Aerosmith drummer Joey Kramer says he has been shabbily treated by fellow members of the band he helped found 50 years ago. They say he is like a brother to them—but he has been "emotionally and physically" unable to play with them. In a lawsuit filed Friday, Kramer says minor injuries last spring prevented him from playing with the band when their Deuces Are Wild residency in Las Vegas began, Rolling Stone reports. He says that when he was ready to rejoin the band last fall, they forced him to re-audition for the group by playing along with a track, and then decided to exclude him from the rest of the Deuces Are Wild shows, along with their upcoming Jan. 26 performance at the Grammy Awards. Kramer still got paid for the Vegas shows, but pay for replacement John Douglas came out of his cut.
Kramer says no other member has been treated like this in the band's history. "Being prohibited from playing with a band that I have given 50 years of my life to supporting, is beyond devastating," he tells TMZ. "I am being deprived of the opportunity to be recognized along with my peers, for our collective, lifetime contributions to the music industry." The band said in a statement that they had encouraged him to rejoin them many times over the last six months, but at this point, they would be "doing a disservice to him, to ourselves, and to our fans to have him play without adequate time to prepare and rehearse." They said that while he won't be performing, Kramer is still very welcome to join them at the Grammys and at an event Friday where they will be honored as the MusiCares Person of the Year. (More Aerosmith stories.)
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