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Max'sKansasCity
Does B&B own the "record" for fewest songs on an album.... of all time ...

While, at eight songs, it's the Stones studio album with the fewest songs, I own lots of records with fewer than eight songs. There are plenty of jazz records and Pink Floyd albums with five or six songs.

Hell, Yes made Topographic Oceans, a double LP set in which each song took up an entire album side! Yes's studio albums that came before and after Topographic Oceans are single LPs with only three songs (Close to the Edge and Relayer). So, over three consecutive studio albums, Yes released four LPs that had a total of 10 songs. Monumental self-indulgence, methinks.

the production is just fantastic (especialy compared to its horrible predecessor IORR)
and micks vocals are outstanding!

Who doesn't? It's a great album with excellent tour to boot!

I love Black and blue - A very under rated album!

I like it a lot--some troubling features, like the dominance of Preston and the blandness of the rockers, but it's more loose and inspired than IORR. The writing of "Memory Motel" is actually innovative, I think, the closest they came to a work of fiction since "Midnight Rambler," and with the Glimmer Twins duetting on keyboards. "Fool to Cry" is an underappreciated could-have-been warhorse.

and has been noted, by far their best-recorded album.

I think the guitar auditions actually make only a subordinate element of the album. Apart from "Hand of Fate" and "Hey Negrita," none of them really step forward.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2010-07-23 17:34 by cc.

I like Fool to Cry - problem is Keith HATES it and won't play it live!

It's funny how Fool To Cry has been on several comps -

Time Waits For No One
Sucking In The Seventies
Rewind
Jump Back
Forty Licks

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baxlap

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Max'sKansasCity
Does B&B own the "record" for fewest songs on an album.... of all time ...

While, at eight songs, it's the Stones studio album with the fewest songs, I own lots of records with fewer than eight songs. There are plenty of jazz records and Pink Floyd albums with five or six songs.

the eight-song argument is funny - in overall time, it's longer than many other stones records....

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71Tele
I am in the minority, I know, but I think it's the last of what I call the "Descending Three", meaning the quality went down each release starting with GHS, then IORR and culminating in Black & Blue. Thank God for Some Girls, or the boys would have been toast had the trend continued.

Tele, sometimes I don't understand you at all. I know you love Exile and I understand that very well, also because it's a typically 'American' album. Mentioning GHS as the first of the "Descending Three" is strange to me, but I can understand you do, because it has such an 'European' mood. But your last sentence, concerning Some Girls, I can't understand at all. As Edward Twining has said it's (all very contrary to Exile) immediate, one dimensional and "the blues influences which give the Stones sound much of its strength is missing". I've added to that it's freshness and I also say it's musically and as for its mood as flat as a pancake. Those are all qualifications that are the very opposite of those of Exile. I can understand that you appreciated it when it was released (like I did) and even during some time after its release, but again I have to say that I don't understand that you still appreciate it that much after 32 years, when its freshness has gone. I really can't comprehend how it's possible that you still consider it as the lifebuoy of the Stones. Well, I think you can't make me understand it. I just had to say it.

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kleermaker
Tele, sometimes I don't understand you at all. I know you love Exile and I understand that very well, also because it's a typically 'American' album. Mentioning GHS as the first of the "Descending Three" is strange to me, but I can understand you do, because it has such an 'European' mood. But your last sentence, concerning Some Girls, I can't understand at all. As Edward Twining has said it's (all very contrary to Exile) immediate, one dimensional and "the blues influences which give the Stones sound much of its strength is missing". I've added to that it's freshness and I also say it's musically and as for its mood as flat as a pancake. Those are all qualifications that are the very opposite of those of Exile. I can understand that you appreciated it when it was released (like I did) and even during some time after its release, but again I have to say that I don't understand that you still appreciate it that much after 32 years, when its freshness has gone. I really can't comprehend how it's possible that you still consider it as the lifebuoy of the Stones. Well, I think you can't make me understand it. I just had to say it.

it's just the conventional narrative of the Stones in the 70s.

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cc

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kleermaker
Tele, sometimes I don't understand you at all. I know you love Exile and I understand that very well, also because it's a typically 'American' album. Mentioning GHS as the first of the "Descending Three" is strange to me, but I can understand you do, because it has such an 'European' mood. But your last sentence, concerning Some Girls, I can't understand at all. As Edward Twining has said it's (all very contrary to Exile) immediate, one dimensional and "the blues influences which give the Stones sound much of its strength is missing". I've added to that it's freshness and I also say it's musically and as for its mood as flat as a pancake. Those are all qualifications that are the very opposite of those of Exile. I can understand that you appreciated it when it was released (like I did) and even during some time after its release, but again I have to say that I don't understand that you still appreciate it that much after 32 years, when its freshness has gone. I really can't comprehend how it's possible that you still consider it as the lifebuoy of the Stones. Well, I think you can't make me understand it. I just had to say it.

it's just the conventional narrative of the Stones in the 70s.

I know cc, but Tele is not conventional in my book. So I wouldn't expect the conventional narrative of him. That explains my astonishment I guess.

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kleermaker

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cc

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kleermaker
Tele, sometimes I don't understand you at all. I know you love Exile and I understand that very well, also because it's a typically 'American' album. Mentioning GHS as the first of the "Descending Three" is strange to me, but I can understand you do, because it has such an 'European' mood. But your last sentence, concerning Some Girls, I can't understand at all. As Edward Twining has said it's (all very contrary to Exile) immediate, one dimensional and "the blues influences which give the Stones sound much of its strength is missing". I've added to that it's freshness and I also say it's musically and as for its mood as flat as a pancake. Those are all qualifications that are the very opposite of those of Exile. I can understand that you appreciated it when it was released (like I did) and even during some time after its release, but again I have to say that I don't understand that you still appreciate it that much after 32 years, when its freshness has gone. I really can't comprehend how it's possible that you still consider it as the lifebuoy of the Stones. Well, I think you can't make me understand it. I just had to say it.

it's just the conventional narrative of the Stones in the 70s.

I know cc, but Tele is not conventional in my book. So I wouldn't expect the conventional narrative of him. That explains my astonishment I guess.

I couldn't care less about "conventional narratives". I think Some Girls brought the Stones back from the heavy, somewhat druggy records that came before it. It was fresh and fun and I love the mood and the uptempo songs. It had humor (in songs like Faraway Eyes, Whip and the title track). I like the thrashing three-guitar sound. I like Ron Wood's use of the pedal steel on rock & roll songs. I think Beast of Burden is one of the grooviest, funkiest things they have done, and that Before They Make Me Run is a classic from Keith. It still sounds great to me. So, rather than explain away my point of view in terms of "narratives", why not accept that I can like very different kinds of Rolling Stones albums, including both Exile and Some Girls.

As for GHS. By "descending three" I meant GHS, IORR and B&B started a descent in quality. That doesn't mean I don't like GHS. I love it. But I think it was not as good as Exile, and better than the two that came after.

OK. One man's opinion.

Personally, I love B & B. It's not near the top of my Stones LP list, but it's got a significantly different vibe than most other albums and when I'm in the mood for it, it's a great listen - yes, I even love Cherry, Oh Baby! I think I'll listen to this album today, now that I'm thinking about it...

With the exception of "Cherry Oh Baby"(Cannot stand it) it's their last great album imo.During the 35 year collapse that followed (mainly lack of decent guitarwork) we can have a toast on a handfull of good songs,with most recent :"Plundered my Soul",the best.. I'am not in the minority here.I'am the only one.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2010-07-23 19:45 by Amsterdamned.

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71Tele
why not accept that I can like very different kinds of Rolling Stones albums, including both Exile and Some Girls.

It's not a matter of accepting or not, but of understanding or not. To quote from my second last post: "Well, I think you can't make me understand it. I just had to say it." Easy to accept.

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Amsterdamned
I'am not in the minority here.I'am the only one.

Well, I doubt that.

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kleermaker

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71Tele
why not accept that I can like very different kinds of Rolling Stones albums, including both Exile and Some Girls.

It's not a matter of accepting or not, but of understanding or not. To quote from my second last post: "Well, I think you can't make me understand it. I just had to say it." Easy to accept.

ok, sure. I was trying to help you understand then.

I've said this before and I'll say it again the four albums that preceded GHS, IORR and B&B were so good that that those three are not quite as good. However all three of them have some great songs and are great in their own way.

Great thread. I like B&B, but I think it's a slight step down from IORR and then they took about 5-10 steps forward on Some Girls. If you added the Tattoo You tracks that came from B&B, it's probably above IORR though.

Also- Jethro Tull's Thick as a Brick is one song on 2 sides. One Track on the CD release.

the term "accessible" seems to apply to B&B like few other stones albums...regardless of how i might view it, critically, relative to the big four or other records of theirs, i think b&b is about accessible as any of them....

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slew
I've said this before and I'll say it again the four albums that preceded GHS, IORR and B&B were so good that that those three are not quite as good. However all three of them have some great songs and are great in their own way.

First for me GHS, IORR and B&B don't belong to the same league. Just like I rank the 1973 'GHS' Tour higher than the 1972 'Exile' Tour, for me GHS is easily equal to the big 4, so for me it's the big 5. IORR is a lesser album imo, especially because of the trio Ain't Too Proud To Beg, the title song (the studio version is a weak, untight, incoherent and unconvincing 'rocker') and Luxury (an unsuccesful, monotone reggae try), and B&B is a hotchpotch of songs. Both are "descending" as Tele called it, but they're still good albums. In retrospect with Some Girls the decline sets in, as Amsterdamned already said. But still some good songs here and there after B&B.

I don't know how many times I have written about this - and many other - album in this forum, but who cares this is always fun... I try to say something "new" about it (if I can)...

When I first discovered the album in the early 80's it was a huge disappointment; it sounded unspired, tired, way too few songs, too slow, too funky, and whatever... My impression were quite close to the "conventional narrative" - and being familiar with the great and current SOME GIRLS/TATTOO YOU era (some weaknesses of EMOTIONAL RESCUE were forgiven), it really sounded like the band out of fresh ideas, unStonesy, and bored (before the vital storm of SOME GIRLS).

Anyway, the years have been VERY friendly to this album, and I think with GOATS HEAD SOAP it represents very interesting phase of transformation or a stage of progression in the great Stones narrative. In a way I see those two albums related. Both of them are very far (in Stones terms) from the typical Stones sound world (that is more home with the mediocre IT'S ONLY ROCK'N'ROLL in the middle of them). With GHS it shares few odd features in the recorded Stones history: it shows mature, depth and is as close as possible to "thinking man's Stones" as it can get. Very odd features, right?

But it has them. This especially true of Jagger. I think the central idea was realizing "shit, this is young man's game, and I'm not young or a hip anymore - what the hell I do now?". He tried to cope with that with "Time Waits For No One" but I don't find that convincing. Over-all in IT'S ONLY ROCK'N'ROLL Jagger was seemingly unsinpired and repitive and going to easy posing (the energetic Jagger-sound he had mastered in EXILE and GHS), but now he sounded like finding a new tone: lower, more mannish, even aggressive. Especially this can be heard in the (few) traditional rockers "Hand of Fate" and "Crazy Mama" that - as rockers - and with their bluesy mid-tempo groove are, I think, among their best ever. To my ears they sound unique. In many cases his lyrics sounded more reflective; think of the lyrical content of "Hand of Fate", "Memory Motel", "Fool to Cry"... still to this date they sound quite odd lyrics in Stones repertuare.

And there is the new funky Stones sound (that scared me almost to death when I - a tough rocker boy - first heard the album). Both sides starts with one. And to start the whole album with such a novel thing by Stones standards ("Hot Stuff"), was a sign of the band having the middle finger attitude towards the expectations and a drive for new (black) sounds still in their agenda. A huge improvement in every sense compared to weak beginnings of GHS and IORR. "Hot Stuff" maybe not have the quality of the opening tracks of the Big Four, but it is a sign of the band finding their self-respect and attitude again. "Hot Stuff" - if any - has written in it: "no hostages taken: you like it or not, we don't care". My Stones.

Yeah, there are some shortcomings in the album (especially horrible "Cherry"), and it's way uncohesive to be anything near a masterpiece, but it is an album I seem to listen - with GHS - most these days from the seventies. It is an album made during a transformation period, and it can be heard, but there is so much in it that makes it unique. Especially its 'mature' feature. This feature was gone for good - or lost - in SOME GIRLS where Jagger found his new boyish, ironic personhood. Good or bad, I don't know.

(By the way, Edward Twining's analysis was spot on, like always.)

- Doxa



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2010-07-23 21:33 by Doxa.

I loooove the Black and Blue album!





IMO it's their "blackest" sounding album.





"Fool to Cry" sounds like The Ohio Players.

and I also love "Melody". I think Mick and Billy made a good musical pair...





***********************************************************
"What I'm doing is a sexual thing. I dance and all dancing is a replacement for sex". - Mick Jagger



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2010-07-24 00:24 by stateofshock.

I love B&B -- it's in my Stones top 10 (granted, it may actually be #10, but that's still pretty great). If I'm not mistaken, "Worried About You" and "Slave" were wriiten during the B&B sessions(?), if so, add those two and shitcan "Cherry Oh Baby" and "Melody" and you've got a real '76-era classic on your hands....

"Hot Stuff" is hot stuff!

Take off "Melody" and perhaps "Cherry", add "Worried About You" and "Slave" and you would have had close to a classic Stones album - or at least a stronger one.

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71Tele
Take off "Melody" and perhaps "Cherry", add "Worried About You" and "Slave" and you would have had close to a classic Stones album - or at least a stronger one.

So true! I still don't understand how they could put MM instead of WAY...
Imho Slave was very unfinished in 1975 so it wasn't a possibility, but leaving WAY on the cutting room, with this timeless Perkins solo...

And I'd take "Act Together" over FTC any day.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2010-07-24 00:26 by dcba.

Hot Stuff finish (with a short gap) to Hand Of Fate opening is one of the finest Stones (and therefore musical) links on record...
...my favourite two songs after a hard day...

I didn´t like it when it came out - but at that time I was too young and too unexperienced and didn´t understand.

Now I like it a lot and that makes the difference: I did change and the Stones were ahead of times but I only understood later......

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skipstone

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71Tele
Memory Motel is contrived lyrically and overwrought sentimental mush (similar to Following The River in that respect).

Memory Motel is a million motherfucking miles better ahead than that Wallowing The River song!!!!! And as a bonus it's got Keith singing on it.

I am probably in the minority, but I think Black and Blue sounds better and less dated than Some Girls. I very rarely listen to SG and usually have BAB in my car rotation.

Along with "Exile", "Black And Blue" is probably my favourite Stones album; certainly those seem to be the ones I listen to most. That said, I could take or leave "Cherry" and "Fool To Cry" (I made a CDR one time replacing them with "Slave" and "Worried About You"...try it; works pretty good as an album that way!) Either way, "Black And Blue" was one of the few Stones albums I actually "got" at the first listen. Most of their LPs were "growers" on me, don't ask me why.

BNB is IMO The Stones' best production as well. The sound quality is awesome, the drums in particular. Especially compared to GHS and IORR. Odd, considering both IORR and BNB were mainly done at Musicland in Munich with Keith Harwood at the board, no?