Best song on "Sticky Fingers"

This has always been my favorite Stones album. I voted "Sway", but it was a tough choice.

sway

(michael morley 'samples' this song to great effect on an old Gate alb)

Too damn hard! I've gotta dig this out & do some serious listening before I canmake a call on this one

Far from perfect: the sequence from "Wild Horses" to "You Gotta Move" blows, and I'm not fond of the terrible organ part in "I Got The Blues." But the sequence from "Sister Morphine" to "Moonlight Mile" is beyond perfect.

"Sway" over "Dead Flowers". My least favorite of the canonical Stones albums.

"Sway" and "Bitch" are pretty awesome.

Sway, Bitch, or any of the last three. Leaning towards Sister Morphine. Love the sound of this record, sleazy and glamorous at once. Also love the intro to Can't You Hear Me Knocking.

inclined toward "Brown Sugar"; coulda sworn we'd done this before & I'd gone with "Sway" but "Brown Sugar" is a flexible song: fun & easy both to change words & rhythm w/o breaking the song. I.e. I do a great nursery rhyme version of it, wherein exclaiming "brown sugar!" isn't riddled with creepiness. Also the lyric is deliciously ambiguous, as has been discussed many times: it's camp so you figure he's pranking racists, but you're not really sure of that (at least I'm not).

my fav stones, voted for Can't You Hear Me Knocking?

wild horses - sometimes I think it's their best song

My least favorite of the canonical Stones albums.

i love it, but i think i agree. i listen to a lot of 2nd tier stuff way more. i still love every song here except "sister morphine" and "i got the blues" (though it was pretty awes when they whipped this one out when i saw them in '99), and i'm prone to skipping "wild horses"

i'm thinking between "dead flowers" and "sway"

it's easy to forget how shit-hot "brown sugar" it is after the 738th time you hear it.

sister morphine, esp. from when that terrific electric guitar starts.

Sway by a landslide.

bitch

"can't you hear me knocking". "wild horses" kinda plods for me, but i lurve the burritos' version

"wild horses" kinda plods for me, but i lurve the burritos' version

Other way round for me

Dead Flowers

worst song is easily I Got the Blues, which is just terrible and unnecessary

DF otoh is pretty much my favorite Stones song - I like to think of it as being sung from the point of view of young Mick Jagger and directed at old Mick Jagger (if that makes any sense)

love all the love for 'sway'

I also love 'wild horses' and 'bitch'

Wow, what a track listing - need to dig this out immediately

I can't remember the context, but I heard "Moonlight Mile" used in something that made me notice and love it in a way I never had before. Now I count it as one of my absolute favorite Stones tracks.

It's hard for me to unravel Jagger's performance on "Dead Flowers": why does Mick ham it up as much as he does? He knows how to pull off this sound without going all cornball. Is it a commentary on country music? Is it a joke on Gram Parsons?

seems like i remember it being used somewhere, too, and according to wikipedia "The track was used extensively during the final episode of the first part of the HBO series The Sopranos' sixth season, "Kaisha," as well as giving its title to and being used in the 2002 motion picture Moonlight Mile. "

not what i was thinking btw

i like mick's hamminess on Dead Flowers ... but it is an interesting question -- are there outtakes of that song where he sings it straight?

I recall Keef noting in interviews somewhere that Mick always had a problem with country stuff and couldn't do it straight for some reason, citing Dead Flowers and Faraway Eyes as examples. Like, its not a persona he felt comfortable inhabiting. Which is kinda weird considering how comfortable Mick was with trying to be black.

Yeah, it wasn't Sopranos or the movie of the same name. I wish I could remember what it was. xxp

yeah, "Faraway Eyes" is another good example. He pulls it off ok on "Factory Girl", though that's more folky than honky tonk.

From Mick's 1995 interview with Rolling Stone:

WENNER:
You do “Dead Flowers” on this record. You put on this kind of loopy, country voice.
JAGGER:
I love country music, but I find it very hard to take it seriously. I also think a lot of country music is sung with the tongue in cheek, so I do it tongue in cheek. The harmonic thing is very different from the blues. It doesn’t bend notes in the same way, so I suppose it’s very English, really. Even though it’s been very Americanized, it feels very close to me, to my roots, so to speak.

is there a thread for British country rock? might make a fun mixtape.

got to be "sway"

i've got a lot of love for "dead flowers" (one of the first songs i learned on guitar!), and "can't you hear me knocking" is epic until it gets to the santana bit, but "sway" is 100% monster. feels weird to vote for a stones song with no keef but mick&mick just killed this one.

btw "i got the blues" is grebt you jerks

i like the santana bit in "knocking" ... it does santana better than santana!

but i'm allergic to santana

The hook and melody of "Dead Flowers" are so good -- and so worthy of Jones, Williams, or Hag -- that I never feel like Jagger's performance is mean-spirited.

townes does a nice version of 'Dead Flowers'

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBwC7Qzljso&feature=related

yeah, i kinda wonder if Jagger thought the song would be too much of a downer if he sang it straight up. evidence of the song's downer-ness: townes' version! (great version, though).

bitch

had never heard "sway" until now - just always passed this album by, heard it was sort of where the wheels started coming off & already knew the hits

had never heard "sway" until now

!!!

if this poll reaches just one person who has never heard "sway," ILM will have served its purpose

I'm not going to vote in this poll since I've known "Brown Sugar" & "Wild Horses" and "Sister Morphine" and "Dead Flowers" for years but a lot of people seem to think "Sway" is the equal of them all but I'd have to get to know it, really, over time. "Wild Horses" musically is just so great but I don't think it's really the best performance from Jagger - this is one of those Stones jams that might have been best served by being turned over to another singer, only they didn't work that way. "Brown Sugar" is that. fucking. hook, plus Jagger just murdering it in the verses - always kinda hated that chorus though to be honest. that leaves "sister morphine," undersung on this thread, and "dead flowers," which, ok, hammy a little, but what a song! townes's version is incredible. still, I got junkie blood, "sister morphine" is probably my favorite of these

the best songs on this album -

Brown Sugar
Can't You Hear Me Knocking?
Bitch
Dead Flowers
Moonlight Mile

i like wild horses but its another track where jaggers voice is too weak to do it justice imho...

listened to this on the way into work this morning, for the first time in ages, and it sounded GREAT. think i've always underrated this alb a bit 'cos of what comes before and after, but i'm not sure now i don't prefer this to BEGGARS BANQUET or GOAT'S HEAD SOUP, both of which i've played to death
things that struck me - this is prob their most 'guitar solo-ey' rec (which is fine by me), mick taylor just slays throughout (i'm guessing its him playing that lovely country rock solo on 'Dead Flowers', sure as shit ain't keith ).
- the stones are absolute masters at building a song - and an album - to a climax; the way that THAT riff comes in halfway through 'Moonlight Mile', in combo w/ the strings, is just stunning, so exciting. and the singing on 'Sway' - so emotional! - is anything but 'weak'.

Sway.

"WENNER:
You do “Dead Flowers” on this record. You put on this kind of loopy, country voice.
JAGGER:
I love country music, but I find it very hard to take it seriously. I also think a lot of country music is sung with the tongue in cheek, so I do it tongue in cheek. The harmonic thing is very different from the blues. It doesn’t bend notes in the same way, so I suppose it’s very English, really. Even though it’s been very Americanized, it feels very close to me, to my roots, so to speak."

theres a diff between lightly tongue in cheek and sounding like youre almost taking the piss.

But fuck it, it's a great song.

Well, points to him for being honest, but I do have to say it does prevent me enjoying it...

Doesn't bother me, I expect Jagger to be, uh, playful on occasions

Playful, yes. "Yeehaw boy, (Spit) Ding!!" no.

yeah, keith just sings (presumably overdubbed at a later date) backup vocals on Sway right?

Jagger also gets a guitar credit, I assume for the electric rhythm part.

i think people that were complaining about the "Santananess" on "can't you hear me knocking" are missing the point - that they're actually even better musicians than often given credit and could pull off that untypically Stones sound and do it so well. the beginning of that song is as tough as they ever sounded, too, imo. jus' sayin'

― If you can believe your eyes and ears (outdoor_miner), Thursday, June 10, 2010 11:24 AM Bookmark

No, this is exactly what's wrong with it. Showy versatility is one of the most irritating musical qualities a band can have, and part of what's good about the Stones is that they generally avoid it. Plus it's not really that good.

i'd probably let it slide if the awesome intitial part of the song wasn't so damned short!!

Here's the bit:

JAGGER: People don’t know that Keith wasn’t there making it. All the stuff like “Moonlight Mile,” “Sway.” These tracks are a bit obscure, but they are liked by people that like the Rolling Stones. It’s me and [Mick] playing off each other – another feeling completely, because he’s following my vocal lines and then extemporizing on them during the solos. That’s something Jeff Beck, to a certain extent, can do: a guitar player that just plays very careful lead lines and listens to what his vocalist is doing.

where was keef for those sessions? just nodded off in the corner?

Rhetorical question, right?

WENNER: There’s underwear on the back. Is that you?
JAGGER: No. It’s one of Andy’s... protégés is the polite word we used to use, I think.
WENNER: All right. That’s the news in this interview. Why does “Brown Sugar” work like mad?
JAGGER: That’s a bit of a mystery, isn’t it? I wrote that song in Australia in the middle of a field. They were really odd circumstances. I was doing this movie, “Ned Kelly,” and my hand had got really damaged in this action sequence. So stupid. I was trying to rehabilitate my hand and had this new kind of electric guitar, and I was playing in the middle of the outback and wrote this tune.
But why it works? I mean, it’s a good groove and all that. I mean, the groove is slightly similar to Freddy Cannon, this rather obscure ‘50s rock performer – Tallahassee Lassie or something. Do you remember this? “She’s down in F-L-A.” Anyway, the groove of that – boom-boom-boom-boom-boom – is “going to a go-go” or whatever, but that’s the groove.

WENNER: And you wrote it all?
JAGGER: Yeah.
WENNER: This is one of your biggest hits, a great, classic, radio single, except the subject matter is slavery, interracial sex, eating pussy...
JAGGER: [Laughs] And drugs. That’s a double-entendre, just thrown in.
WENNER: Brown sugar being heroin?
JAGGER: Brown sugar being heroin and –
WENNER: And pussy?
JAGGER: That makes it... the whole mess thrown in. God knows what I’m on about on that song. It’s such a mishmash. All the nasty subjects in one go.

Insightful

No, this is exactly what's wrong with it. Showy versatility is one of the most irritating musical qualities a band can have, and part of what's good about the Stones is that they generally avoid it. Plus it's not really that good.

― hills like white people (Hurting 2),

i feel the way you do about technocracity, in general. but i don't get that from the part of CUHMK in question. and i beg to differ, it is a pretty great bit, IMO

speaking of the stones this looks cool: http://www.collectorsmusicreviews.com/announcements/new-rolling-stones-on-scorpio/

oh my! wish there were some sort of details. i LOVE that early stuff, like the bright lights big city "boot", and was just thinkin' how it's a shame it's never seen official light of day

"Showy versatility is one of the most irritating musical qualities a band can have..."

Really? I dont really know what "showy versatility" is, but it sounds like something I would like.

this doesn't look to be totally complete but ...
Rolling Stones - The Genuine Black Box 1961 - 1974
I -THE REBELS ARRIVE
1.On Your Way To School
2.Johnny B.Goode
3.Little Queenie
4.Beautiful Delilah
5.You Can't Judge A Book By The Cover
6.Bright Lights,Big City
7.Diddley Daddy
8.Honey,What ユs Wrong?
9.Roadrunner
10.I Want To Be Loved
11.Fortune Teller (take 1)
12.Poison Ivy
13.Fortune Teller (take 2)
+ 20 songs

II -SHAKE,HOLLER &RUN
1.High Heeled Sneakers
2.Stewed &Keefed
3.Look What You've Done
4.Tell Me Baby,How Many Times?
5.Meet Me In The Bottom
6.Crackin'Up
7.Congratulations
8.Time Is On My Side
9.Try A Little Harder
10.Some Things Just Stick In Your Mind
+ 20 songs

III -LIVING IN THE STONE AGE
1.19th Nervous Breakdown
2.Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby,Standing in the Shadow?
3.Get Yourself Together I
4.Have You Seen Your Mother,Baby II
5.If You Let Me
6.Yesterday ユs Papers
7.Sometimes Happy, Sometimes Blue
8.Get Yourself Together II
9.We Love You
10.Cosmic Christmas
11.2000 Light Years From Home
12.Gold Painted Nails
13.Did Everybody Pay Their Dues?
14.Child Of The Moon I
+ 10 songs

IV -IT MUST HAVE BEEN THE DEVIL
1.Child Of The Moon II
2.Prodigal Son
3.Family II
4.Still A Fool
5.Give Me A Hamburger To Go (Stuck Out All Alone)
6.Memo From Turner II
7.And I Was A Country Boy
8.Sister Morphine I
9.You Got The Silver
10.Gimme Shelter
+ 9 songs

V -LIFE ON THE RUN
1.Got A Line On You
2.Hillside Blues aka I Don ユt Know The Reason Why
3.Wild Horses
4.Cocksucker Blues
5.Dead Flowers
6.Dancing In The Light
7.Shake Your Hips
8.Leather Jacket
9.Stop Breaking Down
10.Shine a Light
+ 8 songs

VI -FOR NOW,SO LONG
1.Let It Rock
2.I AIn't Lying
3.Potted Shrimps
4.Aladdin Story
5.Loving Cup II
6.All Down The Line II
7.I Don't Care
8.Exile On Main Street Blues
9.Winter
10.Criss-Cross Man
+ 10songs

Huh, I own a couple of the older Black Box releases and these are completely different

missed this one. would have voted 'dead flowers' in a heartbeat. i'm actually kind of obsessed with that song and its veneer of joviality masking grim subject matter.

though 'sway' is classic for sure, and i have no problem with it winning. love that kind of messy sing-along chorus and that guitar solo that snakes in out of nowhere at around 1:35.

http://i.imgur.com/ilCa1sJ.jpg

Posted on fb by one of my Muscle Shoals friends. It cost $1009.75 to record "Wild Horses."

I don't remember if I voted in this, but it's probably "Dead flowers" with "Bitch" as runner-up.

neither of those are 'sway' tho

it's just that evil liiiiiiife

Dead Flowers is one of best Stones' songs on any album.

however many times you say that doesn't make it 'sway'

sway has half the number of chords as wild horses but is twice as good

Both songs are really amazing. Dead Flowers always stuck with me a lot though, it seems to capture something essential about the band, the joy and sorrow of degeneracy

don't try to be reasonable

I stick by this:

"DF otoh is pretty much my favorite Stones song - I like to think of it as being sung from the point of view of young Mick Jagger, directed at old Mick Jagger"

I love how it communicates something real even though its sung in an even thicker than usual fake patois, and features a chorus with a "little susie." Mick Jagger's strange alchemy

YOU KNOW AH COULD NEVER BE AH-LOOOOONNNE

okay just played sticky fingers again

i won't make it, but there's an argument for DF being its nadir

That's a provocative suggestion

I can see how it the song wouldn't work for some people. It's also jammed in a weird spot on the album between two songs with really different moods

Mick Taylor's solo by itself sez otherwise.

it's just that evil liiiiiiife

― the Rain Man of nationalism. (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, February 24, 2017 9:50 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

isn't it "demon wine??"

Demon life

Posted on fb by one of my Muscle Shoals friends. It cost $1009.75 to record "Wild Horses."
― Ⓓⓡ. (Johnny Fever), Monday, February 20, 2017 1:19 AM (five days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

How much is this in 2017 money?

$6,681.38

Sway
Sway
Sway
Sway
In the morning
*Cedric the Entertainer voice*
Wake yo ass up!

Anyway, I love stuff like that, particularly pictures of tracking sheets/tape boxes etc.

On sway it's about Taylor's solo which starts with the slide and then transitions

Taylor's my favorite thing about the stones. How he was a vegetarian when he joined (40 years before his time?) and had to eventually leave because he freaked out on drugs ???

What do you mean 40 years before his time?

maybe my mistake but I'm assuming there were more vegetarians in 2011 than in 1971

I'm sure there are no reliable figures on it but there were certainly more hippies in 1971 so...

Might be close tbh xpost

Supposedly it wasn't so much that Taylor freaked out on drugs as it was he felt the Stones were on the precipice of breaking up away, and let Andy Johns talk him into starting a band with Jack Bruce that was going to be the "Cream of the '70s" but ultimately wasn't.

Oh?

I mean who could tell what was really going on in the second half of the 70s anyway

Taylor's drug use was at its worst after he left the Stones.

There's an interview with Taylor & Bruce somewhere on Youtube where both are high as kites.

The cost of recording 'Wild Horses' vs. the cost of recording 'Who's Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses' ...