The Rolling Stones

I like plenty of their albums and songs after '81, and I think it's become too pat to just dismiss that era. A lot of those songs, in some ways, are a victim of '80s pop studio trappings.

I couldn't have married someone who didn't love "Exile on Main Street." That's how intertwined it is with who I am. I haven't picked up a guitar in a decade, and I never advanced beyond the beginner stage anyway. But when I listen to those 18 tracks, it truly starts to feel silly to spend one's life doing anything other than playing the blues. The lights go on, and I know that's not true, but that's how viscerally it hits me. Today as much asthe first time I listened to it, at age 19, through headphones in a broom closet.

If I have learned anything in my 30s, it is that music is a subjective thing, and I no longer hurt to force others to like what I like, to hear something the way I hear it. But, man, a dimly lot room, a tumbler of Glenlivet, and the horns coming in during, "All Down the Line." That's heaven, and even if it's not "Exile," I hope everybody knows what it's like to hear a piece of music, or a piece of art in general, be it a novel, a film, a poem, or a painting, to your bones like that. It's special.

 

Yeah, I agree Emotional Rescue and Tattoo You were their last decent albums. I remember getting the next one, Undercover, I think when I was 10 or so and thinking it sucked at the time.

 

I remember seeing them with Guns N Roses in the late 1980s and when they started playing songs off Dirty Work, I can't remember if Steel Wheels was out yet, but people just started heading to the bathrooms. You see the same thing at some Springsteen concerts. A member of the band (other than Little Steven) starts singing and everybody runs for the bathroom.

 

I thought the magazine was named for a pre-Christian proverb by Publilius Syrus or was it Erasmus in 1500?

 

Hence the blue font.

 

I like Exile well enough but Sticky Fingers is the Stones album that hits me viscerally from beginning to end. I never get sick of it. I feel about the beatles, however, as the original poster seems to feel about the Stones. I respect the hell out of them and objectively agree they're great, but they just don't do as much for me as the Stones and especially the Who.

 

The Rolling Stones are my favorite band, but I'd be lying if there's much post-81 Stones that's vital. Some songs here and there, but not much. And don't forget that Tattoo You is an outtakes album. Really, Some Girls is where the creativity dried up (Emotional Rescue is a mess of an album).

But with bands, I think its best to compare peak periods, and the Stones' peak period from Beggars Banquet to Goats Head Soup (yes I include it because its underrated as hell) is hard for any band to beat. The key to that period is that Keith Richards was with it and engaged in the early part of that run (Beggars Banquet, Let It Bleed) and then he, and especially Mick Jagger, had the awesome Mick Taylor to work off of in the latter part of the run. Listen to the Richards-Taylor era live, best heard on several bootlegs and commercially on Get Yer Ya Ya's Out. They cut hard.

The Stones were versatile in that period. Could rock out, could do decent ballads, could country it up, could blues it up. They had great creative drive from producer (Jimmy Miller) on down the line. Their songs were never better-written. They did innovative things like play a guitar through a Leslie speaker to create a unique sound (as on Let It Loose and others). They used horns in ways rock bands hadn't. Much of it seems cliche or perhaps dated now, but it was groundbreaking at the time and most of it holds up.

They could be sloppy, but I think sloppiness is a virtue in rock. That's why I love The Faces, who were sloppy as hell, but rocked out. Rock is always better when it's more about feel than technical brilliance. If the technical brilliance comes with it, so be it, but it's not necessary.

I also dispute Mizzou's point that Led Zeppelin -- another band I love -- didn't have decline periods. As much as the highest highs on Physical Graffiti are fantastic, it has its share of dreck on it. Presence sucks out loud. I like In Through The Out Door better than most, but it's still not a peak level effort. Heck, even Led Zeppelin III is ponderous to listen to.

 

I gravitate toward more polished work. Rubber Soul is my favorite Beatles album. The sloppiness of the Stones never sat right with me.

 

The difference between the Stones and the Beatles is the difference between a 3.7 GPA and 4.0 GPA. The distinction isn't talent or ability, it is ambition to get it perfect, not just right. Lennon and McCartney seemed (1967-69) to strive to get every single song perfect. Work every nuance, try something different.
Mick and the boys were happy to get it right, make great music, and live the life of the rock star. John and Paul (and George, too) were striving to make rock an art form.

They all succeeded

 

Songs like "Midnight Rambler" and "Sweet Virginia" wouldn't sound right polished.

 

The Beatles don't have a magazine named after them.

 

Same with "Sway" and "Rip This Joint" among others.