Something

Album: Music from Another Dimension! (2012)
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Songfacts®:

  • Guitarist Joe Perry penned this tune and provided lead vocals. The song finds him sneering at people who have him done him bad. "I wrote 'Something' a long time ago, back when there was a whole other batch of people around us: lawyers, managers that I was really pissed off at," he explained to Rolling Stone. "It's a short bit of angst and pissed-off-ness about these people that ripped us off forever. The funny thing is that 20 years later, There's a whole new batch of people I'm pissed off at. The lyrics still work."
  • The band's regular vocalist Stephen Tyler takes over the drums here, bringing back memories for Perry of the first time the pair met in 1970. "When we first started playing together, it was him on drums. I thought it would be perfect to get Steven to play drums on 'Something' because it's such a simple song. Steven played great," the guitarist told Rolling Stone. "It's ironic that our very first meeting together and playing together was that way. We stripped it right down to the basics. I left every mistake on there I could. I tuned the guitar down from an E to a C so that the strings would wang and twang."
  • The song features frequent Aerosmith sideman Paul Santo on keyboards and Perry's friend, Dr. Rudy Tanzi, who is a neuroscientist at Massachusetts General Hospital, on Hammond organ.

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