.....love the Toronto Bridges rehearsal version from '97.....
They drop it back a gear or two and sure it's as rough as guts but hey yeah it's got a feel



ROCKMAN

Just too big song for them, and funnily makes them sound so small and incompetent when trying to deliver that... Technically speaking there is nothing wrong in their version (and the song, of course, is just so damn good), and probably one of their best live tracks for ages, but still something essential is lost - they just cannot even touch to the deep core of the song, and their means in hiding the lack of substance by using all the arrangenment power of their Vegas band, just makes it worse, so thin. Jagger really sounds like some vocal-coached Idols singer, trying technically deliver the song somehow home, despite having not any personal attachement to it, or grasping what the hell he is singing about. So empty, so empty.

And since we are talking one of the most definitive rocks songs of all-time, it was really a cheap trick from their side to make a video single of that. Cheap cheap cheap. Like I said when the issue was discussed some time ago, I'm looking for their version of "A Day In The Life". Probably Keith would find a nice Open G variant for that as well...

But if anyone sees the Stones doing better job in that than Dylan, alright... Susan Boyle has also lots of fans...

- Doxa



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2013-12-17 14:57 by Doxa.

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Rockman
.....love the Toronto Bridges rehearsal version from '97.....
They drop it back a gear or two and sure it's as rough as guts but hey yeah it's got a feel

Interesting, will have to dig that one out.

It's not a Vegas band that is playing on LARS (why do you say that??). The song is not "too big for them", and they don't sound small and incompetent - not at all.

What a load of rubbish

It's just that it is impossible to exceed Dylan's monumental version, as well as delivering those lyrics convincingly so many years later - although the Stones sure do a very nice version of it.

Keith's guitar brings new life to the song, melodically, but that alone isn't enough.

Bernard, Lisa and Chuck must be the incarnations of "Vegas" to you

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Gazza

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Rockman
.....love the Toronto Bridges rehearsal version from '97.....
They drop it back a gear or two and sure it's as rough as guts but hey yeah it's got a feel

Interesting, will have to dig that one out.

Same here. The versions I've heard are just so damn formal, teethless and balls-free.

- Doxa

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DandelionPowderman
It's not a Vegas band that is playing on LARS (why do you say that??). The song is not "too big for them", and they don't sound small and incompetent - not at all.

What a load of rubbish

It's just that it is impossible to exceed Dylan's monumental version, as well as delivering those lyrics convincingly so many years later - although the Stones sure do a very nice version of it.

Keith's guitar brings new life to the song, melodically, but that alone isn't enough.

Bernard, Lisa and Chuck must be the incarnations of "Vegas" to you

There shouldn't exist such a thing as "nice" version of "Like A Rolling Stone". There is nothing "nice" in that song. Only Vegas bands think so. Yeah, it is very entertaining version for certain function.

- Doxa

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DandelionPowderman
It's not a Vegas band that is playing on LARS (why do you say that??).

I say so because it sounds like that. Like I wrote above I find the version teethless, lacking balls... There is no danger, no edge. The band simply made one of the most striking rock songs of all time easy entertainment with their easy-listening arrangemnet (and I include Keith's open G stuff also to that). Maybe a term "safe and sure grandpa rock and roll" would do better.

I can only imagine what they could have made out of it had their played it, say, with the mind-blowing energy of 1967, the high-flying guitar addreline of 1972, or with the guts and sleaziness of 1975, or the rough punk attitude of 1978... Good that they didn't (still had a taste enough), but that's just to give you idea what "Vegas" is. (Having some background singers is not Vegas an sich - just listen EXILE ON MAIN STREET).

- Doxa



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2013-12-17 15:50 by Doxa.

It's not a rock song.

The equivvalent to the Stones's LARS on Exile must be Loving Cup.

Both are melodic roots-based songs, and not rock. I don't know why you need more aggression on it, I don't. I like the Stones-version, even though it lacks the greatness of the original.

It has nothing to do with Vegas, except for what you call Vegas, for some reason...

Cool guitars with great sound and a hammond organ: There are no extra backing musicians on the track, and it's played live. They sound like the Stones, and I love it

A-ha, it's not a "rock song" (and a "rock song" cannot have a melody...)... Be so, don't care much about those kind of categories or definitions, if it leads to missing a point. And I don't feel like lecturing of Dylan's songs, but that comparison to "Loving Cup" is total crap.

Why I need aggression in it? Because it is the damn song which introduced the whole idea of "edge" to "pop music" (= "rock music") back in the day. There are many ways to deliver the song - Dylan himself has a league of them - smoother, roughier, etc. (Hendrix in his 'once in a life time' performance gave us both 'smoothier' and 'roughier' treatments at the same) but I think the problem with the Stones' version that they really can't deliver the strongest point of it: that of expressing feelings. They don't sound like internalizing the song at all, but deliver it like a karaoke band. Like I said, technically okay, but of all performing artists, they should know better that to sound convincing - to make a difference - you just need more. Probably the "feel" is missing there. And if the Stones have no 'feel', their magic touch is lost. (A side note: it is the 'feel' factor that I am so fascinated in both of them, Dylan and the Stones.)

So my verdict is that with their Vegas minds they are not any longer competent enough to do this song a rightness. I take that as a symptom of the Stones 'losing it' creatively, and probably just don't giving a damn: just go there where the easiest route is. The idea of making a (not very inspired) version of one of the biggest rock classics ever could be a nice one if it is to perform it here and there, a funny "oddity" in gigs, but just to release at is as a single, to make a (corny) video of it, with one of the hottest actresses at the time, shows only artistic dementia and ruthless business mind with quick and easy profits in mind(of course, it was to be one of their best selling singles of the last two decades).

Personally, after being disappointed with the way too obvious sounds and unispired ideas of VOODOO LOUNGE, hearing them to do a mediocre version of "Like A Rolling Stone" - to be seen there in MTV - was almost a nail in the coffin for me at the time. Shit, these guys are seriously running out of bullets. Even the idea of the title matching with their name sounds like such a stupid thing, typical for the times.

- Doxa



Edited 6 time(s). Last edit at 2013-12-17 17:04 by Doxa.

I've always liked the Stone's version of LARS. It does not compare to the original, I don't think that's the point though.

A rock song can have a melody of course, but it also needs a certain beat to be rock

"Vegas" probably has something to do with slick and smooth arrangements and many musicians on stage, in your perception of the term?

"A Vegas Mind", however, is a new term for me. How can a bunch of musicians, all playing through a song - NOT leaning on the big bang - have a "Vegas mind"?

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Doxa
A-ha, it's not a "rock song" (and a "rock song" cannot have a melody...)... Be so, don't care much about those kind of categories or definitions, if it leads to missing a point. And I don't feel like lecturing of Dylan's songs, but that comparison to "Loving Cup" is total crap.

Why I need aggression in it? Because it is the damn song which introduced the whole idea of "edge" to "pop music" (= "rock music") back in the day. There are many ways to deliver the song - Dylan himself has a league of them - smoother, roughier, etc. (Hendrix in his 'once in a life time' performance gave us both 'smoothier' and 'roughier' treatments at the same) but I think the problem with the Stones' version that they really can't deliver the strongest point of it: that of expressing feelings. They don't sound like internalizing the song at all, but deliver it like a karaoke band. Like I said, technically okay, but of all performing artists, they should know better that to sound convincing - to make a difference - you just need more. Probably the "feel" is missing there. And if the Stones have no 'feel', their magic touch is lost. (A side note: it is the 'feel' factor that I am so fascinated in both of them, Dylan and the Stones.)

So my verdict is that with their Vegas minds they are not any longer competent enough to do this song a rightness. I take that as a symptom of the Stones 'losing it' creatively, and probably just don't giving a damn: just go there where the easiest route is. The idea of making a (not very inspired) version of one of the biggest rock classics ever could be a nice one if it is to perform it here and there, a funny "oddity" in gigs, but just to release at is as a single, to make a (corny) video of it, with one of the hottest actresses at the time, shows only artistic dementia and ruthless business mind with quick and easy profits in mind(of course, it was to be one of their best selling singles of the last two decades).

Personally, after being disappointed with the way too obvious sounds and unispired ideas of VOODOO LOUNGE, hearing them to do a mediocre version of "Like A Rolling Stone" - to be seen there in MTV - was almost a nail in the coffin for me at the time. Shit, these guys are seriously running out of bullets. Even the idea of the title matching with their name sounds like such a stupid thing, typical for the times.

- Doxa

Essentially I think you're right about RS covering LARS that way at that time. Had they covered LARS in the 68-78 period the result would have been great, I imagine. I disagree though with your charaterizing LARS so immensely great (to my ears SFTD way surpases it - also lyrically) that RS couldn't do nothing else than this tame hommage version. The three times I have heard His Bobness deliever LARS live, he hasn't done it well either. Dylan doesn't have the Vegas-thing, but a voice driving on a flat tire for ages. His bands can be good experiences though.

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DandelionPowderman
A rock song can have a melody of course, but it also needs a certain beat to be rock

"Vegas" probably has something to do with slick and smooth arrangements and many musicians on stage, in your perception of the term?

"A Vegas Mind", however, is a new term for me. How can a bunch of musicians, all playing through a song - NOT leaning on the big bang - have a "Vegas mind"?

"Like A Rolling Stone" did what only a few songs in the genre can do: to redefine what rock and roll is all about. The effect and significance of it is much bigger than some little technical details about certain school-book features - "beat", etc. - can tell. Like the whole "rock" genre is.

As you might have noticed I have used the notion "Vegas" - even though not much lately - just as a general term to describe the Stones activities since 1989, even though the term derives from pointing out the features of their live sound. But most important is the static, predictable, safe and sure, business oriented way of running the band, which in a drastic difference to the way the band used to work. To me the term does not have any longer a pejoritive meaning; it is just a theoretical term with an explanatory value.

Like I have said (many times), there is nothing 'technically wrong' in "Like A Rolling Stone", and like I said it is one of the best things they have done live during 'Vegas Era'. It flowers havinmg sort of freshness they don't usually have - when compared to other live stuff they have released since 1989, but I think the problem is that the point of reference is not their own 'war horses' or 'oddities' or how they deliver them these days, but the song has a life outside the Rolling Stones realm. And for me - knowing the song, its potentia, and what is all about - shows the weaknesses of the 'modern' Stones sound, no matter how good they do within it. So for me "Like A Rolling Stone" is like a reality check or a tough test: oh shit, this far you guys have wandered from your true greatness. It shows like empirator without clothes, or how it is said.

- Doxa

All in your opinion...

What did LARS re-define exactly? It is a good mid-tempo pop song, with excellent lyrics - and it drags on for too long, imo.

I think you're putting too much into this. The Stones did Mannish Boy as well (also in the Vegas era), with excellent results. But it can never even come close to the original.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2013-12-17 18:52 by DandelionPowderman.

An addition led to a double post, I am sorry.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2013-12-17 19:48 by Witness.

If it is the version on STRIPPED, which is the only recorded live version from the Stones that I have, my judgement is as following: Played with good taste and feel. But it stays on the surface and is rock without attitude. This on that song of all songs. With their name and the title of the song, it must have been tempting. I think they should have let it be, when it was, in my eyes, the very signature song of Bob Dylan more than any other song of his. The first Bob Dylan song that really made me stop and listen and respect, even if I am no Dylan follower and only have got his albums up to and including BLONDE ON BLONDE. (Probably, I ought to do something about that.)

[As before, I do not find the Vegas epitet covering. That discussion, however, I would be embarassed to enter in this setting.]

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DandelionPowderman
All in your opinion...

What did LARS re-define exactly? It is a good mid-tempo pop song, with excellent lyrics - and it drags on for too long, imo.

This is getting ridiculous. That I write "Like A Rolling Stone" is one of the most significant songs ever written - or something to the effect - is "all my opinion". Because you seemingly don't like it very much, means that it doesn't have any historical significance? This subjective relativism is really getting out of hand and make sensible discussion impossible. That I do like the song very much - I guess it is my favourite of all-time - goes nicely hand in hand with its recognized place in modern music. But even though I don't like The Beatles very much - they bore me to hell, to be honest - I still don't start claiming that it is all "just your opinion" if the Beatles were seen significant in pop music once upon time a go, or that SGT. PEPPER was probably the most efficient album ever made. There is a bit reality in music world outside our idiosyncratic taste or biased opinions. It's not really that subjective to define the actual events of history.

Here is another "opinion" by ROLLING STONE magazine of it in their list of 500 greatest songs of all-time (funnily, holding position #1). It is a nice start if you don't know why the song was (and still is) such a big deal - in my words: redefined what rock and roll is all about - but I can assure there are lots of literature on history of rock music, and to tell more about the significance of that particular song. (My favourite quote comes from its early review: "Immanuel Kant meets Rolling Stones".)

[www.rollingstone.com]

- Doxa

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Doxa
It's not really that subjective to define the actual events of history.

- Doxa

In your opinion.

Just kidding, just kidding.

But anyway, I'm dying to hear their version of "A Day In The Life" or "Stairway To Heaven" or "My Generation". Probably "Paranoid" might fit better to Keith's open G...

- Doxa

I definitely like it, Doxa. No doubt about that.

But it's not THE major event in rock history, as you're describing.

It's not even a rock song

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Doxa
A-ha,

Take on Me

I like the version on the B2B dvd. I like how it was shot as well. It's a great song and the band's cover feels playful.

But back to Bob...this famous one...A chillingly wonderful confrontational moment between artist and audience.

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Doxa

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DandelionPowderman
All in your opinion...

What did LARS re-define exactly? It is a good mid-tempo pop song, with excellent lyrics - and it drags on for too long, imo.

This is getting ridiculous. That I write "Like A Rolling Stone" is one of the most significant songs ever written - or something to the effect - is "all my opinion". Because you seemingly don't like it very much, means that it doesn't have any historical significance? This subjective relativism is really getting out of hand and make sensible discussion impossible. That I do like the song very much - I guess it is my favourite of all-time - goes nicely hand in hand with its recognized place in modern music. But even though I don't like The Beatles very much - they bore me to hell, to be honest - I still don't start claiming that it is all "just your opinion" if the Beatles were seen significant in pop music once upon time a go, or that SGT. PEPPER was probably the most efficient album ever made. There is a bit reality in music world outside our idiosyncratic taste or biased opinions. It's not really that subjective to define the actual events of history.

Here is another "opinion" by ROLLING STONE magazine of it in their list of 500 greatest songs of all-time (funnily, holding position #1). It is a nice start if you don't know why the song was (and still is) such a big deal - in my words: redefined what rock and roll is all about - but I can assure there are lots of literature on history of rock music, and to tell more about the significance of that particular song. (My favourite quote comes from its early review: "Immanuel Kant meets Rolling Stones".)

[www.rollingstone.com]

- Doxa

It's a great song, no doubt about that. And many a rock critic consider it a defining moment, not only in Dylan's oevre, but in rock history too. I personaly do not agree on that. To me it has this distracting selfflattering outsider/hippie romantic taste to it. Distracting because it makes too easy us-and-thems. Like the wise singer vs. the despisable mr. Jones who doesn't know what is happening (in Ballad of a thin man).
As a lyric-writer I think Mick Jagger stays clear of this distracting dylanesque flaw. Often this flaw is mirrored in Dylan's voice too.

Just because Rolling Stones (which write a LOT of BS, btw) calls the best song ever, or something, doesn't mean that we can't find 100 other magazines that don't...

It is a good song indeed, but it didn't re-define anything, except for Dylan himself, imo. It's just a good song, and it didn't top the US charts - the Beatles did...

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DandelionPowderman
Just because Rolling Stones (which write a LOT of BS, btw) calls the best song ever, or something, doesn't mean that we can't find 100 other magazines that don't...

It is a good song indeed, but it didn't re-define anything, except for Dylan himself, imo. It's just a good song, and it didn't top the US charts - the Beatles did...

You seem to have some personal issue here, and you come up with the oddest remarks which make no sense. Believe whatever you like, create your own music histories, rock and roll definitions, or whatever, and be happy.

Unbelievable.

- Doxa

The only one with personal issues here is you, obviously - can you stand to be questioned at all?

Now play nicely ! It's supposed to be the Season of Good Will !

...and this is what comes of thinking about Rock N Roll instead of just dancin'

There's no good will left, after the finns stole santa from us

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DandelionPowderman
There's no good will left, after the finns stole santa from us

... and Coca Cola made him red.