Permanent Vacation is the ninth studio album by American rock band Aerosmith, released in August 1987 by Geffen Records.
Recording sessions took place in March-May 1987 at Little Mountain Sound, Vancouver, and Unique Recording, New York City.
Demos and outtakes from these sessions can be commonly found on a few bootlegs leaked in the late 90s: ‘Love me like a Bird Dog’, Permanent Outtakes, Pandoras Leftovers, and other compilations.
Love Me Like A Bird Dog
Excellent demos and outtakes from the “Permanent Vacation” era leaked as a bootleg in 1995. Question date detailed for the second set of tracks (spring 1986) as Aerosmith were on the “Done With Mirrors” tour from January-August 1986 especially as DWM wasn’t released until Nov. 85. These tracks definitely post-date the first session from February 1987 and assume the period is Spring 1987 since “Permanent Vacation” was released in Summer 1987.
Tracks 1- 5 from Rick Rubin Sessions New York City February 1987, Tracks 6-17 Listed as Studio Rehearsals Spring 1986 but assume is Spring 1987. There were apparently six songs in the Rick Rubin demos which also included “Hollywood”. The recording quality isn’t as excellent as you may expect from a studio recording, probably because the songs are demos. Sometimes it’s hard to hear what lyrics Steven exactly sings.
- Love Me Like A Bird Dog
- Take It Easy
- One Time
- Joe’s Funky
- Love Me Like A Bird Dog
- Once Is Enough
- Girl Keeps Coming Apart (Instrumental)
- Hollywood
- Danger Street
- Sleeping Sickness
- St. John
- Joe’s Funky
- Got To Find A Way
- Simoriah 4:01
- Dude (Looks Like A Lady)
- Permanent Vacation
- Hangman Jury
Permanent Outtakes
Excellent CD set carrying various outtakes from the “Permanent Vacation” sessions leaked in 1999. Assumingly from the Little Mountain Studios, Vancouver in Spring,1987. The CD says the band is “Dr J. Jones and the Interns” and the recording is called “Permanently Out”. Aerosmith used the name in August 1978 when they undertook a short club tour before taking the “Draw The Line” Tour back out on the road again. Tracklist:
- Right Key, Wrong Key Hole
- Angel
- I’m Down
- Dude (Looks Like A Lady) (mix #1)
- St. John (mix #1)
- St. John (mix #2)
- Girl Keeps Coming Apart
- Permanent Vacation (mix #3)
- Dude (Looks Like A Lady) (mix #2)
- Magic Touch
- Got To Find A Way
- Samurai
- Walking On Danger Street (mix #1)
- Rag Doll
- Feel The Pain
- Looking Like A Lady
- Gotta Find A Way
- Samurai
- Permanent Vacation (mix #4)
- Hangman Jury
- Hollywood
- Funky Thing
- Walking On Danger Street (mix #2)
- Sleepy Sickness
- St. John (mix #3)
- Girl Keeps Coming Apart (Instrumental)
- Once Is Never Enough
- Hearts Done Time
Pandora’s Leftovers – The March 1, 1987 sessions
Another tape escaped to the public domain with additional material from the Permanent Vacation sessions. These seem to be leftover material from the previous two bootlegs where the majority of the recording was just the band in the studio leaving the tape rolling. The leak probably came at the hands of an ex-label/studio employee that was selling stuff on E-bay. The tape contained the session of March 1, 1987, a 58minutes CD with 7 long tracks in it:
- “Joe’s Funky”, very raw riff rehearsal (just Joey and Joe).
- “Steven’s Intro Song”, just Steven (piano, vocals) and Joe.
- Joe & Brad improvised riffs and jams.
- “Joe’s Funky” raw riffs.
- “Girls Keep Commin Apart” 9mins full band jam.
- Drum sounds/Funky Blues Jam/Girls Keep Commin Apart.
- “Girls Keep Commin Apart” 12mins jam, instrumental.
At the end of track 2 Steven and Joe discuss something like:
Steven: if, what ever you’r running of for Tim, why can’t you be running of in fast speed, and do it in 10 minutes!!!…
Joe: It’s not like that, “it’s work… hemmm
Steven: what is what, what does he want?
Joe: he wants everything.
Steven: he’s got a tape of everything.
Joe: well…
“Steven’s Intro Song” (track 2) sounds like a slow intro Steven is writing to connect it with Joe’s riff for “Joe’s Funky”. The KORG keyboard sounds typical of the era, and he does say scat some random sounds and bits of lyrics.
“Funky Blues Jam” (track 6) is another original segment of instrumental improvisation. Slow funky bluesy jam, similar to the “Movin Out” ending, but funkier with cool long Joe and Brad solos.
Track 5 is a full band rehearsal of “Girls Keep Comming Apart”, with Steven singing unfinished lyrics on a loop as he is still trying to figure out the words and the band trying different arrangements. Track 7 keeps the same trend of the band trying different things on “Girls Keep Comming Apart” including some very interesting solos by Brad and Joe, giving the listener the perspective of being a fly on the wall while the band works on developing the song.
Permanent Vacations Outtakes
This 3CD bootleg is a low-quality combination of the previous two bootlegs in mono with a tracklist that reads as if a casual fan was guessing their way through the track names and production status. We highly advise any interested fan to stay away from this source.
Songs on other Studio tapes:
1986 Excellent sound demos: Hangman – Girl keeps coming apart. Instrumentals of: Simoriah – Girl, funked up – Girl, heavy drums – Girl – Magic touch 1 – Magic touch 2 – Only time will tell and 8 more…
1987 demos: Steven’s song – No room in my heart – Hollywood, different version – Take it easy – Mishugas.
On another tape: ‘I love you’, a short intro type song…
The Back-Burner: Aerosmith Outtakes & Demos 