The album Joe Perry thought “didn’t sound like Aerosmith”
One of the hardest things in the life cycle of a band is attempting to keep up with the times. Especially for acts that boomed to success in the 1960s and ‘70s, a time when rock and roll was not only in its prime but was new, exciting and widely popular, attempting to modernise out of their era and into the new millennium was a tricky thing. It was a hurdle that so many acts fell at, and when it comes to their first record of the 2000s, Joe Perry admits to thinking that Aerosmith at least stumbled.
Back when Aerosmith first formed and gained popularity, rock was the way. It had grown way beyond underground, countercultural spheres and into major mainstream popularity. The biggest acts in the world were rock bands, and Perry’s troupe were primed to join them. However, as time went on, good old-fashioned rock music remained, and the music world around it grew. There was punk, grunge, pop, hip hop and a whole host of other genres that all began fighting for attention. With the rise of things like MTV and entertainment media, it was no longer all about the rock star, and being a good band no longer cut it in an era of pop stars and 15-minute-famers.
The pressure was on acts to move with the times if they wanted to stay relevant. They could no longer just keep putting out rock and roll records like the last ones; they needed to deliver something new. But according to Perry, that’s where Aerosmith went wrong on this album.
When it came to making Just Push Play, the band’s 2001 album that announced their entry in a new millennium, Perry thought it was too different too soon, and not in a good way. He wanted to keep things the way that they were as he said, “I did as much as I could to keep that old vibe going, and when the four of us were together, it worked.”
But while the backbone of the band was still working like a tight ship, their leader, Steven Tyler, was off on a new path, keen to innovate and modernise away from the classic rock scene and into a new one. “Steven was working with Mark Hudson on lyrics and was spending a lot of time in LA at that point, so the vibe was different,” Perry said. The fact was that Aerosmith had now come a long way from the band they’d started out as in Boston, Massachusetts. Theirs is undeniably a success story as they’d grown into one of the biggest acts in the world. But for Perry, that had come at the cost of their original energy as Just Push Play seemed to lack their old spirit in favour of a commercial sheen.
In the eyes of the world, the album was a success. It was certified Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America within a month of its release, sold hundreds of thousands of copies and kept the band in the cultural spotlight. However, to Perry, it simply didn’t feel like their work as he said, “I don’t know; some stuff on there doesn’t sound like Aerosmith to me.”
