November 28th, 2012 | 5:19 pm by Zara Golden (@lindseyweber)

Steven Tyler Apologizes To Nicki Minaj, But Insists That He’s Not A Racist

American Idol producers might want to drag another chair up to the judges’ table, because Steven Tyler has landed himself in the drama-fest and the already sure to be explosive season might be more fun yet if they leave him put, don’t you think?

As you’ll recall, Tyler said over the weekend that Nicki Minaj would have sent Bob Dylan “to the cornfield” had he turned up to try out. Nicki of course thinks otherwise, and said as much on Twitter, where she suggested that the comment might have been racially motivated. And almost as soon as she hit send on that last one, Tyler was on television apologizing.

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November 27th, 2012 | 10:22 am by Zara Golden (@zaragolden)

Nicki Minaj Calls Steven Tyler’s Criticism Of Her American Idol Judging “Racist”

And just as it was beginning to seem that early American Idol drama had begun to dial down, the quiet has been broken by a bell signaling a new round: this time, with Nicki Minaj and Steven Tyler trading barbs over Nicki’s judging ability. Speaking with MTV last week, Tyler lamented the lack of “camaraderie” between judges this season before really digging his teeth into Nicki, saying:

“These kids, they just got out of a car from the Midwest somewhere and they’re in New York City, they’re scared to death; you’re not going to get the best [out of them]. … If it was Bob Dylan, Nicki Minaj would have had him sent to the cornfield! Whereas, if it was Bob Dylan with us, we would have brought the best of him out, as we did with Phillip Phillips. Just saying.”

Nicki, of course, is not so sure that’s the case; and so yesterday she took to Twitter to defend herself against the Aerosmith frontman and Idol veteran’s criticisms. She suggested that he may be bitter about having lost his seat at the table, or more damning yet, that his “cornfield” comments might have been racist: Read more…

October 19th, 2012 | 2:44 pm by Zara Golden (@zaragolden)

Aerosmith Are Still Getting It In The New “What Could Have Been” Video

Steven Tyler might have one or two grey hairs in this new video, but boy can the Aerosmith guys still get it. This new video for “What Could Have Been,” off their upcoming album Music From Another Dimension!, finds the band in some sort of smoky bar, Tyler slouched over on a stool with a pretty blonde while the rest of the band cue up a game of pool behind him. There is also a subplot involving a handsome young fella and the pretty young girl he loves that ends dramatically with a  kiss and a fistfight, but that part feels like an unnecessary “sexy” bone being thrown our way. Sure, “Dream On” came out almost 40-years ago now, but here Aerosmith are legends and still very much in the game. Why can’t we just celebrate Aerosmith, back with new music for the first time since 2001 and sounding as good as they ever did?

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July 11th, 2012 | 5:15 pm by Zara Golden (@zaragolden)

Aerosmith Do It Again In “Legendary Child”

“This is the story of America’s greatest rock band,” thus introduces the narrator in the opening of the video for “Legendary Child,” the first single from Aerosmith‘s upcoming Music From Another Dimension. The story is of drug addiction, shady managers and bad sushi overcome. And it’s a story best told by girls on roller skates because, so says the narrator, “How f****ing cool is that?”

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June 28th, 2012 | 2:28 pm by Zara Golden (@zaragolden)

Aerosmith Push Album Release Back To November, But Might Rock Your Summer Anyways

Aerosmith's New Album Gets Delayed

After more than a decade, can you make it a few more months? Calling into Cleveland radio station 100.7 WMMS, Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler explained that “too many people are are releasing those weeks, and we don’t want to step on their release dates.” And thusly — so as not to dwarf the competition, of course — the Rock and Roll Hall of Famers have pushed the release of their forthcoming Music From Another Dimension back from August 28th to November 6th. “We said, ‘You know what, we got the goods, ain’t no doubt about [it], we’ll wait a couple months.”

Music From Another Dimension will be Aerosmith’s first full album since 2001′s Just Push Play, and we believe that it has potential to be a true return-to-form. “We accomplished what we set out out to do, which was write some stuff so we could represent who we were in the old days,” Tyler told WMMS. “After all these years, you can become something other than you started out to be — and I’m not saying that’s a bad thing — but we kinda love our rock.” Read more…

March 29th, 2012 | 1:45 pm by Christina Leake (@_bobina)

Aerosmith Plans To Release A New Album Of Original Material This Fall, Their First In 10 Years

Aerosmith Announces Their "The Global Warming" Tour

Between announcing a new summer tour earlier this week and Steven Tyler turning 64 on Monday, it’s already been a busy week for the guys in Aerosmith. However, it seems like they saved the best news for last. All that time they spent in the studio recording on Tyler’s days off from American Idol looks like it paid off, as the band announced last night that they’re finishing up a brand-new album, one that they hope to release this summer!

The new album does not have a name yet, but we have reason to believe it will be a classic return-to-form for the band. (By the way, can you believe that this is the band’s first album of original material since 2001′s Just Push Play?) Word on the street is that the band teamed up with an old friend to help produce their new album. Just how old is this friend, you ask? Well, producer Jack Douglas, the man that the band themselves dubbed as “The Sixth Member,” has been friends with the band since the ’70s and produced many of Aerosmith’s classic albums like Get Your Wings, Toys in the Attic, and Draw the Line. It seems like the guys have taken a page out of the Van Halen playbook and are building at least a portion of this new album around guitar riffs that the band wrote many years ago, but never formally released.

“We have a lot of songs that are very dear to us that we’ve written over the years,” Aerosmith bassist Tom Hamilton told the AP. “And we can feel it when it’s the perfect time to whip them out. And we’re having that kind of experience now.”

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January 27th, 2012 | 10:59 am by Jim Shearer

Shearer’s Spotlight: In Defense of Steven Tyler

Each week here on VH1 Tuner, our VH1 Top 20 Video Countdown host Jim Shearer (@jimshearer on Twitter) will be sharing his Shearer’s Spotlight with us. Be sure to tune into the VH1 Top 20 Video Countdown tomorrow morning when it airs on VH1 at 9 a.m. ET/PT.

As I’m sure you’ve literally heard, Steven Tyler sang the National Anthem at last week’s AFC Championship game in New England. Because the internet has perfected the art of making mountains out of molehills, pop-culture and sports-related blogs teed off on Tyler, making it seem like William Hung sung the National Anthem.

Here’s why it wasn’t as bad as you’ve been told:

It Was a Perfect Length
Before Game 5 of the 1968 World Series, Puerto Rican singing sensation, Jose Feliciano, delivered a lengthy improvisational version of the “Star-Spangled Banner,” which not only irked various fans, but made Detroit’s starting pitcher, Mickey Lolich, get cold in the bullpen, causing him to give up three runs in the first inning (Detroit, however, ended up winning the game and eventually the series). Steven Tyler’s version of the anthem caused no players on either team a disruption in their pre-game rituals.

Sound Bounces
Why do musicians record albums in a studio? Because live sound in a stadium sucks. When Steven Tyler was singing the anthem, I’m sure he not only heard his voice, but 17 different echoed versions of it, which makes it impossible to deliver a pitch-perfect performance.

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January 26th, 2012 | 12:00 pm by Mark Graham (@unclegrambo)

American Idol Recap: Steven Tyler Attempts To Find The “Ass” In Aspen

Ah, Aspen. While not exactly known as a music mecca, it is by all accounts a place where the beer flows like wine, where beautiful women instinctively flock like the salmon of Capistrano! (Clearly, we’ve watched Dumb & Dumber one too many times.) It was also where J. Lo, Steven Tyler, Randy and Ryan Seacrest hunkered down to try out contestants on this week’s episode of American Idol.

We don’t know if it was a result of the altitude or what, but something in the mountain air inspired Steven this week. He was able to avoid falling prey to the charms of 19-year-old nose-ring enthusiast Tealana Hedgespeth (“I’m more of the outgoing person, I’m more of the person who would go up to you and be like, ‘Hey, i like your shirt’”), but our bescarfed host planted a giant smacker right on the lips of 24-year-old music teacher Jenny Schick right at the top of this week’s episode, scoring a perfect 5 out of 5 on the Dude Is Acting Shady Meter. We’ll cover this, as well as Tyler’s other flirtations, below:

WHO: Jenni Schick
SET-UP: Jenni started off reminding us a bit of Week One contestant Erika Nowak, confessing that she’s got a hankerin’ for reality singing competition judges like Steven Tyler and The Voice‘s Adam Levine. However, her performance of Pat Benatar’s “Heartbreaker” got Steven all hot and bothered, resulting in him clutching her face with his grubby fingers and kissing her mouth. (Can we talk about that kissing technique for a second? Face touching is one thing, but outright face grabbing? WEIRDZIES.)
TYLER’S COMMENTS: “Holy shick! You better be able to sing, good girl … Whoa, I’m gonna get in trouble for that.”
DUDE IS ACTING SHADY METER SCORE: 5/5 – EWWWWWWWWW!

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January 23rd, 2012 | 12:00 pm by Mark Graham (@unclegrambo)

The Newly Ubiquitous Steven Tyler Performs The National Anthem, Flirts Ever-So-Tamely With A Few Idol Hopefuls

Seemingly everywhere you turn your head these days, Steven Tyler is standing there. Leno on Friday night? Check. American Idol on Fox? Check. On the victory podium with AFC champions the New England Patriots? Check. Wait, what???

Yes, that’s right, the Aerosmith lead singer is buddy buddy with billionaire businessman and owner of the NFL’s New England Patriots franchise, Robert Kraft. He brought some good luck to his hometown team by singing the National Anthem at yesterday’s AFC Championship game, a performance that his Idol co-hort Randy Jackson would describe as “pitchy.” Depending on how many cups of CLAM CHOWDA you ingested yesterday afternoon, you’ll either love it or hate it.

Oh, and after the seventeen hours of football that was on yesterday (only a slight exaggeration), there was a new episode of American Idol on, too. We don’t know what’s going on with the water in San Diego, but Tyler didn’t score very high on our new Dude Is Acting Shady Meter (which now come complete with an ACTUAL meter, designed by our own Lauren Deiman). He didn’t so much as bat an eyelash with Jim Carrey‘s 24 year-old daughter, Jane, but he did turn on the charm a smidge for two of yesterday’s female contestants.

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January 23rd, 2012 | 10:05 am by Kat George (@kat_george)

Tuned In: Steven Tyler, Joe Perry And Randy Jackson “Chip Away The Stone” On Leno

American Idol judges Steven Tyler and Randy Jackson teamed up with Joe Perry on The Tonight Show With Jay Leno to give a super fun performance of Aerosmith‘s “Chip Away The Stone.” With a full band, the veterans we’re lively and animated, for what was a joy filled performance. The guys had great chemistry together on stage, and proved that age ain’t nothing but a number when it comes to rocking out.

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