On April 8, 1975, around 10 AM, I recall a sunny yet cool day. I found myself lounging in a lengthy queue, sporting the typical ’70s fashion with jeans, black engineer boots, a black t-shirt, a denim jacket, and a blue cap featuring the Ford logo. Standing amongst a crowd of people, we were eagerly awaiting the opening of a record store in Waterloo, Iowa. The reason for this anticipation?
We were all there to purchase Aerosmith’s third album, “Toys in the Attic,” which was going on sale that day. I still have the LP I bought on that memorable day somewhere, even though I lack the means to play it. It’s hard to fathom, but that was half a century ago.
To mark that anniversary, Aerosmith’s producer, Jack Douglas, has told the story behind that album’s top-selling hit, “Walk This Way.”
As Aerosmith was putting the finishing touches on their legendary 1975 album “Toys in the Attic,” they stumbled upon the idea for “Walk This Way” while casually walking through the gritty streets of Hell’s Kitchen and Times Square.
“‘Walk This Way’ was the last song that we had to finish,” “Toys in the Attic” producer Jack Douglas exclusively told The Post. “But we could not come up with a lyric or a melody line or anything.”
Taking a break from the studio sessions at the Record Plant in Midtown Manhattan, they went searching for a stroke of creativity in the city.
“Because of the pimps and hookers and drug dealers, there was always a lot of good material on the street,” said Douglas.
But on this particular Sunday afternoon, “it was barren,” he said. “There was nobody on the street.”
This is where Mel Brooks comes in. Yes, really.
“I suggested that we take a break and go see ‘Young Frankenstein,’” recalled Douglas of the 1974 Mel Brooks flick starring Gene Wilder. “And there’s a scene where the hunchback [played by Marty Feldman] says, ‘Walk this way,’ and they all walked this way, which totally broke us up. That was so hilarious.”
And when they got back to the studio, Steven Tyler said, “I got it! He went into the stairwell, and about an hour or two later, he came back with the whole trip.”
Now, that’s a great story. And, in all my years of following rock & roll – the stuff I listened to as a kid is now “classic rock,” and I guess I should be grateful they aren’t calling them “oldies” yet – I’ve never heard that tale before. And I was a big Aerosmith fan, although, in my long-ago concert-going days, they were one band I would have loved to have seen, but never did.
