Post by valerie davenport on Sept 11, 2007 12:21:31 GMT -5
from Helen 
thank you Helen you are great Valxx
________________________________________
Aerosmith still has the power
September 6, 2007
By DAN PEARSON Contributor
Nearly 37 years after Aerosmith played it's first chord in Boston, the mega-star band is still going strong with Steven Tyler on lead vocals, Joe Perry on lead guitar, Brad Whitford on rhythm guitar, Tom Hamilton on bass and Joey Kramer on drums.
Inducted into the Rock & Rock Hall of Fame in 2001, the band has sold more than 100 million albums and hit big with songs like 'Walk This Way," "Dude (Looks Like A Lady)" and "I Don't Want To Miss A Thang."
In a recent phone interview Hamilton, 55, admitted he's amazed at the group's longevity.
"I mean, there is a big part of me that doesn't question it because I don't want to think about it too much. I just want it to be what it is. But we are all aware how long we have been doing this," he said. "The excitement of knowing there are still people out there that we have never played for, that really want to hear us play, or when they say come to Moscow, come to India, you have a lot of fans there, it's a fantastic feeling."
Beating cancer
That feeling is a major improvement for Hamilton. Last year he missed the band's tour when he was diagnosed with throat cancer. "A year ago this time I had just finished my seventh week of chemo and radiation and I felt pretty horrible. I was looking forward to coming out of it, I was just not aware that they were still hurdles to get over," he recalled.
Hamilton said that "Sick as A Dog," one of the songs he co-wrote for the 1976 album "Rocks," never came to mind during that challenging experience. "Oh my god, that is really funny. Thanks for pointing that out," he said.
Fans will be glad to here he's been cancer-free since last December.
Hamilton credits drummer Joey Kramer with coming up with the name for the band back in 1970 in Boston.
"We said, like, isn't that one of those books that make you read in English class? He said, 'No wait, you guys, not A-r-r-o-w-smith, A-e-r-o-smith' and that made a huge difference. It doesn't really mean anything, yet it seems to imply stuff and have a good rhythm to the syllables."
To test out the potential of the name, they decided to do their own market research by giving packages of rolling papers stamped with the band's name on them to random hitchhikers they picked up in Boston. "They would say it was pretty cool. So we landed on that name and it stuck," said Hamilton.
About the same time, after their first few gigs, the band jelled.
"We noticed when the audience went nuts when we played certain songs. People used to dance to rock and we played a lot of gigs that were college mixers and parties when people would be getting drunk and dancing," he said. "It was really rewarding for us to watch that."
Known as "the bad boys of Boston," the group's reputation for partying nearly destroyed Aerosmith in late 1970s. Some original members left, but returned in 1984 with reform in mind.
Party's over
"We had gotten to a point when getting high was an important priority in our lives that it crowded out the priority of really getting our (stuff) together musically," said Hamilton. "And not only musically, but in the way we related to each other and got things done."
Once that was accomplished, the temptation died. "It wasn't like, 'Oh my god, I feel weak and I want to do it,'" said Hamilton of their former drug-taking. "It was more like, 'That's kind of cute,' but we have seen the power of what we can do when we are organized, when we are not burned out and hung over.
"We like communicating the fact that we really feel the spirit of what we are doing. A lot of the reasons we are doing it now are the same reasons we wanted to do it when we were teenagers."
Having learned to appreciate their own talent, the band has become more assured and successful than ever. So with their heads now in the right places, one might ask which was a bigger thrill: Being inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame or being featured on "The Simpsons?" (They've accomplished both in recent years.)
"Oh boy," said Hamilton, "I would say 'The Simpsons.' We might have known when we started this band that someday there would be something called the 'Rock & Rock Hall of Fame.' But if you had come to us in 1970 and said someday you are going to be on this really cool cartoon show, we would have said, 'No, you're crazy.'"
thank you Helen you are great Valxx________________________________________
Aerosmith still has the power
September 6, 2007
By DAN PEARSON Contributor
Nearly 37 years after Aerosmith played it's first chord in Boston, the mega-star band is still going strong with Steven Tyler on lead vocals, Joe Perry on lead guitar, Brad Whitford on rhythm guitar, Tom Hamilton on bass and Joey Kramer on drums.
Inducted into the Rock & Rock Hall of Fame in 2001, the band has sold more than 100 million albums and hit big with songs like 'Walk This Way," "Dude (Looks Like A Lady)" and "I Don't Want To Miss A Thang."
In a recent phone interview Hamilton, 55, admitted he's amazed at the group's longevity.
"I mean, there is a big part of me that doesn't question it because I don't want to think about it too much. I just want it to be what it is. But we are all aware how long we have been doing this," he said. "The excitement of knowing there are still people out there that we have never played for, that really want to hear us play, or when they say come to Moscow, come to India, you have a lot of fans there, it's a fantastic feeling."
Beating cancer
That feeling is a major improvement for Hamilton. Last year he missed the band's tour when he was diagnosed with throat cancer. "A year ago this time I had just finished my seventh week of chemo and radiation and I felt pretty horrible. I was looking forward to coming out of it, I was just not aware that they were still hurdles to get over," he recalled.
Hamilton said that "Sick as A Dog," one of the songs he co-wrote for the 1976 album "Rocks," never came to mind during that challenging experience. "Oh my god, that is really funny. Thanks for pointing that out," he said.
Fans will be glad to here he's been cancer-free since last December.
Hamilton credits drummer Joey Kramer with coming up with the name for the band back in 1970 in Boston.
"We said, like, isn't that one of those books that make you read in English class? He said, 'No wait, you guys, not A-r-r-o-w-smith, A-e-r-o-smith' and that made a huge difference. It doesn't really mean anything, yet it seems to imply stuff and have a good rhythm to the syllables."
To test out the potential of the name, they decided to do their own market research by giving packages of rolling papers stamped with the band's name on them to random hitchhikers they picked up in Boston. "They would say it was pretty cool. So we landed on that name and it stuck," said Hamilton.
About the same time, after their first few gigs, the band jelled.
"We noticed when the audience went nuts when we played certain songs. People used to dance to rock and we played a lot of gigs that were college mixers and parties when people would be getting drunk and dancing," he said. "It was really rewarding for us to watch that."
Known as "the bad boys of Boston," the group's reputation for partying nearly destroyed Aerosmith in late 1970s. Some original members left, but returned in 1984 with reform in mind.
Party's over
"We had gotten to a point when getting high was an important priority in our lives that it crowded out the priority of really getting our (stuff) together musically," said Hamilton. "And not only musically, but in the way we related to each other and got things done."
Once that was accomplished, the temptation died. "It wasn't like, 'Oh my god, I feel weak and I want to do it,'" said Hamilton of their former drug-taking. "It was more like, 'That's kind of cute,' but we have seen the power of what we can do when we are organized, when we are not burned out and hung over.
"We like communicating the fact that we really feel the spirit of what we are doing. A lot of the reasons we are doing it now are the same reasons we wanted to do it when we were teenagers."
Having learned to appreciate their own talent, the band has become more assured and successful than ever. So with their heads now in the right places, one might ask which was a bigger thrill: Being inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame or being featured on "The Simpsons?" (They've accomplished both in recent years.)
"Oh boy," said Hamilton, "I would say 'The Simpsons.' We might have known when we started this band that someday there would be something called the 'Rock & Rock Hall of Fame.' But if you had come to us in 1970 and said someday you are going to be on this really cool cartoon show, we would have said, 'No, you're crazy.'"
