During a conversation with Haute Living, Aerosmith vocalist Steven Tyler looked back on the band’s early days, recalling how he met guitarist Joe Perry and some of the financial issues they had with the management.
The musician said:
“Imagine that your biggest dream is that you wanted to be signed to a label.
“It was our only dream. However, our managers f*cking lied to us. They had a deal with the label, and we weren’t signed to a label. But that didn’t stop us.
“Or imagine, for instance, finding out that one of your albums sold 22 million copies – remember back then they were CDs? And CDs sold for $19 a piece, and so what’s $19 times 22 million? Roughly $418 million.
“Then, what’s thrown at you is that the band has to pay for a thing called packaging and soft goods. So now… the band wants to know, ‘What’s that?’ Only one person asked that question – it was moi.
“I found out from my A&R man. And what did we make on that album? I won’t even tell you because I don’t want to get in a lawsuit.
“That was the second coming of Aerosmith. Between our management and our money people, we did not get what we deserved, and those two things are what I will tell you.
“How did I survive in the music business? By being in a band that sat together in New Hampshire, New England in the 1970s that had a dream.”