Aerosmith – A Little South Of Sanity

Here’s another installment in the IOU Series. This one’s for Mike Lebrain… 

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I found this 2CD at work, and texted Mike about it, asking if he thought I needed it. He replied emphatically that no, I most certainly did not need this. Apparently, they used backing tapes for these performances, or something? My memory is fuzzy on the exact I’m sure he’ll comment to let us all know! Mike?

Anyway, the news was I did not require this set in my collection.

Of course, I bought it anyway.

I’m such a rebel.

Recorded live during the Get A Grip and Nine Lives tours (though it’s not listed where the tracks were played, but who cares?), it’s also (apparently) the only live Aero album to capture tracks from all three decades (to that point) of their career.

I dunno what the issue is, honestly. To my ears, this is a pretty decent set of live tracks, covering a lot of their biggest hits and some oldies too. I’ve never seen them live (oversiiiiiight!), but this is how I’d imagine they’d sound if I ever did get the chance. It sounds big, slightly messy as it gets sweaty rocking out, but it’s never too sloppy. In fact, most of it has the sound of a thirty-year band nailing it down.

I dug around for about two seconds for other reviews of this, as it filled my ears through the good heapdphones and found some naysayers. They claim the crowd noise is mixed too loud into it, at points. Others say the production is bad, sounding synthetic and flat. One said they saw them live around this time and the band was just going through the motions, not soul in it. Some were even mad that they got an edited version, which cuts out Tyler’s potty mouth.

I couldn’t find anywhere that mentioned backing tapes, though I didn’t try all that hard.

But for all that I also saw way more positive reviews, saying that the band plays the hell out of the tracks, that the solos are great (even perfect to the album versions), and that this set captures the atmosphere of being there.

Damn, that took longer for me to type out those other reviewers’ comments than it did for me to scan-read them…

I’d love to hear what you folks think about this one. Is it Aero-Great? Aero-Decent? Aero-Meh? Or Aero-Suck?

Myself, I’d vote for Aero-Decent with moments of Aero-Great.

The Tracks: