Categories : Music Reviews, Rock + Pop.
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Rating: 3/5 Released: October 17, 2006 Reviewer: Trent McMartin |
Aerosmith has never been shy about cashing in on their legacy. Since 1978 there has been a never-ending flood of Aerosmith compilation/live albums into the market – thirteen or so to be exact. The band authorized a few, if not most of them, but some were issued without the group’s approval, released more to cash in after the group had left a record company or to fulfill a contract – the latter reason being the rationale for the release of Aerosmith’s latest hits CD, Devil’s Got a New Disguise: The Very Best of Aerosmith.
This new best of album features 16 of Aerosmith’s most well-known hits, spanning their entire career, as well as two new songs: the country rocker ‘Sedona Sunrise’ and the title track, ‘Devil’s Got a New Disguise,’ a leftover from the 1989 Pump sessions. These two “new†cuts don’t stand up well along the group’s older hits – ‘Dream on,’ ‘Sweet Emotion,’ ‘Last Child,’ and ‘Mama Kin’ – but they fit alongside anything released post-Permanent Vacation.
Most of Aerosmith’s earlier compilations captured an era rather than their entire career as Devil’s Got a New Disguise failingly tries to do, but the compilation does have ‘Walk this Way,’ w/ Run-DMC, the first successful blend of rap and rock and the song that put Aerosmith back on the map. Sadly, that version of the song signified the beginning of Aerosmith’s obsession to win some kind of top 40 talent show, leaving behind their gritty hard rockin’ past.
