Aerosmith have backtracked on the central theme of their “farewell tour”.

As guitarist Joe Perry admitted to NME, the band changed their minds shortly after announcing their retirement plans, as the prospect of the band actually being over started to dawn on them. “We thought it was gonna be a good idea when we first started plotting the European run”, he explained.

“We’re gonna do South America and the States for five months and we thought ‘well, we’re getting near the end here, we don’t know when the tour is gonna end but we know there’ll be a last gig of this tour. We all have lives outside of the band. We grew up together, went from being kids in the apartment to a long and storied career, so we thought ‘it’s time.’

“Then we were in South America doing interviews and we couldn’t fucking say it, that there was gonna be a last gig. We were looking at each other going ‘really? Are we really gonna say this is the farewell tour?’ So we kinda changed our minds.

“Will the band be together in a year? We’ll do everything we can to make sure it is but God may have other plans. Judging by how he’s treated us over the last 48 years I’d like to think he’s gonna let us see 50 but you can’t guarantee that.”

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