Joe Perry - Joe Perry

Genre rock Publisher Roman/Columbia External Links Official Website Columbia Records

Several tracks on Joe Perry's new solo album get off to a such a blazing start, it's enough to think that the aging Aerosmith guitarist has recaptured the magic his band has been missing for so long. Perry's blues rock riffs and solo licks cook throughout the album, leading you to believe that this record has the potential to obliterate the bloated, power ballad-ridden exercises in cheeseball hard rock heard on every Aerosmith album since 1992. With no Diane Warren-penned schlock, bombastic Glenn Ballard production, or the tiresome preening of Steven Tyler (who just seems to be getting worse the older he gets) getting in the way, Joe Perry could have reminded us all what made the sober Aerosmith of 1987-90 so likeable. Instead, Mr. Perry had to go and open his darn mouth.

Although this is Perry's first solo album since 1984, he has proven to be a first-rate rock songwriter on his own in the past (his 1980 song "Let the Music Do the Talking" was even good enough for a reunited Aerosmith to cover on 1986's Done With Mirrors), but there's a reason why the Joe Perry Project worked so well 25 years ago: Perry had let someone else handle most of the lead vocals. Simply put, the man's a terrible singer, and the more the new record goes on, the more unbearable it becomes, sounding like bad karaoke. It's a shame, too, because such blooze-infused rock 'n roll numbers as "Hold on Me," "Lonely," "Talk Talkin'," "Vigilante Man," and "Dying to be Free" could have really worked had they been sung by a vocalist who actually possesses some flair. Instead, Perry sings in a flat monotone so lifeless, and to such a distracting degree, that it completely destroys the mood of the CD. If that weren't enough, Perry's ambition gets the best of him on several especially weak tracks, namely the flaccid Alice in Chains knock-off "Pray For Me," and the abysmal cover of The Doors' "Crystal Ship," in which Perry's by-the-book reading manages to show how much charisma Jim Morrison put into the original recording.

Aerosmith's "Toxic Twins" have always been compared to Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, but while Richards has always been able to serve as a gritty vocal foil to Jagger's over the top singing, Perry is much better off being the silent, ace lead guitarist, and nothing more. It took a real dog of an album like this one to hammer that fact home.