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Redhotcarpet

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Silver Dagger
The main acoustic riff strikes me as being the work of pretty much a guitar novice. It's really easy to play and reminds me of the kind guitar noodling absolute beginners come up with as they find their way around the fretboard.

Thats why I never bothered to listen before. Love the song but the intro is a typical beginner noodlings

All part of it's charm.

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His Majesty

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Redhotcarpet

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Silver Dagger
The main acoustic riff strikes me as being the work of pretty much a guitar novice. It's really easy to play and reminds me of the kind guitar noodling absolute beginners come up with as they find their way around the fretboard.

Thats why I never bothered to listen before. Love the song but the intro is a typical beginner noodlings

All part of it's charm.

100 per cent. Less is quite often more. I'd much rather have a simple guitar motif than some crazed jazz rock noodler trying to squeeze more than 100 notes in the first few bars.

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T&A

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treaclefingers

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T&A
too spacey and ethereal...where's the backbeat? where's keith's chugging guitar and mick's wailing harp????

Unfortunately they had already used that up on the previous album, on Midnight Rambler.

that's the problem when you let the tape keep running...if rambler were short and sweet at 3 minutes, moonlight mile coulda been saved....

Unfortunately Mick wouldn't have been able to do that whole belt thing in concert then. Sigh, life is full of compromises.

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Redhotcarpet

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Silver Dagger
The main acoustic riff strikes me as being the work of pretty much a guitar novice. It's really easy to play and reminds me of the kind guitar noodling absolute beginners come up with as they find their way around the fretboard.

Thats why I never bothered to listen before. Love the song but the intro is a typical beginner noodlings

I give him credit for arranging a guitar part that is quite clever. It characterizes the song. You hear the intro and immediately you recognize Moonlight Mile.

Technically it is as easy or difficult as any other stones riff is. But the level of technical difficulty says nothing of the beauty of a piece of music.

C

In my opinion, MOONLIGHT MILE, along with Wild Horses, Time Waits For No One & Shine A Light belongs to the 20 greatest tracks that The Stones have ever written & recorded. It starts very delicate and fragile, builds up slowly and climaxes in the "Down The Road, Down The Road" section only to be followed by the same delicacy that the guitar intro showcased. A piece of rarest beauty, even in the Stones catalogue!

Most listeners won't know how easy or difficult the opening guitar figure is to play, and it doesn't matter: it's beautiful anyway. Everything works on this track, including some magnificent lyrics and a heartfelt vocal from Mick to deliver them.

There's a certain amount of "Keith isn't even there" comment going on in the thread - but in this case, he doesn't need to be, any more than Mick needed to be present when Happy was recorded. Both Glimmers are capable of great songwriting separately (though better together, IMO) and the Jagger/Taylor team is perfectly capable of delivering a glorious track in his absence. It's one of the band's strengths that they make such good use of creativity from outside the official songwriting team, and one of its weaknesses that since the end of "Nanker Phelge" that kind of input is so seldom acknowledged or rewarded. Who knows what they've lost by being so mean?

Just because the opening guitar part is not technically difficult to play does mean it is not beautiful, or even brilliant. I think the drone strings in the riff are musically interesting. Keith's open G guitar riffs for Brown Sugar, Tumbling Dice, et al are not technically difficult to play either, but someone has to create these things before anyone can play them. Therein lies the true value of the great Stones guitar parts. The fact that people continue to confuse technical virtuosity with creativity after all this time is quite amazing to me.

Just did a search and there seems to be many consistent references to MM starting out as an accoustic demo by Keith Richards and then Taylor worked it up from there. No one argued that point for many years. What I'd like to know is if anyone heard demo? I don'ti think any one believes this was all Mick Jagger.

<<< In 1501 Michelangelo returned to Florence and began working on fifteen small statues for the Cathedral of Siena. He completed only four of them, as in 1501 the Opera del Duomo of Florence commissioned his David. For this enormous statue, Michelangelo used a single block of marble that had previously been worked on by Agostino di Duccio and then discarded in the courtyard of the Opera. The David - intended, like the Pietà, to be looked at from the front, even though it was properly finished on every side - confirmed Michelangelo's concept of art, already elaborated a few years before: "to sculpt" meant "to take away", not "to add", as the sculpture already existed inside the block of marble. The stone was just the covering that contained a work of art; the sculptor only had to take away the part in excess. The notion of the statue that potentially existed inside the marble was expounded in several of Michelangelo's letters as well as in afamous sonnet. This idea, already partly expressed by Alberti, attained with Michelangelo a higher philosophical meaning: the sculptor's hand, guided by intellect, could only take out what was that already extant inside the block of marble and needed to free the "idea" inside from the superfluous surrounding it. >>>

It's like that for Honky Tonk Woman, Gimme Shelter, and Moonlight Mile. There is a certain perfection, as if those recordings already existed within our subconcious, and they were just "channeled" or sculpted out of white noise by the artists.

Moonlight Mile is amazing and I will never tire of listening to it.

OT: New York City Serenade, say no more.

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71Tele
Just because the opening guitar part is not technically difficult to play does mean it is not beautiful, or even brilliant. I think the drone strings in the riff are musically interesting. Keith's open G guitar riffs for Brown Sugar, Tumbling Dice, et al are not technically difficult to play either, but someone has to create these things before anyone can play them. Therein lies the true value of the great Stones guitar parts. The fact that people continue to confuse technical virtuosity with creativity after all this time is quite amazing to me.

This is so true. We wouldn't even listen to the Stones if technically advanced playing was that important to us.

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Slimharpo
Just did a search and there seems to be many consistent references to MM starting out as an accoustic demo by Keith Richards and then Taylor worked it up from there. No one argued that point for many years. What I'd like to know is if anyone heard demo? I don'ti think any one believes this was all Mick Jagger.

Most likely, Keith made a tape with an acoustic version of what would later become Buckmaster's string arrangement. According to Taylor, he took Richard's riff and suggested that the strings played it.

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Slimharpo
Just did a search and there seems to be many consistent references to MM starting out as an accoustic demo by Keith Richards and then Taylor worked it up from there. No one argued that point for many years. What I'd like to know is if anyone heard demo? I don'ti think any one believes this was all Mick Jagger.

Where did you find these references? All I find is that everybody agrees it was totally Jagger's song, and that both Taylor and Richards claim that they wrote the riff the string section is based on:

Moonlight Mile was all Mick's. As far as I can remember, Mick came in with the whole idea of that, and the band just figured out how to play it.
- Keith Richards, Life (2010)


The music quite often comes ahead of the words. That annoys me. It's very hard to write lyrics to the track. It's much easier to have it done before but... I always try to write the lyrics to the songs. Like that thing with strings on Moonlight Mile, the lyrics weren't written to that before we cut the track. That was very extemporized. We didn't THINK of having strings or anything. It just comes.
- Mick Jagger, 1971


(W)e recorded it in my house in the country, Stargroves. And we recorded a lot of stuff (there): Bitch, stuff from Exile on Main Street... I remember Mick Taylor playing that song. Real dreamy kind of semi-Middle Eastern piece. Yeah, that's a real pretty song - and a nice string arrangement.
- Mick Jagger, 1995


At Stargroves, we had the Stones' 16-track mobile recording unit outside, and, inside, we played in this huge room with a gallery and great acoustics. That's where Moonlight Mile came from. But Mick first sang it to me in a first-class railway compartment on the way from Lindon to Bristol. Then he had the idea of embellishing it with strings. I contributed the riff that Paul Buckmaster's strings are based on - that ethereal, unresolved ending. Moonlight Mile, I Got the Blues and Sister Morphine are probablay my favourite songs on the whole album.

- Mick Taylor, 2011


(A)s far as the (Stones songs) I played on, I like Sway - and Moonlight Mile because I sort of had a hand in co-writing that, in a way. Or at least I wrote the riff the string part is based on.

- Mick Taylor, 2012


The only thing in Sticky Fingers I don't have anything to do with is Moonlight Mile, 'cause I wasn't there when they did it. It was great to hear that because I was very out of it by the end of the album and it was like listening, really listening. It was really nice.
- Keith Richards, 1971


I thought I wasn't on Moonlight Mile but the last riff everybody gets into playing is a riff I'd been playing on earlier tapes before I dropped out.
- Keith Richards, 1971


(T)hat's a dream song. Those kinds of songs with kinds of dreamy sounds are fun to do, but not all the time - it's nice to come back to reality.
- Mick Jagger, 1978

Mathijs

- Recording began in March 1970 at Stargroves. The song was the product of an all-night session between Jagger and guitarist Mick Taylor. Taylor had taken a short guitar piece recorded by Richards (entitled "Japanese Thing" ) and reworked it for the session. Jagger performs the song's prominent acoustic guitar riff. It was Taylor's idea to add a string arrangement by Paul Buckmaster to the song.

[en.wikipedia.org]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2013-02-13 10:16 by DandelionPowderman.

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DandelionPowderman
- Recording began in March 1970 at Stargroves. The song was the product of an all-night session between Jagger and guitarist Mick Taylor. Taylor had taken a short guitar piece recorded by Richards (entitled "Japanese Thing" ) and reworked it for the session. Jagger performs the song's prominent acoustic guitar riff. It was Taylor's idea to add a string arrangement by Paul Buckmaster to the song.

[en.wikipedia.org]

If its on wikipedia than you know at least half is wrong.

Mathijs

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Mathijs

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DandelionPowderman
- Recording began in March 1970 at Stargroves. The song was the product of an all-night session between Jagger and guitarist Mick Taylor. Taylor had taken a short guitar piece recorded by Richards (entitled "Japanese Thing" ) and reworked it for the session. Jagger performs the song's prominent acoustic guitar riff. It was Taylor's idea to add a string arrangement by Paul Buckmaster to the song.

[en.wikipedia.org]

If its on wikipedia than you know at least half is wrong.

Mathijs

True. The "japanese thing"-story is pretty well-known, though. And it's not only Keith who told the story. I seem to recall Charlie was talking about it as well, but can't find the quote right now...

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Mathijs

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DandelionPowderman
- Recording began in March 1970 at Stargroves. The song was the product of an all-night session between Jagger and guitarist Mick Taylor. Taylor had taken a short guitar piece recorded by Richards (entitled "Japanese Thing" ) and reworked it for the session. Jagger performs the song's prominent acoustic guitar riff. It was Taylor's idea to add a string arrangement by Paul Buckmaster to the song.

[en.wikipedia.org]

If its on wikipedia than you know at least half is wrong.

Mathijs

Really? Not sure I agree with you there Mathijis. Like it or not, Wikpedia exhaustively, and impressively researches its entries, and provide adequate footnotes. The entry for Moonlight Mile has two footnotes quoting other sources. I often use Wiki for medical research and track down the footnotes and primary sources, and it is very accurate.

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whitem8

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Mathijs

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DandelionPowderman
- Recording began in March 1970 at Stargroves. The song was the product of an all-night session between Jagger and guitarist Mick Taylor. Taylor had taken a short guitar piece recorded by Richards (entitled "Japanese Thing" ) and reworked it for the session. Jagger performs the song's prominent acoustic guitar riff. It was Taylor's idea to add a string arrangement by Paul Buckmaster to the song.

[en.wikipedia.org]

If its on wikipedia than you know at least half is wrong.

Mathijs

Really? Not sure I agree with you there Mathijis. Like it or not, Wikpedia exhaustively, and impressively researches its entries, and provide adequate footnotes. The entry for Moonlight Mile has two footnotes quoting other sources. I often use Wiki for medical research and track down the footnotes and primary sources, and it is very accurate.

It is indeed often accurate, but you'd never know if what you're reading there and then has been revised or "tampered with" - so you'll have to check back quite frequently to see if what's posted is accurate...

The trouble with Stones research is that the sources quote each other so much
that seemingly well-sourced statements turn out all to be based on some single remark
that may well have been confused, misremembered, misinterpreted, misheard or whatever.
I recall reading an interview where Bill said that Moonlight Mile started off as "Keith's Japanese Thing",
but the jumble of contradictory statements that Mathijs quoted from [www.timeisonourside.com]
is pretty clear evidence that at this point we can find firsthand eyewitness accounts
in support of whatever we want to believe about the track.

Which is gorgeous in any case.

Hello.

The last 5 seconds are my favourite ending to any album ever.

Declan.

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with sssoul
The trouble with Stones research is that the sources quote each other so much
that seemingly well-sourced statements turn out all to be based on some single remark
that may well have been confused, misremembered, misinterpreted, misheard or whatever.
I recall reading an interview where Bill said that Moonlight Mile started off as "Keith's Japanese Thing",
but the jumble of contradictory statements that Mathijs quoted from [www.timeisonourside.com]
is pretty clear evidence that at this point we can find firsthand eyewitness accounts
in support of whatever we want to believe about the track.

Which is gorgeous in any case.

Thanks!!! THAT was the quote I was looking for. You have made my day, dear with sssoul

Just do an internet search "moonlight mile Japanese thing." Tons of sources.

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DD
Hello.

The last 5 seconds are my favourite ending to any album ever.

Declan.

Which in this case, is clearly Beethoven influenced. This German thing.

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whitem8

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Mathijs

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DandelionPowderman
- Recording began in March 1970 at Stargroves. The song was the product of an all-night session between Jagger and guitarist Mick Taylor. Taylor had taken a short guitar piece recorded by Richards (entitled "Japanese Thing" ) and reworked it for the session. Jagger performs the song's prominent acoustic guitar riff. It was Taylor's idea to add a string arrangement by Paul Buckmaster to the song.

[en.wikipedia.org]

If its on wikipedia than you know at least half is wrong.

Mathijs

Really? Not sure I agree with you there Mathijis. Like it or not, Wikpedia exhaustively, and impressively researches its entries, and provide adequate footnotes. The entry for Moonlight Mile has two footnotes quoting other sources. I often use Wiki for medical research and track down the footnotes and primary sources, and it is very accurate.

I disagree. On the subjects I have a little knowledge, professionally or as a hobby, I notice many mistakes many times. The references quoted can be misleading, or downright wrong, even though they are considered trustworthy references. There are so many books written about the Stones by people who don't have a clue, and these books are used as references.

Take this Moonlight Mile entry: as a reference a review by Bill Janovitz is given. He states is 'facts' in a 'reportedly' way -and can be be 100% correct, completely incorrect, or anything in between. Janovitz does not give his references.

Many references use James Karnbach's book as reference, while we all know its full of mistakes. The article on Brian Jones uses many references from tabloid books, only written to prove he was a gift from god and murdered by Jagger personally. Then, the Brian Jones entry is written and edited by these so-called hardcore fans of the Stones, who truly believe he wrote all songs for the Stones.

Mick Taylor's entry has stated on many occasions he wrote a lot of songs, and any reference to his drug use was edited out by people close to him (hi!). It wasn't until the Crossfire Hurricane film, where Taylor stated himself heroin was part of the problem, that the drug reference wasn't edited out.

Concerning MM: I never trust these new statements. Taylor has a tendency to embellish his own actions and influence, Jagger pretends he can't remember, and Richards doesn't remember. I trust vintage interviews most, and from old remarks it seems it is a pure Jagger song, with the outro based on a piece Richards wrote.

Mathijs

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Mathijs

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whitem8

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Mathijs

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DandelionPowderman
- Recording began in March 1970 at Stargroves. The song was the product of an all-night session between Jagger and guitarist Mick Taylor. Taylor had taken a short guitar piece recorded by Richards (entitled "Japanese Thing" ) and reworked it for the session. Jagger performs the song's prominent acoustic guitar riff. It was Taylor's idea to add a string arrangement by Paul Buckmaster to the song.

[en.wikipedia.org]

If its on wikipedia than you know at least half is wrong.

Mathijs

How long did this Japanese thing take, 5 odd major pentatonic tones he finally discovered having an oriental origin? Is it recorded, can I hear it, can Keith remember anything at all ? It's basically Keith who bashes Mick T on his lack of skills and imput. One thing is for sure, Keith didn't play a single note on it, and still it is one of the greatest tunes the Stones ever recorded. It's the singer, not the song.

Really? Not sure I agree with you there Mathijis. Like it or not, Wikpedia exhaustively, and impressively researches its entries, and provide adequate footnotes. The entry for Moonlight Mile has two footnotes quoting other sources. I often use Wiki for medical research and track down the footnotes and primary sources, and it is very accurate.

I disagree. On the subjects I have a little knowledge, professionally or as a hobby, I notice many mistakes many times. The references quoted can be misleading, or downright wrong, even though they are considered trustworthy references. There are so many books written about the Stones by people who don't have a clue, and these books are used as references.

Take this Moonlight Mile entry: as a reference a review by Bill Janovitz is given. He states is 'facts' in a 'reportedly' way -and can be be 100% correct, completely incorrect, or anything in between. Janovitz does not give his references.

Many references use James Karnbach's book as reference, while we all know its full of mistakes. The article on Brian Jones uses many references from tabloid books, only written to prove he was a gift from god and murdered by Jagger personally. Then, the Brian Jones entry is written and edited by these so-called hardcore fans of the Stones, who truly believe he wrote all songs for the Stones.

Mick Taylor's entry has stated on many occasions he wrote a lot of songs, and any reference to his drug use was edited out by people close to him (hi!). It wasn't until the Crossfire Hurricane film, where Taylor stated himself heroin was part of the problem, that the drug reference wasn't edited out.

Concerning MM: I never trust these new statements. Taylor has a tendency to embellish his own actions and influence, Jagger pretends he can't remember, and Richards doesn't remember. I trust vintage interviews most, and from old remarks it seems it is a pure Jagger song, with the outro based on a piece Richards wrote.

Mathijs

How long did this Japanese thing take, 5 odd major pentatonic tones Keith finally discovered having an oriental origin ? Is it recorded, can I hear it, can Keith remember anything at all ? It's basically cowboy Keith who bashes Mick T on his lack of imput, just like he bashes Jagger about other things. One thing is for sure, Keith didn't play a single note on it, and still it is one of the greatest tunes the Stones ever recorded. Get over it, you Keith puppets. Jagger was the man here. It's the singer, not the song.

I'm not sure what we're supposed to get over. There's many instances of inconsistency around Rolling Stone's Songwriting. In Keith's book he calls "before They Make me Run" a collaboration. On the other hand Mick Jagger has stated Keith wrote it by himself. My hypothes is that Keith gave Mick more credit on certain songs so that his book would not totally destroy the Rolling Stones given the other criticism in his book. The page dealing with Moonlight Mile contains a fair amount of critism towards Mick. I think that if Keith took credit for writing Ruby Tuesday based on a vague baroque piece by Brian, Keith could find it in his heart to give Mick Jagger credit for Moonlight Mile which was probably based ona vague oreintal piece by Keith. No one is saying that the Mick's were not the main contributors on Moonlight Mile. No one is saying it's a Keith song in any large measure.

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VT22

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Mathijs

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whitem8

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Mathijs

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DandelionPowderman
- Recording began in March 1970 at Stargroves. The song was the product of an all-night session between Jagger and guitarist Mick Taylor. Taylor had taken a short guitar piece recorded by Richards (entitled "Japanese Thing" ) and reworked it for the session. Jagger performs the song's prominent acoustic guitar riff. It was Taylor's idea to add a string arrangement by Paul Buckmaster to the song.

[en.wikipedia.org]

If its on wikipedia than you know at least half is wrong.

Mathijs

How long did this Japanese thing take, 5 odd major pentatonic tones he finally discovered having an oriental origin? Is it recorded, can I hear it, can Keith remember anything at all ? It's basically Keith who bashes Mick T on his lack of skills and imput. One thing is for sure, Keith didn't play a single note on it, and still it is one of the greatest tunes the Stones ever recorded. It's the singer, not the song.

Really? Not sure I agree with you there Mathijis. Like it or not, Wikpedia exhaustively, and impressively researches its entries, and provide adequate footnotes. The entry for Moonlight Mile has two footnotes quoting other sources. I often use Wiki for medical research and track down the footnotes and primary sources, and it is very accurate.

I disagree. On the subjects I have a little knowledge, professionally or as a hobby, I notice many mistakes many times. The references quoted can be misleading, or downright wrong, even though they are considered trustworthy references. There are so many books written about the Stones by people who don't have a clue, and these books are used as references.

Take this Moonlight Mile entry: as a reference a review by Bill Janovitz is given. He states is 'facts' in a 'reportedly' way -and can be be 100% correct, completely incorrect, or anything in between. Janovitz does not give his references.

Many references use James Karnbach's book as reference, while we all know its full of mistakes. The article on Brian Jones uses many references from tabloid books, only written to prove he was a gift from god and murdered by Jagger personally. Then, the Brian Jones entry is written and edited by these so-called hardcore fans of the Stones, who truly believe he wrote all songs for the Stones.

Mick Taylor's entry has stated on many occasions he wrote a lot of songs, and any reference to his drug use was edited out by people close to him (hi!). It wasn't until the Crossfire Hurricane film, where Taylor stated himself heroin was part of the problem, that the drug reference wasn't edited out.

Concerning MM: I never trust these new statements. Taylor has a tendency to embellish his own actions and influence, Jagger pretends he can't remember, and Richards doesn't remember. I trust vintage interviews most, and from old remarks it seems it is a pure Jagger song, with the outro based on a piece Richards wrote.

Mathijs

How long did this Japanese thing take, 5 odd major pentatonic tones Keith finally discovered with having an oriental origin ? Is it recorded, can I hear it, can Keith remember anything at all ? It's basically Keith who bashes Mick T on his lack of imput, just like he bashes Jagger or Wood about other things. One thing is for sure, Keith didn't play a single note on it, and still it is one of the greatest tunes the Stones ever recorded. Get over it, all you Keith puppets. Jagger was the man here. It's the singer, not the song.

VT22, no one has claimed that Keith did anything but, perhaps, contribute a short section of the song and that is what people have been trying to ascertain. Everyone has acknowledged that it was almost, if not completely Mick Jagger and Mick Taylor who composed the beautiful Moonlight Mile. The conversation, as far as I can tell, has been civil, up until your nasty comment. I suggest you get over it.

I don't think it's meant to be nasty, it is my temperament. Get used to it.

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VT22
I don't think it's meant to be nasty, it is my temperament.

OK, well I won't comment on your temperament... I just get tired of comments that seem to be aimed at deliberately stirring up trouble where there is none. But, perhaps I just need another cup of coffee.

There are many funny quotes from back in the day, too, Mathijs.

The best one is perhaps from Taylor, stating that he wrote all the ballads in the early 70s

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latebloomer

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VT22
I don't think it's meant to be nasty, it is my temperament.

OK, well I won't comment on your temperament... I just get tired of comments that seem to be aimed at deliberately stirring up trouble where there is none. But, perhaps I just need another cup of coffee.

You are repeating yourself. Have a cup of coffee indeed..