The boys are at it again. Not unlike their late ’70s cocaine-fueled feuds, Aerosmith lead singer Steven Tyler and guitarist Joe Perry are once again talking some serious trash about each other and threatening to break up the band. Let’s hope the threat is real — Aerosmith, to borrow one of its album titles, needs to take a “Permanent Vacation” and make it stick.
Sorry AeroForceOne fans, but the Aerosmith that re-emerged on the musical scene in 1987 has done nothing but destroy the reputation of the iconic classic rock band of the 1970s that went by the same name. Admit it.
The heights to which Aerosmith have soared commercially in the last 20-plus years has been matched only by the depths it has plummeted to creatively. “Janie’s Got a Gun” is one of the band’s biggest hits, but it’s got nothing on “Toys in the Attic.” When you listen to earlier albums like “Rocks” and “Get Your Wings” and follow it up with recent efforts like “Get a Grip” and “Just Push Play,” it makes you wish the band would start doing some serious drugs again.
Let’s face it, sonically and lyrically, Aerosmith was always much better high than sober. Just download “I Ain’t Got You” and “Mother Popcorn” (a cover of the James Brown classic) from the Aerosmith album “Live Bootleg” and mourn all the promise this once-great band squandered. Those two little-heard songs, seemingly recorded in a Boston bar half-filled with drunken patrons during its earliest days, showcase Tyler and Perry at their finest.
Steven! Joe! You guys were supposed to be America’s Rolling Stones.
All the components were there. Booze- and barbiturate-infused blues band? Check. Crunchy, monster guitar riffs? Check. Deep bass and percussion grooves? Check, check.
Hell, Tyler even gives Mick Jagger a decent run for his money as the man with the largest lips in music.
And Aerosmith did indeed become the Rolling Stones, just not the version music fans had hoped. Today’s Aerosmith and today’s Rolling Stones have more in common than their original incarnations. Both are musically boring — when Tyler sings a scat version of the national anthem, you know he’s flat out of ideas. Both put out new albums simply so they can go on tour and make millions of dollars from fans desperate to hear the old ones.
What we’re trying to say here is that you guys have all stuck around for far too long.
Which gives us more reason to hope that yesterday’s rumors of a breakup actually stick.
The latest dust-up was provoked when Tyler told Classic Rock magazine that his next project was “definitely going to be something Steven Tyler, working on the brand of myself — Brand Tyler.”
This after the trout-pouted lyricist injured himself crashing off the stage during a concert in Abu Dhabi, forcing Aerosmith to cancel the rest of its tour and, evidently, straining relations among the band’s members.
Perry responded by unleashing a tirade in response to Tyler’s comments in media outlets ranging from the Las Vegas Sun to People.com to Aero-smith’s own Web site. Perry said, among other things, that Tyler hung up on him the last time he called, that the singer hasn’t been giving 100 percent “for a long time,” and that as far as he can tell Tyler quit the band.
Perry even goes so far as to suggest that Aerosmith may continue with another singer.
Don’t do it, Perry. This idea isn’t just bad — it’s phenomenally awful. The only thing worse than Aerosmith with Tyler is Aerosmith without Tyler.