Aerosmith – ‘Get A Grip’ (1993) – Album Review (The Aerosmith Collection Series)

After the massive success of their previous album, ‘Pump’, the band took a little break in 1992. They started recording the next album in January & February, but stopped for some rest and didn’t return until September of that year to finish up the album. The music environment had significantly changed since 1989’s ‘Pump’ so I believe everyone was curious as to what they would do. And it turns out, they would keep doing what they do best and didn’t change a thing. When most bands faded away around this time, Aerosmith ended up flourishing even more. How did they do it?

First thing was they brought back Bruce Fairbairn as their producer as he has been creating gold with everything they had done…or should I say Platinum since the last album went 7 x’s Platinum. Second, they brought in some friends to help out such as Don Henley and Lenny Kravitz. Third, the record company wanted them to continue using outside writers to help so back was Desmond Child, Jim Vallance, Jack Blades, Tommy Shaw, Richard Supa, Mark Hudson and Taylor Rhodes. Damn, that is a lot of help!!

The line-up was still unchanged with Steven Tyler, Joe Perry, Brad Whitford, Tom Hamilton and Joey Kramer. The Boston Boys we ready to take on the world again. The album was released on April 23, 1993 and became the band’s first album to debut at #1 on the Charts. They released 7 singles on the album and selling over 7 million copies again in the U.S. It was the band’s third straight album of over 5 million in sales. If that wasn’t enough, the album won two Grammy’s for Best Rock Vocal Performance for a Duo or Group in both 1993 and 1994. The band was on fire still and the fans were eating it up.

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My Sunday Song – “Hotel California” by The Eagles

My Sunday #50 is “Hotel California” by The Eagles.  When you add on 2 special edition weekends, this is the 52nd week of My Sunday Song.  One full year!!  Each 10 weeks I have been switching up the theme, but I am enjoying going through my favorite songs so much that I will continue with this theme for a lot longer.

I had to choose a very special song to celebrate a year’s worth of My Sunday Song so I chose what just might be one of the songs ever written or ever played.  “Hotel California” is pure magic in songwriting.  Musically it can’t be beat and lyrically it conveys a mastery of storytelling.

“Hotel California” is the title track to the album of the same name.  The single was released in February 1977 and went all the way to #1 on the Billboard Hot 100.  The song also won the band a Grammy (which they did not attend because Henley didn’t believe in contests or something like that).  The song was written by Don Felder (who wrote the music), Don Henley (who wrote the lyrics) and Glenn Frey (who contributed some lyrics, but mostly helped with the outlining of the story).

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Posters, Posters, Posters

I was in the garage getting down the Christmas decorations and I came across a box that strangely said…”Posters”.  It dawned on me rather quickly that these were posters that I had when I was younger and posters from when I worked at the Sam Goody Music Stores.

I couldn’t get the box down fast enough to see what was in there.  I was surprised at how many I still had after 25-30 years and what great shape they were still in.  There were a few slight rips or tears and maybe a little discoloration, but all-in-all I thought they were in great condition.

We will start with those from my personal collection that actually hung on my walls when I lived at home in my parents house around 25+ years ago.  First, you will notice the crystal looking candlesticks holding down the posters.  They have been rolled up for quite some time and wouldn’t stay open, so I had to have some help.

If you know me, then you know I had to have either Def Leppard or Kiss on my wall. Actually, I had both.  The Def Leppard posters were from High & Dry and Pyromania era live shows.

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