December 1973, Hollywood, California – Back in 1973, before he was Joe “Fucking” Perry, the Aerosmith guitarist was just another kid in a hard rock band from Boston. Thirty-five years ago, he hadn’t racked up album sales in excess of 150 million or been immortalized in a video game. He was neither one-fifth of the Bad Boys from Boston nor one-half of the Toxic Twins. And he was still at least 10,000 broken strings away from becoming one of the coolest and most copied guitar players of all time.

But you could have never told Joe Perry that. From the moment Aerosmith were formed in 1971, the guitarist had a vision, and the balls and chops to back it up. In his head, the gold records were already mounted on his walls – right next to all of the framed guitar mag cover stories. The concept of Guitar Hero may have escaped him, but it certainly wouldn’t have surprised him.

Aerosmith were stars just waiting to happen.

That blind faith, however, was sorely tested at the beginning of ’73. Columbia Records had released Aerosmith, their eponymous debut, but it had barely broken into the Billboard Top 200. “Dream On,” their first single, had stalled at number 59 on the Pop Singles charts.

It was a bad year for a baby rock band trying to make its bones. (more…)