Joe Perry
Joe Perry
Anthony Joseph Pereira, better known by his stage name Joe Perry, is the lead guitarist, backing and occasional lead vocalist, and contributing songwriter for the American rock band Aerosmith. He was ranked 84th in Rolling Stone's list of The 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time. In 2001, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as part of Aerosmith, and in 2013, Perry and his songwriting partner Steven Tyler were recipients of the ASCAP Founders Award and...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionMusician
Date of Birth10 September 1950
CountryUnited States of America
Maybe you could put it out there that I don't have a built-in dislike of ballads. That was kind of the reputation I had back in the Seventies. But I've come around. Ballads have become something of an acquired taste.
We went back to the beginning of the band's career for some of these songs. We had fun knocking the dust off them but it was a little nerve-racking too, because we hadn't played some of the songs in a while. I think we've only played 'No More No More' live a total of 20 times in our entire career. We were going on muscle memory for some of these, which gave our performance an edge.
I've seen bands split up for five years and do nothing. That sounds great to me, but it just hasn't worked out that way.
I've been fascinated with all kinds of weapons my whole life, and as I have been able to afford to acquire pieces, here and there I started to collect.
I've been into guns ever since I was a little kid, and the ones that fascinate me most are the black powder guns that people used back in the 17 and 1800s.
There's something about it that still works. To draw on a sports analogy, there's a certain excitement that you get from watching that ball go in the hoop. That's still there, even though the sneakers are fancier.
Practice has gone well and I am really looking forward to Sheffield.
People spend their careers trying to figure out what makes a hit single. But I learned a long time ago that you can't anticipate what people want, because it's always going to change.
Every time I get in front of an audience, I do the best I can. I really don't look at it like, you know, 'This is gonna be this crowd, or that crowd.' If anything, I think about the demographics only because of what songs will entertain more than others.
I've always felt you are only as good as your next album or next show. What you've done is done. When you get a gold record, you hang it on the wall, and then it's like, 'Yeah, next?'
There's no doubt arena shows are exciting, but you don't get that up close and personal kind of vibe, and that's what rock n' roll is all about for me.
That's what I love about music. It's immediate. There's a connection whether you are playing at Hyde Park or Chicago, and it's been happening since the beginning of time and the troubadours.
Listening back to the tapes to make this record, it was just one of those nights. Usually when you put out a live record, you kind of cull them from a series of shows -- you get the best performance of each song and hone it down. But with that one, we just kind of let it fly.
For years I've wanted to find some guys that I could work with, because I realized a long time ago that I can do a lot of things other than Aerosmith.