How do the boys from beantown follow up their masterwork?
Aerosmith – Get a Grip -1993 (buy it)
Livejudging Get a Grip:
1. Intro: Great. Nod your hat at the very tune that got you here. Nice.
2. Eat the Rich:Oh, back to the big-ass riffage that you were known for in the first place. Why does Perry sound so good? B+
3. Get a Grip: Did I need that belch? I don’t think so. Infectious, but ultimately boring big blues rock.B-
4. Fever: Like Elvis on steroids. Or Horton Heat Lite. Put the top down, find a piece of traffic-free, open road and crank it. A
5. Livin on the Edge: This song gets extra points for being co-written by Mark Hudson, one of the Hudson Brothers from that cheeky Saturday Morning variety show. (And he’s Kate Hudson’s uncle!) It also helps that it’s a pretty good anthemic rock tune. B+
6. Flesh: The first real turkey the band has churned out in years. It’s just a wannabe sex-driven, almost Reznor influenced, one-eye-on-the-charts one trick pony that wears out its welcome before the second chorus. C-
7. Walk on Down: What’s this? This doesn’t sound like Steve—oh. It’s a Perry track. No doubt he’s taking the vocals. He has that laconic semi-ability to sing where he sounds like a lazy power pop rocker or Kiss on a bad day. If this is what The Joe Perry Project sounded like, I’m glad I never heard it.Pass. C
8. Shut Up and Dance: This is a weird and really poor track. Why weird? Because it’s co-written by Tommy Shaw and Jack Blades, the guys from Damn Yankees (And Styx and Night Ranger….) Why is that weird? Because it is the furthest thing from a rock song that I’ve heard in a while. It’s just a melange of competing riffs and licks and it’s muddled and ugly and it’s these ROCKERS calling for us to dance. Um….no. D
9. Cryin’: God bless the big, rustic, farm-tinged, anthem rock ballad. Does it work? Sure. Why not. I almost wish it was bigger. Or I was at the prom. Or dating a young Alicia Silverstone. A
10. Gotta Love It: The Hudson Brother’s back but this time everyone was too busy asking him what Goldie Hawn was really like to realize that they hadn’t really written a song. “She was my SISTER IN LAW, you idiots!” He could be heard shouting but, by the time the day was done, there was nothing but a future jingle for Cold Stone Creamery and a lot of hurt feelings. C-
Man this album is long……..
11. Crazy: When in doubt, mine the territory of so many country-western amblers and toss in a little retro-50’s talkin’ to your “girl”. I always thought this was the weakest of that trilogy, but it did have a couple things going for it: Liv and Alicia, acting all lipstick lesbiany. There’s just something so wrong with Steve singing a love song over images of his daughter writhing in her underwear on a stripper pole. Not as bad as his singing a love song over images of Ben Affleck mounting his daughter, but pretty damned close. This piece of junk won a Grammy……blech. C
12. Line Up: Lenny Kravitz gets in on the action with a songwriting credit on this one. Line Up kind of sounds like the theme song to a wacky comedy from the 70s starring Richard Pryor and Gene Wilder and is ABSOLUTELY the kind of song you would expect to hear the Brady Family sing in their Variety Show amidst the ice skating distractions. Oh, wait, is this song still on? Blah. C-
13. Can’t Stop Messin’: My version of this album has this Japanese B-side right there at lucky number 13. Also co-written by the Damn Yankees boys it kind of makes you understand why that band couldn’t go any further than “High Enough”. This tune sounds like the kind of drivel Brian May would foist on the band toward the end (Anyone remember Headlong?). Completely unmemorable. C
14. Epic Rock Tune 3, otherwise known as Amazing: Actually, of those three, Celine Dion/Dianne Warren-esque anthems, Amazing is the best. Sounding a bit like Wings with a taste of Jon Brion (who I like to believe they copped from retroactively), this is the song that probably sounds the most like the band is pandering. As it could be Dream On, or Sweet Emotion, or any other Tyler screeching ballad. But where those were heartfelt and dynamic, the later ballads just seem to be begging 15 year old girls to buy into the desperate pleas for emotional validation and, thereby, the records. This from the guys who wrote Cheese Cake. A
15. Boogie Man: Pointlessly useless instrumental closing track. A tedious part of the repertoire by now. D
Sadly, Get a Grip is a real step back for the band whose second act is notoriously brilliant. A hodgepodge at best. A letdown in every way.
Yet it sold a bajilion copies.
Oh well.
Grade C
A Side: Cryin’, Amazing, Livin on the Edge
Blind Side: Fever, Eat the Rich,
Down Side: Shut up and Dance, Boogie Man, Walk on Down & Gotta Love It.
