Friday, January 16, 2009

Aerosmith-Toys in the Attic

Post #50 [Poll winner: Favorite Aerosmith album of the 70's]
For Aerosmith, the "Toys In The Attic" album, released in 1975, defined the band for the 70's. To this day it is often regarded as their best album. This album features 2 of the band's biggest hits of all time: "Sweet Emotion" and "Walk This Way". However, anyone who's heard this album in its entirety knows there's a great deal more where those two came from.

There are quite a few good stories behind this album and its songs too. If you read Aerosmith's biography "Walk This Way" you'll see what I mean. Here are a couple of my favorite details: the title of the song "Walk This Way" was inspired from a classic scene in the comedic movie "Young Frankenstein" where Igor says "Walk this way..." and the other characters proceed to follow him... hunching their backs to walk like he does. Also, the original lyrics for "Walk This Way" were forgotten in a taxi cab by vocalist Steven Tyler on the day he went to the studio to record the song. The intriquing fact is that the version of the song we all know is composed of the lyrics he improvised in the studio that day.

"Toys in the Attic" truly represents Aerosmith at their best in the 70's. As a creative team, this album was their most balanced effort from that era, with Tom Hamilton (bass) making significant writing contributions on several songs- including "Sweet Emotion" & "Walk This Way". Now, I encourage you to go out & listen to this album anew, and rediscover Aerosmith's best effort from the 70's.

For a little direction, I recommend the following songs:
-Toys in the Attic
-Uncle Salty
-No More No More
-Sweet Emotion

1 comment:

Wild Woman said...

No More No More was one of my favorites on that album. I still have the vinyl and it is very worn. I played it daily for a year. Love love this album. On my top ten list of all time favorite albums.