"The Rolling Stones" Thread

[FORD]

Pretty good video quality for an audence bootleg phone shot.

[FORD]

[Terry]

I appreciate what you're offering.

Do not get me wrong. I am a SERIOUS Stones fan. (You should see my collection in my mancave...every album, box set, Blu-Ray, DVD, book, etc.).

But I almost separate them into four bands:
1) The 60s Stones...lots of R&B and covers...some great originals...pretty good live band for the 60s era, but merely a weak blueprint of what they later became. This period is everything before BEGGARS BANQUET.
2) Greatest Rock & Roll Band in the World...BEGGARS to EXILE, possibly including GOATS HEAD SOUP. Simply amazing. Their raggedness was part of their strength.
3) Great band but not the same...IT'S ONLY ROCK 'N' ROLL to TATTOO YOU...great, professional rock 'n' roll band. My favorite album from this period is actually BLACK 'N' BLUE, not SOME GIRLS. TATTOO YOU is great (but outtakes)...the TATTOO YOU bonus disc (more finished outtakes) from the box set is a solid Stones album in and of itself.
4) The later, polished band...UNDERCOVER to present. It's nice having them around. HACKNEY DIAMONDS is, easily, the best album from this long period. I would argue that it's almost as strong as TATTOO YOU...a minor miracle, that album. I saw them twice during the VOODOO LOUNGE tour...then didn't see them again until SOLDIER FIELD in 2019. That was the better gig...they smoked in 2019. Keith was ragged...but Charlie was great and the band played better and sounded more inspired than both VOODOO LOUNGE shows I saw. Studio work during these decades...there are moments here and there. I might place A BIGGER BANG as the absolutely weakest Stones album ever. BRIDGES TO BABYLON is also really weak. I'd actually (at this point) take STEEL WHEELS over VOODOO LOUNGE. And as cheesy as moments on UNDERCOVER are, I'd still place it higher than most of the work they released in this "super-stars" period. But, funny enough, I'd probably rate HACKNEY DIAMONDS as the best album from this entire LONG period.

Footnote: The Stones losing Wyman was a greater loss than anyone realized at the time. I find Daryl Jones...really dull on bass.

The Stones are a great band. But they're not really The Stones anymore, as much as I like HACKNEY DIAMONDS. Without Mick Taylor, they lost their ragged perfection. Without Wyman/Watts, they lost an amazing rhythm section.

But, as always, it's nice to have them around.

At this point, I get more excited by the box sets than anything else they do...because with MOST of the box sets, they release a solid album of finished outtakes. The EXILE ON MAIN STREET bonus disc is one of their strongest albums EVER...let alone a strong archive release.

Yeah, I'd have to agree in general terms, especially delineating the first period of the band as anything before Beggar's Banquet. To be frank about it, I can't remember the last time I had a desire to listen to a Stones album from start-to-finish that was made prior to Beggar's Banquet. Or, really, ANY of the studio recordings made prior to Beggar's Banquet save for maybe a half dozen of the singles/album tracks released between 1966 and 1968. Which, you know, longtime fans still go on about Brian Jones and how important he was to the band in the early days...and he WAS important to the band in the early days, but by the time 1968 rolled around Jones was already marginalized in terms of what he was contributing to the group. The vast bulk of the Stones best work - from Beggar's to Exile - was done without him; he threw down some harmonica work along with maracas, sitar, tanpura and mellotron on several of the tracks on Beggar's, along with some nice slide guitar on the Beggar's track No Expectations. Nice augmentations to the tunes, but nothing central in terms of constructing the songs. I think on the next album Let It Bleed he did autoharp on You Got The Silver and various percussion instruments on Midnight Rambler, and that was it.

For me, the best part of the last 30 years or so Stones-wise was the release of all those vaulted shows for the home video market from 1970/1971, the re-release of Ladies And Gentlemen, The Rolling Stones along with the 1975 LA Forum show and the 1978 Texas show.

[Terry]

Hasn't really been 'the Stones' for me since Wyman left, and even then the band had been washed up creatively since Tattoo You. With Watts passing and the band continuing, I suppose it is in a sense (as you say) nice they are still around for whoever still wants to see them...apparently more than a few still do. I dunno...I can't really consider what is out there today The Rolling Stones. It's more like The Mick Jagger Show featuring Keith Richards with special guest Ronnie Wood. Still lucrative, so I guess it'll keep going as long as people are willing to pay. Gives Jagger and Company something to do.

[FORD]