider-Man. First, guitarist Joe Perry blew out his knee and had to undergo replacement knee surgery. A few months later, guitarist Brad Whitford hit his head getting out a car and had to sit out a number of dates. Soon after, Singer Steven Tyler injured his leg, which led to several shows getting canceled. Worse, bassist Tom Hamilton, who has battled throat cancer off and on since 2006, had to take a brief hiatus for unspecified surgery. Then, disaster: Tyler fell off the stage during a show in South Dakota and broke his shoulder.
The fallout of Tyler’s tumble was a band torn asunder. The supposedly long sober singer had been videotaped purchasing alcohol at a liquor store that summer. Anonymous sources inside Aerosmith told the Boston Herald that Tyler’s fall was a result of “partying hard” ahead of the show. Tyler and the rest of Aerosmith were barely on speaking terms. In a portent of things to come, Tyler even had his own manager separate from the band. By the end of that annus horribilis, the singer was boasting that he was developing “Brand Tyler.” Soon after, Tyler entered rehab. The band had made several attempts at writing and recording a 15th album since 2007. Now it seemed headed for a permanent vacation.
One month later, however, Aerosmith made it known that they were about to do the unthinkable: replace Tyler with another singer. A flurry of activity by lawyers and managers seemed to put the band back together for another series of live dates. The subsequent tour was akin to inviting J.R. Ewing and Bobby Ewing over for a backyard BBQ at Southfork ranch. First, Tyler bopped Perry in the head with his microphone stand then, a few nights later, Perry nudged Tyler so that he toppled offstage. Worse, the singer signed up to be a judge on American Idol without informing his bandmates, a move that Perry blasted as one step above the Teenage Mutant Turtles. Tyler used the reality show as a launch pad for his first solo single, “(It) Feels So Good.” Could brand Tyler coexist with Aerosmith?
By that point, public feuding between the Toxic Twins, aka Tyler and Perry, had reached a point of such rancor that not even Madeleine Albright would’ve been able to negotiate a truce. Yet, to everyone’s surprise, a public reconciliation unfurled during an episode of the 2012 season of American Idol when Perry made a surprise appearance to sing “Happy Birthday” to the frontman. Aerosmith later guested on the show’s season finale. All the while, the band persisted in its marathon-long effort to finally finish its 15th album by recruiting Jack Douglas, producer of four of the band’s classic 1970s records, including Toys in the Attic and Rocks.
Against such formidable odds, Aerosmith’s Music from Another Dimension is something of a triumph. The 15 track album plays a like a greatest hits album that touches on just about every aspect of Aerosmith over multiple eras. Those yearning for the band’s raw rockers from the 1970s will be thrilled with the likes of “Street Jesus,” “Freedom Fighter,” “Something” (featuring Perry on lead vocals and Johnny Depp on backing vocals), and the Rolling Stones-like “Oh Yeah.” On the frantic “Lover Alot,” Joey Kramer plays whack-a-mole drums, Hamilton thrashes a baritone bass and Tyler unleashes his lusty mojo. It’s topped off by a Joe Perry guitar solo that twists and turns like a wild magic carpet ride.
Much of the album sounds like cryogenically unfrozen material dating back to the polished studio sound of Aerosmith’s ’90s commercial renaissance. The band has once again roped in songwriters for hire such as Marti Frederiksen, Diane Warren and Desmond Child for the epic ballads “What Could Have Been Love,” “Another Last Goodbye,” and “We All Fall Down” (during the latter, the 64-year-old Tyler unleashes a tonsil scraping scream that shows that he’s lost none of his range during these many seasons of wither). There’s even a modern country style duet featuring Carrie Underwood called “Can’t Stop Loving You.” The acoustic ballad “Tell Me” is less likely to appeal to Aerosmith’s Harley’s Angels fanbase than it is to their wives and girlfriends.
Music from Another Dimension includes a number of ’90s style rockers, too. “Out Go the Lights” boasts a strutting guitar riff, cooing female backing vocals and, in the immortal words of Christopher Walken, “more cowbell.” The Tyler/Perry co-write has so many hooks that its bridge is almost as catchy as its chorus. “Legendary Child” consists of a stampede of drums, a Jimmy Page-like riff, sitars, Tyler’s patented tongue-twisting verses, and a sinuous chorus that snakes its way into one’s memory forever. If “Beautiful” had been released in the mid ’90s when radio still mattered, it would probably have been a number one hit.
It may be a stretch to call this stuff Music from Another Dimension given that it hews closely to familiar Aerosmith tropes. But talk about a tune up—the bad boys from Boston sound thoroughly rejuvenated and the melodies are mostly killer.
Rock Square recently got on the phone with guitarist Brad Whitford to talk about the making of Music from Another Dimension.
First, before I go any further, I want to tell you that I loved your guitar playing on Joe Bonamassa’s Driving Towards the Daylight earlier this year.
What a fun project to be a part of. Joe and I are friends and he does all his albums with Kevin Shirley, who is also a good friend. I got the phone call and went out to Las Vegas. I love working with Kevin and Joe because they know how to work. No downtime. There’s nothing worse than being in the studio with your thumb up your butt, so to speak! Every single day we did two tracks and every single morning, we had no idea what we were going to do. In some cases, not even a song title. A few hours later, we had a finished track.
Is recording with Aerosmith quite long and protracted by contrast? It’s been a long time between Just Push Play and Music from Another Dimension.
Yeah, I think we all had doubts in the back of our minds whether we could get this record done and how it was going to happen. We actually had a few attempted false starts with the record, which yielded us nothing, pretty much. Something sort of clicked at one point. We decided to have a little writing session and went out to Marti Frederiksen’s studio in California. And, boy, just right out of the box it started rolling. We wrote about eight different things there and several months later we moved into our studio in Massachusetts and just started rolling. The ideas started rolling fast and furiously. It was really a great working environment. I think if we’d had the time to stay in there, we’d have been able to do a second record! The work vibe was a lot of fun.
People talk about the healing power of music. Did the recording sessions help heal the rifts inside the band?
Oh, I would say, “Absolutely, yes.” The music definitely has that power to it. We’re all just huge fans of our band. We hadn’t been together in that setting in quite some time and everybody was in a great mood and in a very creative mood. So I think it definitely put our eye back on the ball.
All great rock bands seem to have a tension between the lead guitarist and the singer. For example, Keith Richards and Mick Jagger, Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey, Jimmy Page and Robert Plant each seem to have a friendship at the same time as they have a rivalry and competitiveness. Would you say the same is true of Joe Perry and Steven Tyler?
Yeah, for some reason that dynamic seems to be pretty standard for guys like that. I think a lot of it is they’re naturally very competitive guys but they also have the ability to work with one another and create pretty amazing volatility that goes along with those relationships. I mean, you take years and years, in some cases before they finally figure it out. It doesn’t have to be quite so difficult. Guys don’t have to live together, all they have to do is get into the studio and get on stage and do what they do best. Steve and Joe are on and off. They’re really the front guys in all these bands we’re talking about. That adds pressure, of course. It’s a tough world. You’ve got to keep your ego in check but you also don’t want to dump that.
Out of that tension comes great music.
I think that’s a huge part of it. That tension and that fire are really a big part of what that music is. So much of it is an emotional experience, whether you are listening or playing.
Did you set out with a certain type of sound in mind for this album?
We did not have a plan. We find that plans sort of corrupt our process. It’s really best just to leave it one song at a time and whatever direction it takes, it takes. That, I think, resulted in a more natural-sounding Aerosmith record. We have a wide variety of influences in this band.
How did Aerosmith hook up with Carrie Underwood?
Carrie is a friend of ours. Steven had performed a song with Carrie at the Academy of Country Music Awards so, one night, we just thought, “This might be a great song to see if we could get someone like Carrie Underwood,” which we considered a longshot at the time, because we had no idea where she was or what she was doing. So, we put the phone call in and it just so happened that we were in L.A. She was in L.A. for one more day and she said she would love to. I think they sing great together.
You reunited with producer Jack Douglas for this record. What was the impetus for that and what did he bring to the new album?
Around here we call him the sixth member of the band. Right from the very earliest days working with Jack, he seemed to have a real understanding of the band. We first met him in 1973, 1974. We were looking for producers at that time. Jack came up to Massachusetts to see us play in a high school gym and really it was the perfect place to see Aerosmith and see what we do. I think he had this understanding of who we are and what we’re trying to do. We all became instant friends and have stayed that way. So, the timing was right. We thought it could turn out great. He’s very easy to work with and he knows how to light a fire underneath us and I think he gets the best out of us musically.
Do you have any lead guitar parts on this record or just purely rhythm?
I’ve always played lead parts on all our albums. But we were never adamant about “lead player 1, lead player 2.” That was never really part of the deal.
What are your favorite guitar parts on the new album and what are your favorite tracks on it?
One of my favorite things is a solo I did on a song Tom wrote called “Tell Me.” We were working on that record one day in the studio and Jack said to me, “Why don’t you do some George Harrison sort of thing?” He gave me a mini computer and a mini stereo and locked me in a room for about two-and-a-half hours. He said, “Don’t come out until you’re done.” I went back into the studio and we tracked it and we had it. It’s a little different but I quite liked that one, quite proud of that one.
You co-wrote a song with Steven Tyler called “Street Jesus.” Tell me about that one.
That was another lick, actually, that I’d been carrying about for quite some time. For some reason, we’d never sunk our teeth into it. So, basically, it was something that we’d pretty much jam on at soundcheck and rehearsal studio. We were kind of fooling around with it in the studio and, suddenly, Steven picked up his legal pad and began scribbling away. And then he’d say, “Stop, play that again.” Sure enough, we had a new song. I’d been sitting on that one for a while, so, basically, I came up with one new part for it and the rest of it fell together. I felt it could be a real high-powered rocker. Now it’s done!
“Legendary Child” is also a 20 year old song. Why hadn’t that emerged before now?
Again, the basic lick has been around for some time but we didn’t have much more than that. We had no idea what it was going to be. Not a clue. We started to toss it around in the studio and see what we could make happen with it. It’s another one that just came together in the studio. We’ve been jamming on that one for a long time, too, but it never went much further than, “That’s cool,” and then on to the next. Sometimes you look back and think, “Why didn’t you finish this?”
Many reviewers of your current tour say that these are among the best shows Aerosmith has done. What is the current mood in the band?
We’re very excited about the new record. I think we feel like it may be some of our best work ever. We’re definitely, 40 years later, starting to improve! We’re having some great live shows and everybody’s really at the top of their game playing-wise. It makes it that much more fun to get out .