Aerosmith's Joe Perry collapses in concert

[NEW YORK] Aerosmith's hard-rocking guitarist Joe Perry collapsed during a concert in New York but was said Monday to be recovering.

Perry was performing Sunday night with his side project Hollywood Vampires, which features glam metal pioneer Alice Cooper on vocals and Hollywood star Johnny Depp as a fellow guitarist.

A video posted on social media by a fan showed Perry slow down and sit on the edge of the drum set as Cooper leads the band in a cover of Spirit's song I Got a Line on You. Perry then exits behind an amplifier and stumbles as he disappears off-stage at the concert, which was one of the first at a new amphitheater on Coney Island, the historic beach entertainment complex on Brooklyn's coast.

"Thanks to all of the fans reaching out and asking about Joe. He is stable right now, with family and is under the best care," said a statement shortly afterward on Perry's social media accounts.

Cooper later said that Hollywood Vampires would go ahead with their tour, with the next date due Tuesday night in a suburb of Dayton, Ohio.

"Confirmed - We WILL see you in Ohio tomorrow night and for the rest of our dates! Thanks for supporting Joe!" Cooper tweeted Monday.

He did not specify if Perry would join them in Ohio and representatives for the band did not return messages for comment.

The band, however, scrapped an appearance Monday on "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert", with alternative rockers Blink-182 filling in.

Hollywood Vampires formed last year to play covers of songs by deceased rockers. After putting out an album, the supergroup performed a tribute to late Motorhead frontman Lemmy at this year's Grammy Awards before embarking on the tour.

Perry, 65, raised in a small town in Massachusetts, made his name with his heavy guitar to complement the vocal cord-straining Steven Tyler on hits such as Dream On, Sweet Emotion and Walk This Way. Aerosmith was notorious for wild parties, although Perry in a 2014 interview with AFP said the rock life never appealed to him and he generally stayed in monogamous relationships with women.

"I was the odd man out because I wasn't into that kind of lifestyle. But I was always a loner anyway, so it didn't bother me much," he said.

AFP