Rolling Stones: Classic or Dud

I like albums that it seems other people don't think about much, like Emotional Rescue, Aftermath, It's Only Rock N' Roll, Tattoo You.

It seems like people get hung up on the "classics" they made, most of which appear on Hot Rocks 1 + 2, I guess. But, I almost shun all that stuff in favor of the laid back good-time blues riffing stuff. I've noticed most of the Hot Rocks stuff is kind of angry or emotional. There's plenty of Stones that sounds nothing like that stuff. I like it all, though.

Better to burn out than to fade away, as it goes...

They never released an album that was the equivalent of masturbation, as many bands do after a while. I can't think of one self-indulgent turd amongst the whole lot of 'em. They're a good, consistent rock band. Seems kind of ludicrous to deny that.

to me, they're classic enough that they've yet to expend all of their credit. i give them 'til 2010 before i may have to call them a dud.

I'll have to echo neuromancer's disregard for charges that the Stones "ripped off" the blues. Sure, they utilized the blues, played with it, turned it over under sideways down, and made it unspeakably boring as well, but they never made false claims to its invention -- except perhaps when the stole "The Last Time" from the Staple Singers and credited "Love In Vain" to "Woody Payne" instead of Robert Johnson.

when you factor in all of the contributors, with the obvious exception of party-pooper ned raggett, freaky trigger becomes THE pop site. we write about madonna and destiny's child and janet jackson, which allows tom to pen lengthy examinations of mazarin and charlemagne palestine. (which i prefer, actually, because when he goes straight pop, we get *shudder* that jessica simpson "interview," post-modernism that'd make eggers proud.) he'll struggle to find the pop in these artists, but will ignore the far more obvious pop in artists like the stones because they're "classic rock" and are white boys playin' the blues.

I dont like rock and roll as an attitude much - it seems played out, of its time, interesting for sure but as inspirational and relevant to me as flappers are, or young edwardians, or any other historical cultural movement.

Simon Reynolds once wrote that, for him, there's something resolutely unlovable about The Who; I feel that way about the Stones, but even stronger.

Anyway I suspect that if you cross-reference the outcome of this thread with The Smiths thread you'll very likely find out that you either like The Stones or The Smiths (who indeed seem like the perfect anti-thesis of The Stones: weak, safe, effeminate, boring, etc.)

I think after 30 years it's hard to imagine anything safer than the Stones, too. Of course they were 'dangerous' in their time, but this is what I mean by the historical interest of rock and roll. (I'd hardly claim any different for the Smiths, at least musically.)

Patrick - almost everyone in the focus group gives a 9 or 10 to two or three pop tunes. It's just the marks then drop because of the averaged-out nature of things. And R&B and Hip-Hop do well, which pretty much define the pop charts now in the way that - as you rightly say - the Stones did 30 years ago. (I think "Satisfaction" is a genius pop single.) But by all means, everyone on this forum join in next time, please. The more the merrier.

Jagger's Voice? It's a question of mannerisms. Some mannerisms I like - some I don't like. Jagger's, in general, I don't.

omar: well, i love both the stones and the smiths. ;) however, i reckon that if i got into the latter before the former, that might not be the case: if my teen years were soundtracked by the smiths, i imagine my tastes might be quite different.

i don't think it's possible to love the stones and not, at the very least, *like* jagger's voice. it's very non-threatening: you can shout along with the music and never have to worry about sounding worse than him. he's one of those singers i wish would always shout because they're voices are really awful when they sing, though he wasn't totally without his charms as a singer.

Dan, the original question was:

"brash, brassy rock gods or bloated, pathetic blues thieves?"



and...



Ally said they'd turned into duds merely by sticking around so long.



So, I was just addressing two ideas at once. (First of all, how could 

they be bloated? They're all scrawny mofos!)



As far as the self-indulgent speil, what I meant was that they stayed 

true to their formula, making decent blues rock music. Yes, I know the 

whole rebellious schtick is self-indulgent, being that they do what 

they wanna do, etc., but I meant, they never produced some barely-even-

music artistic piece of crap halfassedly, like so many other bands.



Sure, you could say "Their Satanic Majesties Request" is a self-

indulgent piece of crap, but I happen to like it quite a bit and it's 

not too different from their other stuff.



"2000 Man" is a great tune off "Satanic", covered decently by a punk 

band called the Groovie Ghoulies and "Summer Romance" off the 1981 

"Emotional Rescue" is a great tune covered by another punk band called 

New Bomb Turks. If you listen to both cover tunes, without any prior 

knowledge of the Rolling Stones, you'd swear they were from the same 

album, probably made in the late '70's. And yet, those two songs span 

almost 20 years.



Point being, their "artsy-fartsy" stuff *and* their later "dud" 

material are still, basically, the same great kind of rock and roll as 

ever.



Now, THAT was a tangent, Dan!
― , Thursday, 22 March 2001 01:00 (twenty-five years ago)  

ANYHOW, lots of replies. First of, I think it's "ludicrious" to claim that anyone who thinks that the Stones AREN'T consistent is wrong. You like them. I generally do not. End of story. It's like me telling the entirety of the Manics thread that they are idiots because several of them preferred EMG to THB. I mean, clearly I disagree so vehemently that I could spit blood out my mouth thinking about it, but they aren't being ludicrious or stupid. It's just what they think.

The Stones to me are a great singles band when they were good, but their albums tended to bore me. And yes, Kris has a great point: they were designed to be indulgent masturbatory rock. You could make a case that all rock is meant to do that - I mean, can someone please explain to me what albums are if NOT indulgent? You aren't exactly curing cancer if you're doing music, despite loads of artists' insistance that if you sing about changing the world, it is the same as doing something about it... ;)

And no, it did not take the Stones, for me, 20 albums to wear out their welcome. They wear it out, for me, about halfway through Hot Rocks. If the dadrock band is not called "MANICS" or "WHO", I am not interested, to give full disclosure. I only like the Stones in theory, because Mick Jagger is such a talentless, ugly man that it's fascinating - it's the ultimate triumph of someone who just really WANTED to be famous tricking the world into making him famous, based solely on personality. That's a kick ass thing, and he's great and fabulous for it; if he wasn't a "singer" he'd have been a tv presenter or actor, just because he really wanted to be a star. It of course works both ways - Mick might be ugly and unable to hit a note with a hammer, but the rest of the band are so dull that no one would've bought them without Mick.

As for FT: what are you talking about, "when you factor in all the contributors..."? As far as I can tell, 90% of any activity on this site comes from Tom. What, because you, Solinger, posted a Destiny's Child piece (which, I might add, is like the 5th piece on that song on NYLPM - can we give it a rest people? At least review a DIFFERENT DC song, look for their album on Napster or something), suddenly it's all pop and sunshine and glory? Tom does post a lot about pop music because there is a lot about pop music on this site and the contributors here are LAZY SODS, including myself, who don't write anything a good portion of the time. I mean, what is Pop Eye if not about Pop? Poor Tom, getting maligned on being a wuss rocker when he does so much work. :)

And where do I fit in, not really liking the Stones and REALLY hating the Smiths? :)

as far as the albums go, i was trying to be fair to both the manics and the stones. clearly you could give or take albums, depending on your particular opinion!

the stones have accumulated a great "legend" over the years and, going back to the weezer thread, very little of it fuels my interest in the group. besides jagger and everything surrounding him, who is a source of personal inspiration.

my comments about f.t. were meant to be taken as tongue-in-cheek. clearly none of us would be here, that is to say in this forum, if it weren't for tom and his ideas about pop.

and you fit in as that very rare hybrid, the manics-who worshipper. ;)

As for me being a party-pooper -- hm, you mean my disdain for singles last year, or my disdain in general? ;-)

Woops, was that fontswitch my fault? I forgot to close the endtag. I just thought it screwed up my message, but it appears to be screwing up everyones?? I just ended the tag, so maybe it'll look normal again?

A long time ago, galaxies away, I went through a brief period of trying to like them, but everything about them rubbed me the wrong way: voice, style, lyrics, attitude, general crankiness. I just couldn't stand them -- they always sounded like a glorified dumb bar- band. I gave up, and then I realized that it's okay to dislike bands that rock critics think are classic.

And I like the Smiths, so I guess that makes me a pussy.

Some further thoughts: for me The Stones are year zero, i don't care about Elvis or any other blues guys they ripped off. and with year zero's you just need a lot of mythology, I would say mythology + intensity + riffs = rock 'n roll. Now regardless of The Stones becoming old farts, I immediatly forget when I put on "Beggar's Banquet" or "Let it "Bleed", for that moment you live in that record and what you get is: psychotic cops cracking skulls, cities burning, lots of knife-pulling, mountains of drugs, under-age girls, armies of rapists flooding the streets, the danger of getting hit by a stray bullit at any moment. Now, in real life I'm a very sweet, liberal, no- violent guy, but this shit excites me. :) Anyone remember the way Guy Pellaert drew them in "Rock Dreams"? A bunch of English dandy's dressed up in SS uniforms drinking tea with naked little girls on their laps. So you see why I don't really find The Smiths very interesting ;)

With the Stones though, the cult of Mick n' Keef is far more important than the actual music. The court cases, publicity stunts, Brian Jones' death, Altamont etc all loom large over the music. The press seem to perpetuate this to such a ridiculous level - I mean who wants to hear about Altamont again and again? If you strip all this away and get back to the music it's pretty obvious that Jagger is a fairly average singer and that a lot of their material lacks the kind of excitement that you might expect it would have if you'd read about it first.

Also I was talking more about the mythology in the music itself, the images of the lyrics (although eventually the spilled out into the real world). All those tales of debauchery eventually become stale, though Nick Kent's 'Twilight Babylon'(in The Dark Stuff) is a great read about the Stones in the 70s, very sick and amusing. Also some brilliant characterizations esp. of Mick 'n Bianca Jagger (man, did he see through them :)

As for Rock Dreams, it's a great book but the whole Godstar decadence trip on the Stones didn't wash with me. It would have worked better for Led Zep I think. Generally though it makes the best case for classic rock and pop of any book out there - some of the images are just magnificent, capturing everything you need to know about a star in one image (the Brian Wilson one stands out).

aside from the odd single ("under my thumb" may be my favourite), a ho-hum dud i wouldn't bother thinking about if they weren't so acclaimed. stiff and wooden rhythm section, mechanical faux-blues vocals. give me the stooges any day. "hand in glove," "handsome devil," or "what she said" are infinitely heavier, more biting, harder rocking, and more dangerous (since when is macho more threatening than effeminate?). in fact, the idea of the stones, an institution as thoroughly mainstream as kellogg's corn flakes, being threatening at all is positively hilarious.

ah well. better get back to stephin merritt and iancu dumitrescu.

I'm prepared to throw my theory out, although since i was re-reading The Dark Stuff I noticed how Kent was fascinated by Mozzer's fear for thugs, crowds and rude violent behaviour (I put 2 and 2 together and built myself a hypothesis, nothing to serious, so I'll take those comments on the wooden rhythm section & the heavyosity of The Smiths with a pinch of salt).

"Oh, I bet they'd be billionaire marrionette ghouls by now..."

oh yeah no doubt he plays this song differently than the 60s/70s when he was chomping down on the rhythm all the time. back then there was a simpler division of labor. now they call it the "weave" where they're constantly and intuitively trading voices. keith's arthritis has taken away a lot of dexterity, and the larger ensemble does a lot of gap-filling, but at the same time there is something even more primal going on where they use rhythm and volume and timing. because of their age it sometimes doesn't *look* like they're doing it. gosh i just love this band.

i went both nights at metlife -- one of them (ironically the one with the much better seats) i made use of their "lucky dip" web option for fast-fingered fans who want to save some bucks and don't care where they wind up sitting. they pulled out a whole bunch of songs they hadn't played the previous night. some were tour "firsts." i never thought i'd hear "rambler" though. i thought it had gone the way of "brown sugar."

you can kind of tell from ron wood's expression at the end they're just as surprised they pulled it off as anyone else.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouJY75hhOcM

I don’t think I’ve ever been this relaxed

Little Feat mentioned

OT, I had no idea Keith Richards had been living in a suburb in CT for the last 40+ years, and apparently an active member of the community (hence the honors bestowed on him this past week).

I love how the interviewer speaks in the most soft and non-threatening tones possible and keeps repeating Keith's name, kind of how one would speak to a angry dog one was trying to pass by on the street.

OT, I had no idea Keith Richards had been living in a suburb in CT for the last 40+ years, and apparently an active member of the community (hence the honors bestowed on him this past week).

― birdistheword

he also gave up smoking and mostly drinking and has never sounded so coherent

Connecticut First Lady Ann Lamont presented Richards — who moved with his family to the nearby town of Weston in the early ‘90s — with the award. “I’d like to say thank you to you all, and thank you to the state of Connecticut,” Richards said, per The Westport Library. “You kind of get lost for words with something like this around your neck. I’ve been here for 40 years, and it’s been a great place for me. I brought the kids up here. When the kids were young, I said, I have to get the kids out of New York City before they don’t get any fresh air at all. So, we moved up here, and ever since, we’ve had a great life. … I’m incredibly happy about everything, especially things like this, because you don’t get them every day.”

“This is a great building, a wonderful library, which even I didn’t know the full extent of,” said Richards, who wrote two books: his memoir Life and the children’s book Gus & Me: The Story Of My Granddad And My First Guitar. “As Bill was saying earlier, without our books, without knowing things, without knowing their special meaning — this isn’t movies, this is not someone drawing you images. This is a book, and you have the movie in your head. It’s very important that we keep our books unburnt.”

There's a story I was told (or that I saw or read, I can't remember, but I think I was told this) by a producer for some DVD supplement who went up to Connecticut to interview Keith for something. He gets to the estate and is able to just drive up to the front, where Keith answers the door. He's very welcoming and brings the guy in to his living room, where Keith is busy trying to set up a satellite TV system, or something like that. The producer helps him for a while, iirc a couple of hours, just shooting the shit with Keith while they try to get the thing working. And after they succeed Keith turns to him and says, "ok, now who are you and why are you here?"

I remember that story! IIRC, it was somebody working with The Director's Label DVD people, and they were there to get Keith to sign a release for the Stones videos Gondrey(?) directed.

Exactly!!!!! Good memory. I know I interviewed a bunch of those people, so I couldn't remember if it was on a commentary track or from one of my interviews. I'm guessing commentary track.

I love how the interviewer speaks in the most soft and non-threatening tones possible

The interviewer is Whispering Bob Harris - he spoke like that to everyone, even when doing a piece directly to camera.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DJSbA5RgEs

(or even facing off against Lindsey Buckingham and Mick Fleetwood)

Bob Harris is 28 in the Keith clip.

28 going on 54

Keith's house is very visible from one of the most popular trails in the Devil's Den nature preserve in Weston… it is a weird looking house, I don't have the necessary command of architecture to describe it… he's lived in this house far far longer than he's lived anywhere else…he had this house at the same time he had taht penthouse on the Tower Records block on 4th and broadway, but he sold the latter I think in the early 00s…

Does he participate in the town community? I live in the town next to weston, and his daughters went to the one public school everyone in that town goes to…I don't know of anyone saying he's been seen at the fair they hold in Weston each year, there is no downtown to speak of in weston, but his brother in law — i spose this must be Patti Hanson's brother? or the husband of her sister?— has a restaurant in nearby ridgefield which Keith hangs out at sometimes… a guy I know once was leaving a restaurant in ridgefield, and saw what at first he thought was a homeless person, and as that shambling person shambled closer…it wasn't a homeless person, not at all…

the library at which the event took place is very very keen to be associated with music culture… Chris Frantz has hosted many events there, they have a somewhat boringly inclined music festival annually that this year will feature "talks" with Patti Smith, Rollins and a performance from the Wallflowers… I have never seen any version of Gang of Four: three years ago, when King and Burnham had Pajo and Lee? I would have loved to see that, but I wanted to avoid covid. So the library is hosting the first show of this final tour, which will have Ted Leo in the Gill chair and the lady who would do high kicks in Belly in the 90s in the Lee/Allen spot…not as good as the 2022 edition, but chiggers can't be boozers.

Mick doing an amazing job of smearing thinning hair over his pate in that clip above, just top denying-what's-going-on action there

Very into Country Stones lately, Mick's fake American accent is always a treat

it is an odd setlist nerd footnote that i was at the only ever stones show where they opened with midnight rambler

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SlV9AimzUOA

I sing "Dead Flowers" at karaoke often.

Despite having a copy of the Gondry Director's Label DVD somewhere, I've never actually seen the "Like A Rolling Stone" video (probably because Stones' cover is lame). It's very Gondry.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aRYokc3VBC4

Gondry also did a clip for the No Security version of "Gimme Shelter" that hasn't been officially anthologized (this version is a TV RIP)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrQrEgDbSH4

so wait

"Honky Tonk Woman" was only released as a single, and was never on an LP??

TIL while listening to Let It Bleed

Yeah, it was on Through The Past, Darkly (Big Hits 2), which came out about three months before LIB.

so wild

I mean, I own and love that London Singles 3xCD, but I never clocked this

The single was b/w a stripped-down edit of "You Can't Always Get..." that didn't have all the lyrics and no choir overdubs.

Isn't that the case for most of their 60s singles?

yes! the 7" mixes rule which is why I love that London set

"Country Honk" was recorded before "Honky Tonk Women", though i always thought it was the other way around.

also new to me!

jesus this song is great

https://stereogum.com/2495761/hear-the-rolling-stones-secret-new-7-single-rough-and-twisted/music

I only made it about halfway through the song (short attention span), but it sounded OK to me. Their best 21st century music was Blue & Lonesome, a tossed-off set of blues covers, and this has a similar sound and feel. If they can maintain that energy for a whole album of originals, I'll listen.

I had no idea at all that Charlie doesn't play drums on (the song) "It's Only Rock and Roll," and, for that matter, that Bowie sings back-up.

and Jagger and Ronnie cowrote it

Wyman doesn't play bass on it either, it's Willie Weeks. It's kind of interesting the assortment of Stones songs Wyman doesn't play bass on... "Sympathy for the Devil." "Live With Me," "Emotional Rescue" and probably others.

And no Charlie on "Happy," "You Can't Always Get What You Want," "Shine a Light" and ... "Tumbling Dice"?

's kind of interesting the assortment of Stones songs Wyman doesn't play bass on... "Sympathy for the Devil." "Live With Me," "Emotional Rescue" and probably others.

oh yeah, there's a lot -- look at Exile credits.

Watts is on "Tumbling Dice."

xp Charlie is on "Tumbling Dice" expect for one tricky section that Jimmy Miller plays on. Wyman doesn't play bass on it though!

i went to the link and it's just a video of somebody cleaning a toilet?

I was trying to think of what Stones songs Keith doesn't play on. "Winter" from Sticky Fingers is one.

and you can tell which are the Mick Taylor cowrites for which he earned no credit ("Sway," "Moonlight Mile").

"It's Only Rock'n'Roll" was cut during the sessions for ILM's belovedly memed I've Got My Own Album To Do by Ronnie Wood.

Stones songs Keith doesn't play on

Aside from the Mick Taylor songs mentioned, "Stop Breaking Down" and "Heaven" are two.

Looking more deeply into this, I had no idea Wyman does not play bass on "Jumpin' Jack Flash," "Stray Cat Blues," or "Street Fighting Man" either. Starting to see a pattern here where most of my favorite Stones basslines were played by Keith.

Yeah! But then consider so many of those pre-1969 bass lines, plus "All Down the Line," "Miss You," "Worried About You," etc.

Thank goodness he did play on "(Si Si) Je Suis un Rock Star." That would've been a huge disappointment otherwise.

"Too Much Blood" is just Jagger, Sly & Robbie, and Keith's guitar tech, who was instructed to "play like Andy Summers".

"Shine a Light" has no Keith, no Charlie and (disputedly) no Wyman - Mick Taylor is the credited bassist but Wyman claims it was him.

Wyman also has claimed for decades he wrote the JJF riff.