Page 24 - New York Waste Hot & Sweaty Summer 2015

24 sweltering summer issue NY WASTE 2015
So, “quelle surprise,” those invariably Rolling Stones are back on the road this summer in sup- port of yet another retro (this time Sticky Fingers redux) big-boxed-bonanza (available on remas- tered CD with 12-page book-
let, or remastered LP with
12x12 insert, or Deluxe Dou-
ble CD with alternate takes,
live performances, and a 24-
page booklet, or Deluxe
Double LP Set with Limited
Edition Spanish Cover, or
Deluxe Edition with bonus
CD, DVD, four postcards
and 72 (!) page booklet, or
Super Deluxe Edition with
two bonus CD’s, DVD, vinyl
45, one poster, four post-
cards, 120-page (yes) booklet
and a real zipper). “It would be nice to have a new album,” M. Jagger recently admitted, “But people don’t like the new album when you play it onstage. They glumly look at you. ‘OK, it will be over in a minute.’ It’s not a good excuse, but it’s the truth and has to be said.”
Whatever your desired audio format, those arriv- ing at the party this terribly late should also con- sider adding to all your vintage-2015 Sticky stuff the five years and ninety-nine minutes contained within Chrome Dreams’ Rolling Stones: The Mick Taylor Years. In fact, should you consider yourself a part of the ever-expanding con- stituency who swear the Stones’ best work was done during that half decade between the death of Brian Jones and the arrival of Ronnie Wood,
THE OTHER MICK
this is one DVD which absolutely deserves your undivided attention.
Beginning as the Sixties became Seventies and The Rolling Stones were struggling to grow all
the way from “England’s Newest Hit Mak- ers” into “The World’s Greatest Rock and Roll Band,” we hear the entire journey re- counted by an impressive list of Stones bi- ographers, historians and even session musicians, plus see the events themselves unfold via clips from the band’s initial, free Hyde Park concert with Taylor clear through their landmark 1969 and 1972 North American
tours. Not to men- tion a slew of pri- mordial promotional clips spanning
“Jumpin’ Jack Flash” to
“It’s Only Rock ‘n Roll”
which cover, in fact, a
defining era in the Stones’
development as the band
survives Altamont, Allen
Klein, and the death of its founding member only to find themselves tax-exiled and semi-comatose in the south of France. It is a period during which they also somehow start their own record com- pany, learn how to make their own records (thanks in no small part to their late, extremely great producer Jimmy Miller) and along with The Who and Led Zeppelin forge the soon-to-be- come fantastically lucrative U.S. arena-rock cir- cuit.
Now, the point repeatedly made during this en- tire documentary is how key a role Mick Taylor actually played in each of these remarkable achievements: First, he joins the band at an ideal time, fully prepared to face audiences who by 1969 were expecting to listen to, rather than sim- ply scream at, rock concerts which now lasted much longer than thirty minutes. With this, Tay- lor introduces to the Stones a new and subtly fluid approach to his instrument – a style which at first challenges fellow guitarist Keith Richard(s), soon perfectly complements him, and by 1973 practically supplants him both on stage
and in the studio. Granted, Mick Taylor may never have displayed the highly adventurous experimentation of his predecessor, but it is hard to imagine the Stones being able to fully come to terms with Seventies-scale rock or even rolling with Brian Jones still in the band ...even if he did figure out a way to se- cure his re-entry visa into the USofA.
Yet most fascinating to me are this
film’s interviews with Exile On Main St. support musicians Al Perkins and Bill Plum- mer, both of whom offer rare and insightful glimpses into the Stones’ recording techniques and intra-band relationships. Sadly, their stories (not to mention all those involving Gram Par- sons) were left completely untold in the band’s own Stones In Exile doc. I wonder why...
Acclaimed S.T.P.: A Journey Through America With The Rolling Stones author Robert Green- field then explains how the tale soon starts to wind all the way down for the band, creatively at