by Lucas J. Villa

Legendary rock band Aerosmith is back in action promoting their upcoming record, Music from Another Dimension! TheCelebrityCafe.com got to catch up with bass guitarist Tom Hamilton, in the middle of the band's Global Warming Tour, to talk about Aerosmith recording the long awaited album and other surprises to expect on the new record due in November.

TheCelebrityCafe.com: My first question is about Steven Tyler and him being on American Idol for the past two years. Would you say his experience or presence on the show helped or influenced the band? Like broadened your already massive fan base?

Tom Hamilton: Well, yeah, you would think so. There's got to be that effect where millions of people are now thinking about the band that might not of before. As far as ticket sales and record sales, that's something we haven't seen a difference in to a large extent. That may be different when our album [Music from Another Dimension!] comes out in November. It still feels like the same old band.

TCC: Your album coming out in November, Music from Another Dimension!, is the band's first studio album of new material since 2001's Just Push Play. How was it being back in the studio with the whole band recording the album after such a long while?

TH: It was fantastic. It's something that I've been hungry to do for a really, really long time. I had certain musical goals and ideas that I really wanted to take part of. We had a few false starts on this record over the last ten years. Once we all enthusiastically got on the same page in terms of the two producers we were going to use, I felt like we had our best shot getting to the finish line with this album. We worked on it all last summer and then Steven did his Idol thing. We later got back to work in the early part of this year in January or February and finally finished mastering it a week and a half ago. The record is in the can and its finished, but unfortunately we have to wait a few months before it comes out.

TCC: The album's newest single is “Legendary Child.” I read that the song was originally composed in 1991. What's the back story behind the single?

TH: “Legendary Child” is a song we wrote a long time ago. It was a song that was very dear to the band, but we just didn't have the extra support behind it, in terms of a producer, to take it to its full potential. Many times we wanted to do something with the song and it was just a matter of waiting until the circumstances were right. Jack [Douglas], because of his past experience with Aerosmith, knew what the potential of the song was and really jumped on it and helped us get it to as good as we could possibly get it. We were very happy with how it came out and that's why we used it.

TCC: It's crazy that the song waited so long to be released.

TH: Yeah, it was written a long time ago, but the lyrics were re-written for the record. Some people have said, “Oh, that's just an old outtake,” but it's not. It's a song that the band loves and was 100% committed to and we're just happy that we were able to bring it in the studio and bring it up to as good as we can get it.

TCC: Do you have a personal favorite song or a few favorite songs from this new record?

TH: There's a rocker called “Lover a Lot” that I think is really cool. I like it because it's just a very in-your-face hard rock Aerosmith song. There's some other songs on there that I will be shamelessly self-promoting. There's a song on the album called “Tell Me” and I'm rooting for that song because I wrote it [laughs]. I haven't really sat down and thought which of these songs is my favorite. I'm so close to call of them because it was so recent that we actually finished the album. I feel everything is a little more special so give me some more time before I figure out which ones are my favorites.

TCC: Speaking of American Idol earlier, I looked into the record and saw you collaborated with former show champion Carrie Underwood on one of the songs. How was that experience?

TH: We wrote this song called “Beautiful” and it came out with a definite country flavor. We didn't sit down and try to write a country song, but this track just had that flavor to it. Steven decided to pull a surprise on the rest of the band and he got in touch with Carrie Underwood. They snuck into the studio and did a vocal for it. He presented us with the track, and as he predicted, the song came out so good that we decided to use it. We're really looking forward to people hearing it.

Music from Another Dimension! comes out on November 6. Aerosmith can currently be seen in concert on the Global Warming Tour.