Thoughts On Their Satanic Majesties Request (In Real Time)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijPzoacp0gA

Enthusiasts, my ignorance runs deep. Never before had I listened to Their Satanic Majesties Request; as a younger man, I recall seeing the album cover and thinking “That’s gonna suck.” It was the Stones’ answer to Sgt. Pepper and it was all swirly and gooey and, like, we really mixed it for the headphones, man. Or so goes its reputation. Big-time novelist and Times columnist Jennifer Finney Boylan advises that Fillmore South give the ’67 release a shot.

So this is her fault.

Sing This All Together

• What is this now?
• Why, please?
• Incorrect.
• Incorrect and unacceptable.
• Rolling Stones records start with guitars.
• Oh, they produced this to within an inch of its life, didn’t they?
• Really used the studio as an instrument.
• Whenever the band said shit like that, it meant that shit was gonna pop up in your left ear, and then your right.
• If they wanted to call the song Sing This All Together, they should have written a better song.
• Harmless.

Citadel

• Oh, don’t do this.
• You heard the San Francisco bands, didn’t you, Rolling Stones?
• Is there gonna be a sitar solo?
• It’s a sitar kinda song.
• Wait.
• Right ear.
• That’s a mellotron, isn’t it?
• …
• Ladies and gentlemen, we have a mellotron sighting.
• Real bands had mellotrons.
• Eh.

In Another Land

• You’re kidding me.
• This is a joke.
• This is a Spinal Tap outtake.
• …
• BILL FUCKING WYMAN WROTE IT?
• AND YOU LET HIM SING?
• I’m staggered, Rolling Stones.
• What were you thinking?
• Bill Wyman doesn’t get to write songs, and he certainly doesn’t get to sing them.
• Was it the acid?
• This was 1967, and you were famously getting groovy.
• Did the acid make you think that all men are brothers or some shit like that?
• That doesn’t apply to Bill Wyman.
• He’s an immobile pederast.
• You wouldn’t give poor Mick Taylor a writing credit, but you let Bill Wyman fucking sing?
• What kind of monsters are you, Rolling Stones?
• And a fucking harpsichord.
• Thumbs downward.

2000 Man

• I know this one.
• KISS did it better.
• Swear to God, man.

• Just rock the fucker out, Rolling Stones.
• Be more like KISS.
• Yell at your instruments.
• Holler at the drums.
• Cuff the song about.
• Never sneak up on a tune, Rolling Stones; they spook easy.
• The year 2000 stood for the future for a very long time, Younger Enthusiast.
• Why would you play this song this way?
• It’s like they couldn’t decide between four different arrangements, and so they used all of them.
• Pick a groove!
• You are not a prog band, Rolling Stones.
• Decide on a rhythm and play the whole song in that rhythm.
• I’m not mad, I’m just disappointed.

Sing This All Together (See What Happens)

• That title is not reassuring.
• Yup.
• Oh, no, not the musique concrete.
• Goddammit.
• …
• EIGHT FUCKING MINUTES?
• Oh, fuck the 60’s.
• Every damned band had one of these.
• The sound collage: it was so trippy, man.
• Oh, no, Rolling Stones.
• Leave this to Pink Floyd.
• Do not.
• Do not this.
• And a sudden tape splice cut.
• Because of course a sudden tape splice cut.
• What did Charlie Watts think of all this?
• I know what Ian Stewart thought of it.
• “Load o’ shite, then.”
• Thank you, Stu.
• Goddammit, drugs.
• Stop making bands record this song.
• Every time you come along: boom.
• The sound collage.
• It is rude of you, drugs.
• Ooh, pretty horns.
• Back to awful.
• Stop doing this, please.
• You’re not fooling anyone, Rolling Stones.
• This is not who you are.
• Is that a flute?
• What the fuck, guys?
• You charged people for this shit?
• This is that Boylan woman’s fault.
• Look it me, I write for the lying, failing New York Times.
• I blame her.
• The fuck did I ever do to her?
• Nothing.
• And now I have to listen to this pigshit.
• Y’know what?
• Fuck her; I’m burning her house down.
• Actually: fuck that, I’m burning all of your houses down.
• TONIGHT.
• By the time the sun comes up, all of you will be hobos.
• I’m house-burnin’ angry.
• Arson is in the cards.
• Stop this. Tell the people you’re joking.
• They’ll find that…song’s over.
• Discuss this–

She’s A Rainbow

• —like a man.
• Ooh, I love this song.
• Ahem.
• You followed me into the next song?
• Apparently.
• Creepy.
• Nicky Hopkins on piano, ladies and gentlemen.
• And John Paul Jones on the string arrangements.
• It’s less entertaining when I like the track.
• I’m just gonna listen to this shit.
• NO.
• STOP.
• WE DON’T NEED THE PSYCHEDELIC PART.
• Okay, Rolling Stones, we need to have a chat.
• Pull up your chairs and lounge upon them rebelliously.

The Lantern

• Rolling Stones, just be yourselves.
• Write drug boogies.
• Ballads about being dirty.
• But not whatever it is you think you’re doing here.
• Stop trying to sound like you’re on drugs and sound like you’re on drugs.
• People don’t like to mention it, but the Stones’ golden era perfectly coincided with Keith’s first major heroin addiction.
• You get a couple good years.
• After that, you repeat yourself, but artists take drugs for reasons.
• Maaaaaaan.
• What was I just listening to?

Gomper

• Gomper?
• Another distressing song title.
• I just have no faith in it.
• What is this shit?
• Fuck you, this shit.
• No, no, this is not what you wanted to put on the album.
• Fuck me, is that a tabla?
• Of course it’s a fucking tabla.
• Who allowed this?
• I want names.
• Someone signed off on this, and I want their names.
• Heads are gonna roll, mister.
• THIS IS NOT HOW YOU ROLLING STONE, ROLLING STONES.
• YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG.
• Ah, fuck, now Brian Jones is playing recorder.
• As if life weren’t rough enough.
• Y’know what?
• This is why Trump won.
• All of this is Jennifer Boylan’s fault, and she caused Trump.
• Stop playing now.
• Oh, God, they won’t fade out.
• STOP IT.

2000 Light Years From Home

• This is another joke.
• Right?
• Spinal Tap did a whole album of unreleased stuff and this is one of them?
• And they’re doing the shit where stuff gets louder and softer and kill me now.
• NO.
• NOT A FUCKING CHILDREN’S CHOIR!
• DON’T YOU DO THIS TO ME!
• Whooshy noises.
• The riff is spiffy, but it’s surrounded by nonsense.
• Like Ron Jeremy’s penis.
• The penis is great.
• But everything it’s attached to is a nightmare.
• That’s what the 2000 Light Years riff is.
• Hmm, two songs on the record with “2000” in the title.
• I bet that spawned innumerable idiotic conversations.

On With The Show

• What?
• No.
• This is…
• No.
• This is The Faces’ bit.
• Like…Music Hall?
• Is that what they call this?
• I want it to cease.
• Goddammit, there’s no Rolling Stones in my Rolling Stones record.
• WHERE ARE THE FUCKING GUITARS, BOYS?
• This is fraudulent.
• This is fraudacious.
• I won’t stand for it.
• Never again will I make fun of the Stones playing the blues.
• Better than whatever this is.
• Never again.
• That phrase is no longer about the Holocaust.
• It’s about Their Satanic Majesties Request.
• Jesus, I forgot to talk about what a dumb name that is.
• Ah, well.