Draw the Line is the fifth studio album by American hard rock band Aerosmith, released on December 9, 1977.

"Draw the Line was untogether because we weren't a cohesive unit anymore," guitarist Joe Perry admitted in the Stephen Davis band memoir Walk This Way.

"[4] Although the LP would sell well more than a million copies in fewer than six weeks after its release, in 2014 Perry would refer to it as "the beginning of the end" and "the decay of our artistry.

"[5] Largely due to their drug consumption, both Tyler and Perry were not as involved in the writing and recording as they had been on previous albums.

[4] For his part, Tyler has maintained that it was the band's lethargy, not his, that slowed his progress, because "I wasn't Patti Smith writing poetry.

"[6] However, Tyler confessed to Alan di Perna of Guitar World in April 1997, "What I specifically remember was not being present in the studio because I was so stoned.

In his autobiography Rocks, Perry admits that he had misplaced a cookie tin full of demos for the band that he had prepared in his basement studio, irritating Douglas, but they were eventually found by Perry's wife Elyssa:[7] "Among those tapes was not only the fully realized "Bright Light Fright," but tracks that led to other songs like "I Want To Know Why," "Get It Up" and "Draw the Line," the title tune.

"[11] Perry performs lead vocals on his solo composition "Bright Light Fright", which was inspired by the Sex Pistols.

[6] In his memoir, Tyler writes that the song's lyrics were inspired by a "medieval fantasy" that featured "a stoned-out rock star in his tattered satin rags lying on the ancient stone floor of a castle - slightly mad, but still capable of conjuring up a revolutionary album that would astound the ears of the ones who heard it and make the critics cringe.

With that one, my brain was back with the knights of the round table..."[13] Drummer Joey Kramer remembers recording "Kings and Queens" at a "typical session at the Cenacle.

I mean when you've got two weeks off and you're told to go write songs for your next album, and you've got all this money, you're gonna want to go out and have some fun, not sit at home banging out notes and words.

"[14] Between attempts at recording at the Wherehouse and additional sessions during their Summer 1977 tour of North America and Europe, the group moved into the Cenacle, a de-consecrated monastery in Westchester County, New York.

According to Tyler's autobiography, manager David Krebs suggested that the band record its next album at the estate near Armonk, New York "away from the temptation of drugs."

"[12] Perry remembers the setting: "The Cenacle included sixty acres, with a great big house, and the Record Plant installed a studio for us.

We had a great time up there..."[15] In the VH1 Behind the Music episode on the group, Douglas states, "People were shooting, bullets were flying.

Billy Altman of Rolling Stone called the LP "a truly horrendous record, chaotic to the point of malfunction and with an almost impenetrably dense sound adding to the confusion.

[18] The Globe and Mail opined that "'Critical Mass' and 'Get It Up' are both bright numbers with solid rhythms while 'Draw the Line' and 'I Wanna Know Why' didn't deserve preservation.

"[3] Another AllMusic reviewer stated that, "although some fans see Draw the Line as the beginning of a decline for Aerosmith, it still offers up some strong hard-rock tunes.

"[26] Martin Popoff defined Draw the Line "complicated, murky and layered", coming across as "the serious, distressed Aerosmith album".

He also wrote that despite "being ambiguously dense, uncommunicative and busy", the album showed the band reaching "new levels of musical maturity.