Guitarist Steve Hunter, who played memorable solos on classic Aerosmith and Alice Cooper songs, is finally to be paid radio royalties for his work.
Hunter recorded parts for Aerosmith’s Train Kept A Rollin from 1974 album Get Your Wings – as well as six tracks on Cooper’s 1973 effort Billion Dollar Babies, including the title track, Hello Hooray, Raped And Freezin, Unfinished Sweet, Generation Landslide and Sick Things.
With the help of Phonographic Performance Limited (PPL) and his wife Karen, Hunter will be paid royalties for the works, backdated up to 10 years in some cases.
The PPL gathered enough evidence for his name to be officially connected with the seven tracks that he did not get credit for when the albums were released.
Hunter says: “Karen and I will not be retiring to Maui – these royalties are for radio airplay only and will go back no further than 10 years. It’s a little piece and will add up.”
He adds: “Now, if it were record royalties, we would for sure be retiring to Maui. That’s a whole other thing and a whole lot bigger piece.
“I am very grateful for all the work Karen put in tracking everything down and getting all the necessary evidence for those tracks on which I was not credited.”
The PPL says it was common in the 60s and 70s for musicians to perform on records without being credited. The ‘ghosting’ players got paid a nominal session fee at the time, but unless their work was officially part of the album credits it wasn’t registered with performance collection agencies.
Hunter, who’s going blind with pigmentary glaucoma, says the royalties will help make it easier to keep touring.
