The Back-Burner: Aerosmith Outtakes & Demos

In the wake of Honkin’ on Bobo (2004) and Rockin’ the Joint (2005), Aerosmith had grand plans to return to the studio with a fresh album of original material—their first since Just Push Play in 2001. But instead of ushering in a new creative era, 2006 and 2007 became a frustrating detour in the band’s history, marked by illness, label friction, and a project that never quite materialised.

By late 2005, Aerosmith were back on the road for the Rockin’ the Joint tour, which extended into early 2006. However, that momentum was cut short in March when Steven Tyler was forced to undergo throat surgery, leading to the cancellation of the remaining tour dates. Soon after, bassist Tom Hamilton began treatment for throat cancer. These serious health setbacks not only halted their live performances but put any immediate recording plans on ice.

It wasn’t until around May 2006 that the band began to regroup. With Steven recovering and Tom still healing, there was a brief window where creative planning resumed. Joe Perry later recalled the band sorting through old demos and vault recordings, sparking the idea of an album made up largely of updated outtakes—an approach that would satisfy both the band’s need for a lower-pressure project and the label’s growing impatience for new material.

Throughout the northern summer of 2006, Aerosmith laid the groundwork for this outtake-based album. Rather than writing from scratch, they began mapping out past favourites they could revisit and rework. The plan aligned well with the recent completion of their new studio near Boston, aptly named Pandora’s Box. In that space, they tracked two songs: the shimmering “Sedona Sunrise,” a holdover from the Pump era, and “Devil’s Got a New Disguise,” a heavy rewrite of an old outtake known internally as “Susie Q.” Both were produced by the band themselves and later featured as the two new tracks on the best-of compilation Devil’s Got a New Disguise: The Very Best of Aerosmith, released on 17 October 2006.

That compilation, while marketed as a career-spanning greatest hits, was really a strategic placeholder. The CD-ROM edition even included an Electronic Press Kit (EPK) video that concluded with a message promising fans a brand-new studio album in 2007. Behind the scenes, however, the situation remained unstable. The band had little time to build on the studio momentum before heading back out for the Route of All Evil tour with Mötley Crüe, which ran from September to December 2006. Any deeper work on the album would have to wait.

When the band reconvened in early 2007, they appeared ready to dive back in. A now-infamous whiteboard photo—snapped from within the walls of Pandora’s Box studio—offers a rare window into the project’s evolution. Handwritten by Steven Tyler, the chart listed nearly 15 potential songs under consideration.

Song Titles
Easy | Kant Stop Messing with It
Devils W/New Disguise
Sedona
Yo Mama
Legendary Child
Black Cherry
Bacon Biscuit
Love Cary?
I Love You Down?
Head First?
Dime Store
Innocent Man
Easy
Something

It’s unclear how far any of these tracks progressed; some may have been demoed, others perhaps just discussed.

Despite the promising list, time was once again not on Aerosmith’s side. By April 2007, they were back on the road for a massive world tour that lasted until September, playing across India, the UK, South America, and beyond. With travel commitments and fatigue setting in, there was simply no room left to focus on recording.

By late 2007, the idea of the outtake album had quietly faded into the background. A new project soon took precedence: Guitar Hero: Aerosmith. The band entered the studio once again—this time not to record new songs, but to re-record classic tracks from their 1973 album for the video game. Many of the original master tapes were either missing or unusable. The success of the game, which became the best-selling band-centric title in Guitar Hero history, shifted their focus away from the vault project and toward their legacy.

In the end, what was meant to be Aerosmith’s triumphant return to studio form in 2007 dissolved into a lost album of possibilities. While “Sedona Sunrise” and “Devil’s Got a New Disguise” offered a tantalising glimpse of what could’ve been, the rest of the material remains locked away—unfinished, unheard, and in some cases, unknown. The project was never officially titled, but among fans and collectors, it’s become known as the “2006/2007 Sessions”—a footnote in the band’s long and turbulent studio history, and a symbol of the album that almost was.