Band:	Aerosmith
Album:	Draw The Line
Style:	Hard rock, Blues rock
Release date:	November 01, 1977
Guest review by:	omne metallum

01. Draw The Line
02. I Wanna Know Why
03. Critical Mass
04. Get It Up
05. Bright Light Fright
06. Kings And Queens
07. The Hand That Feeds
08. Sight For Sore Eyes
09. Milk Cow Blues [Kokomo Arnold cover]

Five albums in and going strong, Draw The Line serves as the last hurrah for the first era of Aerosmith, aptly named as it draws a metaphorical line in their career where they would fall into a drug-induced decline that would last a decade. While the band hit ever greater highs chemically, the music begins to sink to lower depths; Draw The Line is a strong album, but not strong enough to stretch the run of classic albums to three in a row.

Starting off with strongest foot first, the title track carries on from Rocks and belies what follows after it; from the wailing guitars at the start to Tyler's screeching at the end, the title track is classic. The band do manage to come close to matching the title track's quality, with songs like "Get It Up", "Kings And Queens" and "Sight For Sore Eyes" being no slouches when it comes to kicking your ass, each song possessing a quality that many bands do not reach even at their peaks. The title track and "Kings And Queens", however, would be the only ones I would put on a greatest hits release (given that's what they did in 1980, it's a shared opinion); "Get It Up" and "Sight For Sore Eyes" are good, but pale when put next to the great tunes Aerosmith have produced over the years.

However, the album does then dip in quality; it doesn't reach unlistenable levels of bad, but it doesn't merit more than occasional listens at best. If it's possible to get a contact high from a record, then put on "I Wanna Know Why", "Critical Mass" and "The Hand That Feeds" to feel the drugs ooze out of the speakers and into your ears. Each song finds its own niche and just plays itself out to the end, never exploring any space or daring to go anywhere that requires much effort.

The production and playing on this album suffer from the drug-induced malaise the band were going through at the time; nobody's heart was in it at the time and you can hear that crystal clear. Nobody does a bad job, but when you have had two records showing their evident skills, you know everyone was just phoning it in here. When you consider the guitar clinics Whitford and Perry created on Toys In The Attic and Rocks, it just seems so pedestrian for the most part of this album.

With clearer heads and a more concerted effort Draw The Line could have worked and lived up to its potential. Alas, it remains an album which could have been great rather that one that reached its potential. Given the depths that the band would soon fall to, this album is an ocean in an oasis, so perspective is always important.