My 1975 summer was spent with the Rolling Stones. When I think of Summer 1976, I think mostly of Aerosmith. Draw your own conclusions.

I kept returning to Aerosmith probably because, as always, they don't do anything wrong. I think they were the only band whose concert I could bear to sit through more than once during this anti-climactic summer.

NEW ORLEANS: It's four in the afternoon and Steve Tyler is awake. He leans over his balcony and shouts to me (I'm at the pool) to come on up. I wanted to dry my hair first, but as I figured it's not too often that Tyler is in such a mood, I go. Julia orders Dom Perignon on the phone; "Wait a minute," Steven says to his lady, "What year do they have?"

Later, Elissa Perry calls. "Do you want to talk to Joe now?" What? This cooperation from Aerosmith, the band with that arrogant reputation?

"Well, I'm not really arrogant," Joe says, "but of course I am moody. It's just that it never really mattered to us what the reviews said, or what the press said about us. Like there was this chick from a paper with 10 million circulation or something like that in England, and she was a schmuck, so goodbye, I just don't care. And that's the way it's always been.

"I guess we've learned not to care that much about the press because of the way those papers treated us in Boston, like we were just some bar band . . . You know, one of the things that probably killed The Dolls was that they had so much press. And you start reading all that . . . I don't know, we were just the total opposite."

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David Johansen and Cyrinda Foxe arrive; Joe's eyes light up. David's in town, playing at a club called Cord's, and of course, Joe wants to jam with him later. We eventually arrive at Cord's, and Cyrinda—who is from the South—has all her Scarlett O'Hara instincts out in full force; she's welcoming people to the club like it's a plantation barbecue.

It couldn't be more obvious that Tyler and Perry are in the club; the David Bowie impersonation at the next table attempts to be cool, but the owners keep bringing Moet et Chandon champagne and real glasses full of margaritas for us to drink. (The next night, it was plastic cups and Great Western . . .) The tension rises as everyone expects Joe to jam. ("You mean he brought his guitar with him?" asks Steven, seemingly surprised. Ultimately Tyler gets onstage as well, and they all join in one long blues jam. "I just love a blues jam," says Cyrinda.)

It was one of those New Orleans nights when everyone sits on a balcony and drinks too much. What is left of the next day is devoted to The Concert. The outdoor stadium is filled to capacity, and there is much talk backstage about a girl who is "better than Deep Throat." Steven is in the dressing room, posing in front of the mirror, partly for Elissa's camera, partly out of habit.

Elissa's worried she'll run out of film; "Buy another roll," Tyler advises her. "Your husband's rich."

Then: "I don't wanna go onstage," he pouts. "I wanna have fun!" What? Isn't it fun onstage? "Well . . . you feel good when you go out there, but you're so alone . . . even with all those people . . ." Aha, Lonely At The Top ...

I like Aerosmith onstage; I don't get bored. But apparently they sometimes do, especially during "Dream On." Joe winces whenever he hears it on a jukebox, and Elissa tells me, "This is my 'bathroom song,"' as she leaves the stage. I like it, I say. "Give me a break," she says. It paid for your house, I say. "You talkin' to me??," she asks.

(Aerosmitn do this thing after the show; it's called Locking Themselves In The Trailer and Not Letting Any Girls In. This intrigued me, so after the fourth time I traveled with them, I asked and was told that Joey Kramer walks around with no clothes on after the show. Well, that was good enough reason for me . . .)

Previously, mention had been made of "meetings" in the dressing room after a show, which I think mainly were excuses for Steven to yell, usually about how he can't hear the monitors. How was your meeting after the show tonight, I ask. "Great," Tyler replied. "We got our fifty dollars tax free."

Joe adds, straightfaced, "I was really fulfilled tonight, It was really an exciting show."

"Well, you know, we always had a bit of a game plan," Steven tells me, "but we didn't think this would happen. I mean, we did the clubs, blah-blahblah, and then we wanted to do a lot of concerts, but you never really think it's gonna turn out like this fucking mess. It's so big, and as big as it gets, the problems get just as big, and it's all one hair pull after another.

"But basically, I can't complain. I don't think that all these things would arise . . . You couldn't possibly be prepared for every little thing that has happened, not unless you experienced it. You just couldn't know . . . you had to be there.

"Of course I love all the shouting. I'm not saying I hate it. I love it; by no means do I hate it. I just don't let them get too close . . . They grab my scarves . . ."

"We're not really 'commercial,'" Joe says. "'Commercial' is the name you put on somebody who draws as many people as we do. It*s just that we play a certain kind of music that we like, and we're satisfying ourselves, and there must be a lot of kids out there who are like us. It's all sort of just coming through us, all the energy, and that's why so many people are picking up on it. That must be it.

"I don't know, it all depends on your ego, too. I mean if you actually think that you're doing something brand new, and there's never been anything like you before . . . that's ridiculous. I just like to play because I like the way it feels. I like that kind of music."

In Milwaukee Lori Whitford and Elissa Perry were arrested for jaywalking. As they were being taken away to the police station, Elissa insisted on making a phone call. The request was denied, and she was outraged. "I know my rights!! I watch Adam-12!!"

CHICAGO: Aerosmith occasionally stay in these real plastic, airport hotels. They decided to leave the Ambassador East because there was no room service ("Can you imagine?? No room service??") and they were freaking out. So, once again, it was something close to the airport. Their fabulous road manager Kelly may not choreograph speedy backstage getaways a la the Stones or Zep, but when it comes to getting out of town . . .

It's the usual rock 'n' roll hotel. No matter how hard they try, there is always the feeling that someone had a water fight there the night before and the orange shag carpet is never quite dry.

"I don't wanna go onstage," Steven Tyler pouts. "I wanna have fun!"

I got to Comiskey Park just in time to see Rick Derringer's ass hanging out of his "good luck jeans." Jeff Beck began to play and Steven, Joe, Brad, Tom and Joey watch from the side of the stage with pleasure. At this point, smoke starts to pour out of the upper bleachers, and huge flames are visible. Thousands of people flee the stadium, and it looked as if the city of Chicago would have its way and forever ban outdoor rock concerts. Beck continued playing, but Aerosmith was quickly hustled out of the place and into safe trailers by concerned roadies. After what seemed like a longer time than it should have taken, the fire department showed up, put out the fire, and "normalcy" resumed.

Manager David Krebs and Kelly made sure that Aerosmith got onstage before the cops could call off the concert. Elissa Perry is ecstatic that Jeff Beck promised her his Yardbirds Tshirt. Joey Kramer is wearing a pink leotard. One fan wears an "Aerosmith Kicks Ass" T-shirt, another one reads, "Sweathog."

The show is the usual success complete with Tyler's rag-laden microphone gymnastics, Joe Perry's cool/ blase/lead guitarist manner, and it seems as though Brad and Tom are more center stage than I'd remembered.

That night photog Leee Black Childers hosts a Photo-Approval (this is a new ritual for successful bands) and birthday party. The whole band is there and their concept of when they look best doesn't always coincide with that of the press present. (Which consisted of photog Leee Black Childers and this observer.)

It was revealing in a way: Tyler knows exactly how he should look, gets mad only if there's too much dental work showing. Joey Kramer seems Cynical, Brad indifferent, Tom couldn't be more pleasant and Joe Perry (who hardly ever takes a bad picture but whose hair gets in the way of a great face) is adamant about what he does, or does not like.

SOUTH BEND, INDIANA: Driving by a lake, Tom says, "I wish I could go fishing." He swears that his hair color is natural. Steven has brought along all kinds of sugar for the ride (and this from a hypoglycemic??), cookies, chocolate, and Oui magazine. Arriving in South Bend, I ask what one does there. "Run track, play football, pick corn, and get out," answers Tyler.

"Dirt is their main crop," adds Elissa.

There is a lot of joking about trying to find the actual Main street, and comments about Knute Rockne Boulevard. We go to eat and the waitress seems surprised when I ask if anything is fresh. It is then that I learn a phrase I will continue to hear all over America: "Fresh frozen" as in, "All our food is fresh frozen," she says, proudly.,

Backstage: "Time to punch the clock," says Elissa Perry as the band runs onstage.

(A word here about "band wives." Despite what you may have heard, it gets lonely on the road. So there's usually at least one who always goes along. Most of the ladies you'd really want to know who are attached to musicians know enough to stay home, but Elissa Perry is a rare exception. Her sense of humor strongly added to my enjoyment of Aerosmith road life this summer. I kept thinking that I should interview her. She continually cracks me up. Elissa discussing Gene Simmons: "The first time I ever saw him I looked at those boots and said, 'Hey, you expecting a flood??' He said, 'Very funny . . . these boots made me my money.'")

"What do I want to do next?" says Steven Tyler. "I'm looking forward to playing Yankee Stadium. Kel,sare we playing Yankee Stadium? No? Well, I'm looking forward to playing Yankee Stadium someday.

"I want to hang-glide," he says. "I want to get up in a balloon and go to Oz. Last week we played a show and this guy was doing a political thing and he had a balloon he was going up in. I looked in it... it was like a whole world in there ... a basket. . . It's something I've always wanted to do. I'm serious."

As for success: "I don't know about the rest of the band; I'm flabbergasted sometimes. And sometimes, I don't know ... I feel like I could take it or leave it."

Lest this sound too serious: "I'm getting a watch, although I'm not too much on time. I even take a ruler to bed with me." (Okay Steven, why do you take a ruler to bed with you?) "To see how long I sleep."

SAN FRANCISCO: The Rolling Stone Cover Aftermath: Steven is wearing the usual silver cross and gold razor around his neck. We take off for the Cow Palace and The Inevitable Subject arises. There was no way you could have been anywhere within miles of this band this summer (indeed, the entire music industry) and not have heard something of the Story of The Cover. It was as much a part of Aerosmith's summer tour as was any show, and phone lines were buzzing for weeks.

Essentially what happened was that a photographer came to shoot the band; they expected one thing, she another. It was explained "how difficult it was to get all of the band looking good in one ishot," promises, threats, (excuses and more were bandied about. CBS execs were dragged in . . . all over The Problem of The Cover. Let's just say that when all the shouting was over, Aerosmith was not smiling about The Cover.

I tried to tell Steven that hundreds of years from now THAT photo (which someone said looked like Karl Malden) will say more about rock 'n' roll road life than all the adorable ones put together, but he's not buying it. "I wish you'd say something about that episode," he says with anger. "I mean aside from the goddamn photographs, that story . . . he took quotes from other stories. I mean, what band was that supposed to be about???"

"Well, I'm not really arrogant," Joe Perry says, "but it never really mattered to us what the reviews said, or what the press thought of us."

Joey Kramer, at the Cow Palace, was wearing an astounding outfit. Black T-shirt, suspenders, cutoff jeans (at the knees), short sox, blue and white sneakers. The fans love it as he tosses dozens of drumsticks into the audience during his drum solo. As the band goes offstage for a brief rest, I amuse them with my stories of other bands who have been known to return to the hotel during the drum solo . . .

After the show Joe laughed, "Everytime I fuck up onstage someone throws something at me these days. Maybe it's a coincidence, but when it happens I feel like goin', 'Yeah, you're right.'"

It's very late and Joe is talking in his hotel room. "So Brad and Tom are farther up front than you remembered . . . Gee," he says cynically, "You mean it's not like Bill Wyman, they're not standing far back enough?? Well, good, they're getting off on it."

Then, talking about Jeff Beck (a favorite subject) he says, "You know, money really changes things. Sure I liked buying things. I got into it. But you can't let it determine the music you play. That's why I think Jeff is so great. He always does whatever he wants onstage.

"The Dolls . . . man, they were so great. With their image and the way we play we could have sunk a continent. Steven is the eternal teenager. When he's forty-five he'll want to pull a chick in the first row ..."

"I don't have the same responsibilities as a lead singer does. I'm a guitarist and I could walk into any room with a band in it and pick out the lead guitarist. . . But I feel that I'm fronting my own band, this is the band I want."

Joe and Elissa calL me from Jhe Beverly Hilton to tell me, a) that "there are eight prints on the walls" and b) Jeff Beck jammed with Joe onstage at Anaheim. "History was made!" Elissa said excitedly into the phone. "It's the first time Jeff has jammed with an American band, they played on 'Train' and 'You Ain't Got Me,' I taped it, and Joe was even smiling onstage."

POSTSCRIPT: The Beverly Hills Hotel, September: Steven and Julia and Joe and Elissa decide at the very last minute that they will attend Don Kirshner's Rock Awards TV show where Aerosmith has been nominated for "Best New Group" (they've been together five years).

They leave immediately after losing to Hall and Oates ("Hall and Oates?? It sounds like a cereal," from Elissa. "I guess we should have been 'good sports' and stayed, but it was sooooo boring," she added. "The best thing was watching Jeff Beck's band during Rod Stewart's number . . .")

When I left them, Joe was waiting to get together with Beck to hear some tapes, and I heard that Steven Tyler was on his way to Malibu to party with . . . Mick Jagger.

Aerosmith, Summer of 1976.

You had to be there.