'Buried Alive'

I can’t even count the number of times I’ve posted up some Aerosmith and tried to qualify the post by saying something like, “Well, back when they were good...”

Despite all qualifications, I happened recently to run up on some newer Aerosmith that’s pretty good. So I think I’ve found the problem: They need to cut out the shit in the studio. I found a couple of disks of demos and damned if even the crap songs from the later albums sound decent when they’re unadorned by studio fluffery. Prime example: “Living on the Edge,” which was, in my opinion, a typical late model, Aerosmith pop song. The demo shows the song stripped down and raw, before Bruce Fairburn glossed it up and turned it into mainstream mediocrity.

This collection, which was probably assembled by a fan, is titled Divers Aerosmith. I don’t know if that’s meant to be “Diver’s” or “Diverse.” Regardless, the original set had 32 songs, some of which had been released commercially, some of which had poor sound quality, and some of which just sucked (i.e. an orchestral version of “Crazy”). I trimmed the fat and ended up with 11 songs that I think are pretty quality. With the exception of “Mama Kin” and “Walk This Way,” everything comes from Permanent Vacation or newer. And, to the best of my knowledge, nothing here has been commercially released.

Bottom line: Here’s yet another Aerosmith post. You know we're all still fans.

Buried Alive.mp3 ~ Pump outtake
Crazy.mp3 ~ acoustic version
Guilty Kilt.mp3
Hollywood.mp3 ~ Permanent Vacation demo
Line Up.mp3 ~ smoky bar mix
Livin’ on the Edge.mp3 ~ Get A Grip demo
Mama Kin.mp3 ~ live, with Guns ‘n’ Roses
Once is Enough.mp3 ~ Permanent Vacation demo
Samurai.mp3 Permanent Vacation demo
Sedona Sunrise.mp3 ~ Pump demo
Walk This Way.mp3 ~ live, with Bon Jovi

Labels: Aerosmith, classic rock, demos, live music, outtakes

posted by aikin @ 7:00 AM