Steven Tyler takes the spotlight on REELZ on Saturday, Dec. 11, 2021, at 8 p.m. ET/PT, as part of the network’s newest music-doc series, Frontmen. In this installment, fans learn first-hand how Tyler, born Steven Tallarico on March 26, 1948, grew up in a middle class Italian household in Yonkers, NY, and went on to become one of the most iconic and charismatic rock and roll frontmen ever. Watch several exclusive clips from the upcoming program, Steven Tyler: Aerosmith Frontman, below.
Aerosmith has sold over 150 million albums worldwide, making them the best-selling hard rock band in U.S. history, thanks to years of touring and significant chart success with classic rock songs like “Dream On,” “Walk This Way,” and “Love in an Elevator.” Despite – or perhaps because of – the band’s phenomenal acclaim, Tyler’s career repeatedly went into a downward spiral caused by drug and alcohol abuse. It led the band’s manager, Steve Leber, to take drastic measures. “I fired Steven Tyler. He hit the bottom and when you hit the bottom, you can recover,” he says in the film.
Flanked by Aerosmith guitarist, Joe Perry, Tyler apologized for his behavior after he got clean—and in classic Tyler fashion—he bragged a little. “For twenty-five years I lived on the other side of the moon,” he says during a People’s Choice Awards appearance. “It took the band away, it took away everything that I loved and I got it back!”
From the network’s announcement: The documentary reveals the story of a man with self-confessed “lead singer’s disease” as told by the people who know Tyler the best. Among them is the band’s road manager, Henry Smith, who accused Tyler of never having been sober until he checked in and out of the Betty Ford Clinic in 2010. “I think he was pretty much the same guy, it’s just you weren’t dealing with somebody that might be dribbling and drooling or can’t put two words together to make a sentence,” Smith says in the REELZ music doc.
Yet every time the Aerosmith frontman fell, he came back even bigger and better than before. Says Tyler, “This band has been around for forty-plus years and the audience is still full of twenty year-olds and they all love to rock and roll.”
Watch REELZ on DIRECTV 238, Dish Network 299, Verizon FiOS 692, AT&T U-verse 1799 and in HD on cable systems and streaming services nationwide. Find REELZ on your local cable or satellite provider at reelz.com.
Related: When Aerosmith opened their 2019 Vegas residency
Tickets to see Aerosmith are available here and here.
Related: Listings for 100s of classic rock tours
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