[www.telegraph.co.uk]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2012-11-27 07:12 by hbwriter.

The thread title should be changed. It isn't a review, but an editorial about the band's direction and the current controversies over commercialization and ticket pricing. Nothing wrong with an editorial, but it has nothing to do with the show itself.

What a whiner. He should be on this blog. So the Stones should just quit? Millions of people love them, want to see them, are willing to pay top dollar to see them, and they should just quit? Why? Because they're not 26 any more? Hacks like this guy don't understand that people want to hear the music. The practitioners of this style of music are gone. The Rolling Stones left the Led Zeppelins and Creams and Sex Pistols and The Police in their dust decades ago.

The reporter claims they haven't made a decent album since Tattoo You. Screw that. Steel Wheels is a great album. Maybe it doesn't have a monster hit like Start Me Up, but it is a great album. And it's not like the Who, who haven't had even a memorable song in 30 years. Although I'm no fan of the post-Wyman studio albums, 'You Got Me Rocking', 'Rough Justice', and the new 'Doom and Gloom' are good songs that bear repeated listening.

To complain of McCartney trotting out 'Hey Jude' is to be ignorant of history. The Beatles as a stage outfit were over by 1966. Few people actually got to see them live, and the latter half of their studio output was never performed live. The reporter has fallen into the trap of lauding B.B. King for performing as a diminished elder statesman, while denying that right to the Stones. Of course they are performing earlier works. How many musical artists can claim such a catalogue, over such an extended time?

I'm not sure where the Stone's pricing scheme for these recent shows compares to other high ticket shows. Didn't Streisand charge and exorbitant amount? And it's still to be seen where this is going. Further touring in 2013 might bring the prices down. The Stones should never quit because someone else wants them too. They should quit when they want to. Or have to. All cynicism aside, this is a beloved group, held close by its fans. Worldwide.

Quote
drbryant
The thread title should be changed. It isn't a review, but an editorial about the band's direction and the current controversies over commercialization and ticket pricing. Nothing wrong with an editorial, but it has nothing to do with the show itself.

good point - done

judge the band by your ears, not your eyes. "the eyes are the whores of the senses" - keith

To be fair, in the article he does say that their performance was "superb" and that "the songs still sound marvellous" so he doesn't just totally pan them. Also, I think IMHO that he does have a point about the way things are too commercialised and I agree that the ticket prices are too high.

Where I do think the piece is unfair is where it complains that "their music is of a time long gone".

I don't see how this is at all relevant.

It is like saying that Beethoven's symphonies must be rubbish because they were written 200 years ago.

You should judge music solely by the pleasure you get from listening to it - not by when it was written.

Another point I think worth making is that one of the reasons that the likes of the Stones can carry on so long is that none of the current stuff measures up. Which of the current bands sound as good as the Stones? I listen to the radio and the current music sounds so bland to me. Many of the newer bands copy the classic sound of the Beatles and Stones but in a watered down fashion - might as well hear the original rather than a pale imitation. What songwriter is there around today as good as Bob Dylan?

People go on about Gaga but I'd hardly say that "Pokerface" compares with "Chimes of Freedom" or "Hard Rains Gonna Fall".

Good music has staying power - I'll bet people are still listening to the Stones in another 50 years - long after most of the current stuff has been forgotten.

the article is good but could have been written every three years after 1973. The stones are fresher and more inventive than those journalists who repeat themselves over and over again the same phrases. Its all over guys! The stones have even survived your complaints.