I just assume every attractive woman ever photographed with Mick has banged him. Why wouldn’t you? That’s one you tell your grandkids about.
“Wook, it’s Winda Wonstadt.”
You would be so interesting to talk to if you knocked it off with the accent.
“Yaw th’ one wivva ak-sent. Oi speak wivva Queen’s Engwish, Oi do.”
You’re unbearable.
ALSO
Who thought Linda was Mick for a couple seconds? They’ve got the same haircut, and Mick would absolutely wear her outfit.
O, those celebrities and their lithe thighs.
“Oi have no idea ‘oo this is.”
Carrie Underwood.
“Oi would.”
Well done. You just do these duets so you have a chance to hit on these women, right?
“An’ cross-demographic marketin’ concerns, but mostly you’re right.”
Good to know. Her name is Carrie and don’t mention American Idol.
“Fanks.”
No one needed to scroll down and find this. It was wrong of me to include in the post. Your anger is justified, and I suggest you take your business to some other Grateful Dead-themed website that goes weeks without mentioning the Dead. I’m ashamed of myself.
I can make this right.
Y’know, thinking about it: Keith’s cock does not make it right. I don’t know why I originally believed it would. Again: all of this is my fault. You shouldn’t have to sit through such silliness. You’re better than this.
Careful, Mick. I think she’s a druid or something.
“Utter bosh, that is. Wuv-wee wedhead.”
What if you just imitated an American accent?
“Well, hello dere. I be–”
NOT A BLACK AMERICAN ACCENT! It’s not 1971 anymore, man.
“We ‘ad sev’ral numbah one ‘its where Oi pretended t’ be a black man.”
Is there any way I can get you to speak without your accent?
“You don’ loik me ak-sent?”
Now you’re leaning into it.
“You evuh b’n to Baaaa-wee?”
Where?
“Baaa-wee. The ay-wind.”
…
The island of Bali.
“Whot Oi said, mate.”
I’ve never been to Bali.
“It’s wuv-wee.”
We’re gonna keep the dialogues to a minimum.
This was 1981. The first all-stadium tour, and an all-daytime tour, too. It was cheaper to play in the afternoon–you didn’t need to tote your lighting rig around the country, for one thing–and so some of the gigs began as early as noon. The Rolling Stones did not employ a Jumbotron, and so Mick dressed this way in an effort to be seen. You’re not meant to look at this outfit up close. It’s made to be viewed from Section 322 of Soldier Field.
There’s no excuse for the quality men’s hosiery. I’m gonna call that shade “peach.”
The ’81 American tour–they didn’t bother naming it, like they would later productions–was 50 shows in 80 days and in addition to being the first all-stadium tour, it was the first sponsored tour in Rock history. Jovan Musk ponied up for the right to say, I don’t know, “Instead of showering, Ronnie Wood sprays his taint with Jovan Musk.” Something like that.
This was also Bobby Keys’ first appearance with the Stones in eight years. He had grown so close to the band during the late 60’s and early 70’s that he began to think himself a Rolling Stone. But Bobby Keys was not a Rolling Stone, and so having room service bring up enough Dom Perignon to fill the bathtub was a poor choice. Bobby was put in a cab and sent to the airport. Mick’s direct orders. The help needs to know its place. But Bobby wasn’t wicked, just excitable, and everyone missed him, so he came back in ’81 and didn’t leave again until his death in 2014.
Keith may be going to jail, but he’s not going without his scarf. There are also, if history is our guide, nine or ten other scarfs secreted on his person. And then there’s Mick.
“You woik me wuffles?”
I told you not to talk.
“Wook at me hawwwwse.”
Goddammit. Nice horse, I guess.
“‘E’s named Waffles.”
Waffles?
“No, Waffles. After th’ gentleman-thief.”
Oh, Raffles.
“Wight. Waffles.”
I’m, like, 85% sure this joke doesn’t work in print.
“WIDE, WAFFLES!”
Stop that!
Mick’s skinnier than she is.
Mick made a run at her. Mick hit on her, Mick hit on her hard, and for all we know Mick got in there. The fact that she’s “America’s Sweetheart” or whatever only made Mick try harder.
This is the Steel Wheels tour in ’89, and Mick is wearing a toppermost. This was their first tour since ’81; they had spent the past eight years sniping at one another in the press and making poor albums, but now the Stones were back, baby. The biggest concert tour in history, and also a new record which wasn’t too bad. (Legacy acts can hit the road without a record now, and the Dead always did, but the Stones needed a new album to promote.)
Did I say big?
You see the rightmost spire, the one that gets cut off at the top? The FAA made ’em put a flashing red light on it, because otherwise planes would crash into the Rolling Stones. The stage was 280 feet across and weighed 180 tons, requiring twelve trucks to haul.
You made those numbers up.
I did.
Why?
I don’t care exactly how big a fucking stage was in 1989, and no one else should, either.
Yeah, okay.
A reminder: this is how the band performed in 1976:
I’m sorry, but I must drop into bullet points for this bullshit.
What are you doing, Billy Preston?
Oh, no, Billy Preston.
Do not.
Do not that.
If you performed on a stage that shape nowadays, conspiracies would abound.
It folded up.
And opened when the show started, the band hidden within.
Like a flower.
You may guess as to whether or not it worked perfectly every night.
You may also guess as to how the fuck anyone on that stage heard anyone else.
But this might be the stage that most succinctly sums up the band:
This is the A Bigger Bang tour, which lasted from 2005 to 2007; Mick achieved the Full Jagger on this endeavor. The Stones had always sold every part of the animal. First, there is the Product. Cannot have a Promotional Tour without a Product. Then there are tickets, and if you are willing to pay more for better seats and/or access to the band, then the band is willing to allow you the freedom to do so. At the concert, you may buy souvenirs Byzantine in their variety, but spartan in their branding: the Rolling Stones will slap those fucking lips on anything. Yes, the Dead is bad about slapping Stealies on shit, but no one beats the Stones for licensing their iconography to janky crap.
Oofah.
Anyway, while you could purchase any Stones-branded tchotchke you desired, you could not bootleg the show. This is an old Stones rule–an old everyone-in-Rock-and-Roll-except-the-Dead rule, to be precise–because it was believed bootlegging cut into official revenues and confused the teens. If the kids were gonna buy a live album, it would come from us, the Stones thought, and so there’s been a live release for every one of their tours; they’ve all been deadly except for Get Your Ya-Yas Out.
And a movie, too. Gimme Shelter (the one where someone died)and Let’s Spend The Night Together (the one Hal Ashby directed)and At The Max (the one in IMAX format) and Shine A Light (the one Scorsese directed) and Ladies and Gentlemen, the Rolling Stones (the one they played the best in) and bunch of others.
That was it. Nothing else to sell, right?
Look again:
Do you see where Mick found more money yet? Do you have it?
Well there you go and don’t it make you feel so good with the teens–chickies, man!–down front clamoring and caterwauling and soiling themselves, piss running down the floors of the auditorium–Li’l Anthony anna GOTdamned Imperials nevuh fucked lahk we dew, Bobby Keys sweats out backstage–and the cops are in their fish-front hats downstage with wild eyes praying to St. George: Help a white man in need; it stunk off them, but Mick didn’t notice (Mick never noticed cops) going up the steps via flashlight beam here they are here they are here they are, Houston (or wherethefuckever), the Rolling Stones, the Rolling Stones.
There was something about the band that forced writers to produce paragraphs like that.
Shake Your Hips
They started as a Blues band. The hip English kids were into the Blues in the early 60’s. At first, the UK had to import all of their Blues, possibly under the terms of the Lend/Lease Act, as the British had not treated their black people cruelly enough to have produced the Blues. (Luckily for music lovers, the British government did treat white people cruelly enough to produce Punk.) Rather quickly, the island’s musicians said to themselves, “I could do that,” and they did so, terribly. No English person has ever played the Blues right: the English don’t get the Blues, they cause them. There’s an inherent disunion. Not Clapton, not Jeff Beck, not one of the public school wankers.
And, you know, there’s the meeting on the bus where Mick notices Keith’s bundle of hip records, or maybe it’s the other way around, and the filthy apartment with the slobbish roommate nicknamed Nanker Phelge. The Marquee Club. Pleased to meet you, Mr. Oldham. Stu, can we talk to you over here? The Crawdaddy and Decca. 1963. All the men in their jackets and ties.
Charlie’s not mad, he’s just disappointed. Keith, on the other hand, is furious.
Casino Boogie
Enduring beauty of Exile #181: Mick’s incomprehensibility. Go ahead, put the record on your turntable and glue it down, listen to just Exile on loop for the rest of your days: you’ll still never figure out what the fuck Mick’s on about. He picks his spots, though, bobbing like Ali deep in the mix and POW hitting you with Judge and jury walk out hand in hand and then sinking back into wide-mouthed flipperty-yamp.
There are lyric sheets available, but I still hold that the man’s just making noises half the time.
Tumbling Dice
Younger Enthusiast, let me tell you about a rarified level of the Rock Star status stratus: the Tax Exile. This was an exclusive club. First, you had to be British. The tax rates for high-earners were so onerous–upwards of 90%–as to be confiscatory. (And I’m saying this as a goddamned socialist who actually does want to start confiscating wealth. Especially since the rates didn’t apply to real estate and holdings and stocks and all that other old money posh fucker rich person shit. The taxes just applied to income. And that’s racism, man.) So the Rock Stars had to leave, pausing briefly to write nasty songs about Members of Parliament, and find a safe haven for themselves and their sweet, sweet cash. (But, seriously: 90% is fucked up. Denmark’s top rate is only 36% and they’re full-on Leninists.)
And so Britain sent forth its young men once more, to plunder and poke and yell at locals for not speaking English and crash many fine automobiles. Los Angeles was popular, but you’d run into Rod Stewart. Bowie went to Switzerland because David Bowie was far more European than most Americans remember him as being. Cat Stevens went to Rio because Cat Stevens was always a fucking weirdo.
The South of France. Yes. We’ll get chateaus. That sounds quite pleasant. We’ll do that, yes?
A visa can be procured. This is no problem. Regardless of past busts, or even convictions, and certainly with no regard for low gossip about one’s character. It can be handled. There will be a fee. The fee will be exponentially less than the price of remaining in London, but it is not small. This is no problem. Keith and Anita (who’s pregnant) are deep into junkiedom and sloppy beyond mortal limits, disappearing into and out of rehab centers and getting hassled by the cops every time they leave the house. This is no problem.
Mick and his new wife Bianca move to Paris. Suitable arrangements are found for the other Stones, and Keith is procured a villa on the Cote d’Azur called Nellcôte. It is a grand home in the Belle Époque style, with 16 rooms and a pool and a view of the sea. Keith proclaimed the house “cool” and immediately filled it with guitars and drug dealers.
Nellcôte would go on to be the most famous vacation home in Rock history.
Sweet Virginia
Don’t talk to me about Brian Jones. Toad-faced little creep with a dumb haircut. Couldn’t write a song and never learned how to swim. He’s beating women in heaven now, Brian Jones is.
Torn And Frayed
The Dead went to Europe in ’72, and the Stones came here; it was like the continents exchanged dirtbags. The Stones’ tour was a different caliber, though; a better class of people, doncha know. Jackie Onassis’ sister and Truman Capote and Terry Southern and all the fabulous people, darling. And writers who actually wrote something, too, and a mid-tour stop at the original Playboy Mansion in Chicago.
And riots. The Stones used to cause riots everywhere they went.
These guys:
Those friendly grandpas! They made the little girls piss their pants and the little boys get to fighting. Everything changes; nothing lasts.
Sweet Black Angel
“Oi, Keef.”
“Grumblemumblecoughcough.”
“Oi’m finkin’ ’bout writin’ a sawng ’bout Angela Davis. Th’ Black Panfer chick.”
“Do it.”
“Oi’m finkin’ ’bout puttin’ th’ N-word in th’ sawng.”
“Trus’ yer instinc’, Mick.”
Loving Cup
STOP ENUNCIATING THE GODDAMNED WORDS, PHOSH. Yes, technically the line is “What a beautiful buzz,” but Mick pronounces the word “buzz” with a long A. No one knows how the fuck he pulled that off but he did. You guys sound like a second-rate gay men’s choir. Try it again with some gum in your mouth.
…
What?
…
You’re pulling my dick.
…
They covered the whole album?
Jesus Christ, they covered the whole album. There’s too much freedom in this country.
Happy
Keef the Immortal. The knockabout urchin with the messy hair and the blonde. The blood-changeling. Mistuh Rockyroll himself. He’s a pirate. He’s a dracula. He’s a cold Italian pizza. He could use some lemon squeeze-a. Just imagine the scent. Someone find Keith. Someone wake up Keith. Someone bail out Keith. What do you mean, there’s no shepherd’s pie?
Who invented Rock and Roll? I do not know. Wasn’t Elvis, that’s for sure. Fat, old Bill Haley? How about Johnny Good Times himself, Ike Turner, playing the fuzz guitar on Rocket 88? Easy enough to say Chuck Berry. It wasn’t him, but it’s easy enough to say he did. I do not know who invented Rock and Roll, and no one else does, either.
But the Rolling Stones invented being a Rock Star.
Ventilator Blues
The album was due. Let It Bleed came out in December of ’69 and it was the middle of 1971 already, which was forever in the music industry of the time. A few tracks had been cut at Mick’s house back in England, Stargroves–houses all have names when it comes to the Stones–but now they needed to get down to it.
The French recording studios were found to be wanting.
Call in the Rolling Truck Stones Thing! Call in Jimmy Miller and Andy Johns to produce! (Both would emerge from the sessions with debilitating drug habits.) We’ll put on the show right here!
So they did. Nellcôte had a basement, a chambered and dank cavern that you’d half-expect to come upon a Minotaur in, and they wired it for sound and waited for Keith. He was putting his boy Marlon to bed. Some nights, that would take all night.
There are swastikas engraved on the faces of the air vents. The locals say that Nazis headquartered here. The locals say a lot of things. The locals rip off the Stones and steal from them and accept their bribes only to pretend no money was exchanged. There are beatings and rapes and people are packed up into cabs and disorbited from the band and John Lennon throws up a whole bottle of red wine on a perfectly lovely rug.
Put the horns down the hall.
Put the piano over there, and the drums in that room. They’re rolling in the truck. Keith will be down any moment.
I Just Want To See His Face
The best choice you can ever make in life is to be fuckable. Smart is good, lucky is better, but fuckable means you get to go to the best parties.
Let It Loose
Nicky Hopkins. Allen Klein. John Jaymes. Marianne Faithful. Spanish Tony. Jim Price. Rupert Louis Ferdinand Frederick Constantine Lofredo Leopold Herbert Maximilian Hubert John Henry zu Löwenstein-Wertheim-Freudenberg, Count of Loewenstein-Scharffeneck. Anita Pallenberg. Freddie Sessler. Sam Cutler. Jo Bergman. Gram Parsons. Andrew Loog Oldham. Tommy Weber. Bianca. Marshall Chess. Bobby GOTdamned Keys.
And Ian Stewart.
All Down The Line
Watch the men all workin’, workin’, yeah. Keep that motor runnin’, yeah. Charlie holds it together, but Charlie follows Keith–this is the way of all great bands, the drummer follows the guitarist–and Keith can’t keep it together, so the groove is raggedy and half-ruined and speeds up as it goes–Rock and Roll is supposed to end faster than it starts, anyway–Christ, it sounds like a bar fight and Mick Taylor’s slide is steel just like a knife is; this is before the gargantuan stages, the backup singers, the support musicians, it’s just the lads and the horns and Nicky and a spotlight and a spotlight and all the cocaine in Texas; no one has any loose skin; no one has hips at all; and high heels and eye makeup and all that throbbing, and that which isn’t kohl is shiny and that which isn’t shiny doesn’t exist, dig: the Stones, baby, the Rolling fuckin’ Stones!
There is something about the band that forces writers to produce paragraphs like that.
Stop Breaking Down
You can’t mix in the mobile. That’s a Rock and Roll Rule, kids. Gotta go to Los Angeles to do the final mixes, and so Mick and Keith dragged the rest of the band–who were both unnecessary and unwelcome in this part of the process–to Los Angeles, where the weather is just as fine as in the South of France and everyone speaks English. Mick Taylor hates America and takes up cocaine to pass the time; this would prove a poor strategic decision. Bill Wyman fucks teenagers and scrapbooks. Charlie Watts takes care of himself.
At one point, Mick and Keith want to hear how the record sounds over the car stereo. They send Ian Stewart to the local radio station with an acetate and called him from the limo.
“Okay, Stu. Play it now.”
Such was the life of the Rock Star.
Shine A Light
It’s about Keith. Mick wrote it about Brian Jones, but it’s about Keith. Hunter write He’s Gone about Lenny Hart, but the tune’s about Pigpen. Songs choose their subjects sometimes.
Soul Survivor
What do you mean “Liz Phair told this joke first?”
Okay, I understand you may not be willing to wade through an hour of demos and outtakes, so for the Stones-reticent: here. Just listen to this one. Tiny bit over four minutes, and all the Stonesy goodness you could want PLUS it contains the immortal line You be Mr. Christian, I’ll be Captain Bligh. What the fuck does that even mean, Mick?
How did anyone ever take more than ten seconds of Dick Cavett? He’s like Alan Alda’s bookish sister. Watch Mick slap away his silly bullshit about Keynesian economics with merely the power of British silence at 17 minutes in.
Hey, look! It’s the songs that weren’t good enough for Goat’s Head Soup! First tune’s a cover of Dobie Gray’s Drift Away and it gets progressively more dire from there. For obsessives only.
Psychedelia was not kind to Charlie Watts, at least not sartorially. Don’t make Charlie Watts wear a caftan with magical sigils all over it. Let Charlie wear his hand-tailored suits.
This was ’67. My high school band, A Bunch Of Guys From France, had more equipment than this; it’s downright adorable. Plus, those are pussy-ass Vox amps and they’re underpowered. No one in that auditorium heard a damned thing.
Let’s see what a real band’s backline looked like in ’67:
Altamont was the best thing that ever happened to the Rolling Stones. Getting busted with naked Marianne Faithful was good, but it didn’t have legs and wasn’t even that scandalous any longer in 1969–all the Rock Stars got busted, man–and the teens down front, the shimmying and swaying teens down front, looked up at Mick and Keith and Charlie and the other two and said, “You keep singing about the Devil. Prove it.”
That’s a terrible paragraph.
Altamont was a success. Think of what might have happened: stampedes, riots, zombie attack. No one got cholera! There were literally no bathroom facilities. Someone should have gotten cholera, but no one did and that is a win for the good guys. Yes, four people died, but two people died at Woodstock and no one blames Mick Jagger for that.
You are missing the point. You are, in fact, missing every point.
Musically, Altamont was not the Rolling Stones’ best showing.
Jesus.
Everyone involved in the Altamont Speedway Free Concert was the stupidest fucking human on the face of the earth. I am aware of the logical impossibility inherent in my statement, and yet I stand by it.
I’ll allow this thesis.
The Grateful Dead were stupid and naive. And entirely complicit: Altamont does not happen without the Dead. They smoothed the way into San Francisco for the Stones, they made all the important introductions, they vouched. Do you know who the soundman at Altamont was? Bear. Do you know who his assistant was? Healy. Altamont doesn’t happen without the Dead. Buuuuuut…
Rock Scully was the worst of ’em all. “The Angels are men of honor,” Rock told the Stones when he visited London in the summer of ’69. The Hells Angels had made an appearance at the Hyde Park show, the free one where Mick wore his poodle frock and recited Shelley, except they were the weird, bland, foreign version of Hells Angels. Some of them rode their scooters to the gig, and others took the bus in. Most motorcycle gangs call themselves “social clubs,” but the London Angels actually were a social club. Any random rugby side could’ve beaten the shit out of them. But the lads wore their jackets with the colorful patches and whatnot, so they got their pictures in the papers. The Stones would have had a good opinion of the “Hells Angels” from their experience.
“The Angels are men of honor,” Rock told the Stones. And then he told the Angels, “We’ll buy you $500 worth of beer if you watch the stage.” This was the worst deal in the history of deals, maybe ever.
Michael Lang was stupid and can-do, and that is a fearful combo. Most folks are stupid and lazy, and that is good for humanity as a whole, but some special sparrows get up real early and work real hard all day, and they’re complete nitwits; those fuckers are dangerous, and Michael Lang was one of ’em, him and those Shirley Temple curls.
The concert was originally planned for Golden Gate Park. This would have been ideal: amenities, logistics, access, public transportation, plus the SFPD could ride through on a phalanx of horses and clear them dirty hippies out after the show was over. The Diggers would distribute food and water, the Hog Farm would handle bad trips and broken ankles, the Mime Troupe would pretend to do stuff. Multiple stages to eliminate between-band downtime. The Airplane, Santana, the Dead, and the Stones–the motherfucking Stones, man–for free in the park! Nice day out, sounds like.
This plan was immediately torpedoed from within via incompetence and macho bullshit. The local planning committee had taken care to go through the City Council to get the permits, because the mayor at the time was a hippie-hatin’ cowboy, but there was a hold-up and so the Stones took charge and–despite the express warnings of the planning committee–called the mayor right up. Golden Gate Park was no longer happening.
A new site was found–this is less than a week before the show, remember, an event that was expected to draw hundreds of thousands of kids–at Sears Point Speedway. This is Sears Point Speedway:
See the embankment on the right? You put the stage there. Push in some dirt with a ‘dozer to level out a platform and lay your scaffolding and plywood on top of that; boom: stage. Ten or twelve feet above the crowd. See all those access roads? This is what’s called an easily policeable property. The location was secured and the production was installed.
Then the deal fell through because–again I remind you–everyone involved with this debacle was the stupidest fucking man on the planet. (I chose my noun with care. No women were included in the decision chain on this one. Altamont was entirely comprised of drugged-up egotists waggling their cocks at one another, metaphorically or literally.) It is Thursday, December 4th. The concert is scheduled for the 6th. “The show must go on” is a maxim, not a suicide pact; the saying isn’t legally binding.
But this is for Rock and Roll, man. It’s for the Stones, maaaaaan. It’s for the kids, maaaaaaaaaaaaaan. If Mick Jagger says it’s safe to surf this beach…well, you know how that one goes.
So Rock and Michael Lang take a helicopter out to some boondock in the San Joaquin Valley to take a look at a racetrack. Now, at this point it should be noted that Michael Lang had no particular ties to either the Stones or to San Francisco, nor had his presence been solicited by either party. Fucker just showed up. The racetrack they are going to is called Altamont, and it is owned by a fellow named Dick Carter. He is broke and desperate and, as befits a character in this story, an utter moron. He has heard on the radio all about the Stones’ free show, and all the troubles finding a location those young men have been having. Dick’s not a Rock and Roll guy, prefers Buck Owens, but he can smell a way out of the hole. Publicity. Spread the name far and wide. Make it so everyone knows Altamont. Calls up the Stones and offers them his track for free. Didn’t know ’em. Fucker just cold-called. Stupidity converges and entwines just as does destiny. Rock and Michael Lang are in the helicopter and they’re over the site and look down and this is what it looked like:
Michael Lang, cherubic Michael, he smiled and his dimples were deep enough to bury your dead in.
“We can do the show here.”
Rock Scully twitched skeletonishly.
“That’s William Blake’s engraving of Lucifer. I think that’s a bad sign, man.”
“We can do it, Rock. It’s for Mick.”
“Where would we even put the stage?”
“Allah will provide.”
This was the man who had produced Woodstock, or at least taken the credit for it, and so Rock agreed. The show must go on.
(That photo is, of course, not Altamont Speedway, but suffice it to say that it’s the worst possible location. Access was inadequate, the facilities were non-existent, and the layout was the opposite of Sears Point; instead of the stage being at the highest point in the venue, it would be at the bottom of an enormous natural basin, which history buffs will recognize as the exact same kind of geography where Custer became famous.)
Melvin Belli was stupid and pompous, but he looked like he was having fun.
Sam Cutler was stupid and reckless and got dumped by the Stones before the sun had risen. Remember what I said about Rock? Well, Cutler might have done that stuff. We’ll never know. Cutler sure got blamed for it, even though…
The Hells Angels were stupid and brutal and all the violence was their fault. It’s tough to blame anyone but the guys who brought pool cues to the party. They knew what they were doing. “Being reasonable” is always an option. Jesus said that, I think.
The Rolling Stones were stupid and arrogant. ’69 was their first modern tour of America. They hadn’t been since ’66, when they played 30-minute sets through tiny amps to shrieking crowds of teeny-boppers, but Rock and Roll was Art now, maaaaaan, and tours were headline news. The Stones broke sales records everywhere, partially because their tickets were around twice as much as any other band’s. Naturally, the Rock Press was besides itself. Rolling Stone called them Capitalists. Mick Jagger! They called him a Capitalist! Bill Graham ranted about them on the radio, about those damn foreigners coming over here and stealing all our blowjobs and cocaine. Ralph Gleason declared them the un-heppest of cats.
And the Stones, don’t forget, were not at Woodstock.
This was not good. The Rolling Stones could not be seen as caring about something as non-cool as money. This was 1969, and Rock Stars did it for the music, or the fans, or the movement, even, but not for the money. A gesture had to be made. Someone suggested lowering the ticket prices, and he was fired immediately. Someone else suggested a free show, and then Mick said, “How about a free show?” and everyone said, “Good idea, Mick,” and wheels became enmotionated.
Mick Taylor had been in the band fifteen minutes–Ian Stewart was still calling him “Nick”–and so did not have the authority to stop the train. No one has ever given two fucks and a shit about Bill Wyman’s opinion about anything, no one ever, not once, and so neither did he have any ability to direct events. If Charlie Watts had refused to play, the show would have been canceled, but Charlie would never do that. Keith Richards is a five-year-old who thinks everything is an adventure, so he wasn’t the one to stop the onrushing disaster. Only Mick Jagger could have.
But he didn’t, and something weird happened when they started playing Sympathy. Something weird always happened when they played that number.
Meredith Hunter was stupid and yes this comes off as victim-shaming but don’t bring a pistol to a concert? And, if you’re a black guy with a blonde girlfriend in 1969, don’t stand next to the Hells Angels. They’re incredibly fucking racist. Again: the Angels are responsible for their own actions, and Hunter did not cause his death. But he didn’t do a lot to prevent it, either.
Chip Monck is stupid and has a stupid fucking name and everyone’s stupid.
I have never listened to Goat’s Head Soup, the 1973 album from the Rolling Stones that the Important Rock Critic community has deemed the beginning of the end for the band. This does not cause me shame, and yet I will rectify this hole in my education. For, like Faust himself, I must possess all man’s knowledges. And one of those knowledges, apprently, is the Stones’ shittiest record.
Here we go.
Dancing With Mr. D
I’ve heard this song before; it’s on the live release from Brussels ’73.
Couldn’t hum a bar of it.
Now that I’m listening to it, I understand why.
This is an exceedingly generic Stones song.
Is there a Rollingstonifier on the latest version of ProTools?
Holy shit, why open the record with this mid-tempo’ed non-riff-adorned miasma?
This song is miasma: it is a fart.
Not even a shit.
This song isn’t bad enough to be shit; its feculence is atmospheric and ephemeral.
I’ve already forgotten it.
100 Years Ago
Oh, no, Mick’s doing his Southern blaccent again.
And Billy fucking Preston.
Billy was also speaking in a Southern blaccent, but for more understandable reasons.
The Stones started their own record company in 72 or 72, around there, and Billy Preston was gonna be their big star, so he got to be on a couple Stones records and tours.
I guess they’re doing a Bitch-type ravey heavy thing here?
Not for me.
Maybe for you.
Not for me.
Coming Down Again
Ooh, pretty.
Oh, wait.
This isn’t the Keith song already, is it?
The Keith song goes on Side Two.
Oh, thank God, it’s Mick.
You can’t be putting the Keith song on the first side of the album.
WAIT!
IT IS THE FUCKING KEITH SONG!
MICK JAGGER TRICKED ME!
Goddamned Rolling Stones and their deceitful ways.
What the fuck, Stones?
Side One Keith Song?
You know what this is like?
Remember when you were a kid and there would be some irregular happenstance that would force you to sit up front and your mom in the back?
And it felt sinful and wrong?
This is like that.
The world has a natural order.
This song is the terrible version of Shine A Light.
Stop.
Just stop it.
Fade this abortion out.
No more.
Thank you.
Doo Doo Doo Doo (Heartbreaker)
I’ve always hated this number.
They literally named it “doo doo.”
And let Billy Preston rub his giant wigs all over it.
Take your clavinet and go home, Billy Preston.
Piano.
The Rolling Stones have a guy that plays piano.
Just piano.
No more wikka-wakka noises out of you.
And it’s Mick doing social commentary.
Which is worse than when Elvis did his tunes about society’s ills, because Elvis wasn’t being cynical.
The King cares about that poor little baby child who had the misfortune to be born in the ghetto.
In the ghettoooooooo.
Mick didn’t give a shit.
Still doesn’t.
Angie
Angie was a #1 hit–the record was, too, don’t forget–and written about either David Bowie’s wife or David Bowie; it’s supposed to be the next version of Wild Horses.
Jesus, he just started whispering ANGIE into my ear and I lost my train of thought.
Ah.
It is not Wild Horses.
The Stones reiterated songs just like any band: Salt of the Earth was the proto-Can’t Always Get What You Want, etc.
You couldn’t think of another example, could you?
SHUT UP.
But, yeah, Mick tried to write Wild Horses again and got Angie.
Which made him a gob of cash, and that’s what he was trying to do in the first place.
And that makes me the asshole, I suppose.
Silver Train
This is pleasant.
It is a boogie.
About a train.
Silver one, one would imagine.
Mick Taylor on the slippity-slide guitar.
Hey, 1973 Mick Taylor.
Things are not going to go well for you in your near future.
You should stay in the band.
Dude.
Stay.
In.
The.
Band.
Do not leave the Rolling Stones, 1973 Mick Taylor.
Go to therapy, go to rehab, adjust your attitude: whatever it takes, dude.
Stay in the band.
I’m a fan of this track.
It’s jaunty and has a kick to it.
You could drink a shandy to this.
Real party-starter.
Woo.
Good job, Silver Train.
Hide Your Love
Fun fact: Mick on piano.
NOT FUCKING CLAVINET, BILLY PRESTON.
What is it about this album?
An interiority is missing.
Or maybe they just chose the wrong chords.
This track sounds like the middle part of Exile, but worse.
That swampy groove the Stones do.
I’m comparing this record to ones I’ve heard hundreds if not thousands of times.
That’s not fair to Goat’s Head Soup.
On the other hand, if they didn’t want people to be mean, then they wouldn’t have named the album Goat’s Head Soup.
From Exile on Main Street to Goat’s fucking Head Soup.
LET IT FUCKING BLEED!
One of the greatest titles of all time!
The Beatles were all Let It Be, and the Stones were like, nuh-uh.
We’re eeeeeeeeevil.
And now this.
Goat’s Head Soup.
Winter
Ah, fuck, it’s the Listless Side Two Semi-Ballad.
All the 70’s Stones albums had one.
Fool To Cry was the perfection of the genre, if only for Mick’s falsetto.
Always a lot of fun when Mick’s falsetto shows up.
It’s so insincere.
This is the string arrangement from Moonlight Mile.
Wait, this whole song is just Moonlight Mile.
You can’t fool your ol’ pal TotD.
I know a Moonlight Mile when I see one.
So, it’s cold.
In the song.
And Mick wants to keep the lady he’s with warm.
Via jacketry or other means.
There is no metaphor one can detect.
Can You Hear The Music?
Of course, I can.
What an absurd question, Rolling Stones.
Oh, these backup vocals are not working for me at all.
They are unpleasant and intrusive.
I won’t put up it with it, Rolling Stones.
Beggar’s Banquet, Let it Bleed, Sticky Fingers, and Exile.
Those were the four albums that preceded this one.
What’s the worst song from any of those records?
I’ve always thought Love In Vain dragged, but you must have your own opinion.
Whatever song you’re thinking of is better than the best song on Goat’s Head Soup.
I feel like I’m punishing myself for no reward, I can’t understand why.
Other than the self-loathing.
Star Star
Oh, yeah, this one.
The Chuck Berry tune.
There was always a Chuck Berry tune on Stones records.
Sometimes Chuck wrote them, and sometimes the Stones did.
The chorus is less than imaginative.
“I bet you keep your pussy clean?”
Why would that be a lyric, Mick?
That’s not a keeper.
And: why are you making fun of the women who want to have sex with you?
They want to fuck you.
Why does that make them assholes?
You should be nice to them.
You know what would make them happy?
Have sex with them.
Jesus Christ, Exile to this in one year.
Always remember, Enthusiasts: the next booking at Winterland after The Last Waltz–the very next night–was Ted Nugent.
Technically, this is a video. It’s on a video-streaming site, and the view does change every now and again. But mostly it’s an audio. Two hours of Exile-era effluvia!
(I must admit to ambivalence about Stones outtakes. The records have been so carved into me that when I hear an alternate take, I don’t think “Oh, neat; an alternate take,” I think “No, Mick, that’s not the right phrasing.” The Stones weren’t the Dead: the songs went a certain way. There’s no Platonic Deal, just a couple hundred iterations on the Deal theme. There is a Platonic Tumblin’ Dice; it’s the one on the album.)
If I were British, I’d call Mick a right cunt, but I’m American and can’t use that word so I’ll call him a complete cunt. In Mick’s defense, it’s tough to remain friendly while wearing a fur cape, ruffled blouse, and pendant watch. It’s an outfit that inspires a certain haughtiness.
Leaving Jimi out of the final cut of Gimme Shelter was the right move by the Maysles and Charlotte Zwerin. The guitarist had died only three months before the film came out on 12/6/70 (a year to the day after the concert) and didn’t play with the band at all, which makes his appearance distracting and pointless. (Jimi wasn’t at Altamont, though the clip makes it seem that way; the footage of him and Keith is from 11/27/69 backstage at Madison Square Garden.)
Since nearly the inception of the band, Mick has tried again and again to carve himself an identity separate from Keith and Charlie and the other two, only to receive the same tepid “No, thank you” from the general public every time. His acting career is speckled, at best, and has always been hampered by the fact that when Mick Jagger enters the frame, your brain goes “Hey, that’s Mick fucking Jagger. Why’s he in this piece of shit?” and this makes it difficult to accept him as, say, a futuristic cop or bounty hunter or whatever the fuck he was in Freejack.
FUN FACT: A young TotD saw this in the theater. My friends and I repeated Mick’s line from the clip above–Oy LOYED–for years afterward.
Not STP. The others, yes. Along with maybe a dozen other Stones books over the years: Keith’s autobiography, four or five longish articles padded out to length by various Important Rock Critics, couple of volumes on Altamont, one of the Mick bios, and Bill Wyman’s dreadful fuck diary. The man kept obsessive journals and scrapbooks, and that was the entirety of the book. “June 19th. We arrived in Kansas City and checked into the Holiday Inn. I banged a 16-year old brunette. June 20th. Arrived in Omaha. Checked into Holiday Inn. Banged a 16-year-old blonde.” That’s all there is. The man was the Samuel Pepys of Rock and Roll.
Nice.
I even read Spanish Tony’s filth.
Spanish Tony?
Exile-era scumbag druggie friend of Keith’s.
Was this self-published?
No. Reputable house. Tony put a lot of really fun stories in the book. Imagine Living With The Dead by Rock Scully, if Rock were 35 IQ points dumber.
Oh, I’d read that.
Right?
How close are we to TotRS?
Quite. If it were an earthquake, animals would be losing their shit right now.
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