Norwell Mariner (www2.townonline.com) has issued the following report from Matt Dunning:

For years, the town of Norwell had the distinction of being the home of a restaurant co-owned by members of the legendary Boston-bred rock group AEROSMITH.

That distinction came to an end last week.

On Wednesday (September 27th), the Norwell Board of Selectmen approved a transfer of stock for Mount Blue Restaurant, making Jayne Bowe the sole owner of the popular Main Street eatery. Previously, Aerosmith front man Steven Tyler and guitarist Joe Perry, along with Duxbury-based construction contractor Lee Kennedy, had been stockholders and co-owners of the restaurant.

Bowe, who has maintained principal ownership of Mount Blue since it opened in 1997, said the transfer of stock would not translate into any major changes at the restaurant, as Tyler and Perry's input into the direction of the restaurant had almost always been nominal at most.

"Joe and Steven weren't trying to be restaurant operators," Bowe said. "It was a great working relationship, and still is a good friendship, but this is something we had all been talking about for a while."

Bowe said the design and décor of the restaurant, despite being partially influenced by the band's long and storied career, was mostly her concept. Where Tyler and Perry had the most input, she added, was and will continue to be the restaurant's menu, which features a wide range of continental and international dishes.

"They travel extensively, and they've always had a big interest in food," Bowe said, "so they were always coming to me with menu ideas, all of which we've tried to incorporate into the food here. And we'll continue to do that."
"One of the beauties of the restaurant was that it was an opportunity for me to work on the artistic aspects of restaurant design," Bowe said. "[Tyler and Perry] didn't have a whole lot of input into the design of the place, but they liked the overall design. It wasn't set up to be a theme restaurant or a Hard Rock [Café'] copycat. That's not what they wanted and that's not what we're about."

Bowe said while she and Kennedy had always talked about her acquisition of his shares once the restaurant reached its 10-year mark - an anniversary that took place in March - a key reason Tyler and Perry elected to sell their stocks to Bowe was their extensive touring and traveling schedules.

"The whole band is away from the area probably more than they're here," Bowe said. "I think all of them are just doing different things with their time. It just made sense at this point in time to do this."

Tyler is also one-third of the Walkental Group partnership, which owns the entire Mug Shots/Mount Blue complex. The Walkental group is preparing to sell the properties to Hingham resident James Kennedy and Norwell resident Douglas Marr.

While Tyler, Perry, and Kennedy are no longer stockholders in the restaurant, Bowe said she hopes the three will still find time to stop in on her and the rest of the Mount Blue staff.

"I really hope they keep coming by," Bowe said. "It was a great business partnership I had with them, and of course I still welcome any suggestions they might have."