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Doxa
Timeisonourside.com gives us the following quite - and actually confirming the assumption I had:
"Starfvcker is all Mick's (song)". - Keith Richards - 1973
Which makes me wonder about the way it was created. Just assumptions, no facts. Was it initially a kind of joke Jagger was just having fun. Like with "Cocksvcker Blues", in which he just used a derivative basic blues song format into which he added his 'poetic message'? Was the same thing happening here, this time using a derivative Berry format? But now they decided take the joke into a further stage?
Anyway, one reason why I don't find Keith's playing in it very inspired, or not like having his all heart there, could be that he probably wasn't too into Mick's song in the first place (using Berry that pejoratively?).
Mick Taylor, by the way, has said that "Star Star" was the last song they did for GOATS HEAD SOUP.
- Doxa
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DandelionPowderman
Obviously, the Stones didn't think of it as a throwaway, since they played it in 72, 75, 76, 78, 81, 2002 and 2003.
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Silver DaggerQuote
DandelionPowderman
Obviously, the Stones didn't think of it as a throwaway, since they played it in 72, 75, 76, 78, 81, 2002 and 2003.
Surely they didn't play it in 72?
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DandelionPowderman
But in no way would I ever criticise the Stones for using the most robust template in rock history to create a song. IMO, it's the execution and the performance that isn't clicking, not the song per se. On LYL it's up there with the El Mocambo numbers, imo.
Once again, it's not degrading in any way musically, to make straight rhythm and blues/real rock'n'roll songs. A 12 bar boogie is not a joke before you make it a joke. And if there is a joke here, it's strongly connected to Mick's words, not the music
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DandelionPowderman
To be a bit cynical, the same thing can be said about Rocks Off, Doxa - if we peel off the production, that is.
IMO, sometimes it doesn't matter what the song is based on, as long as it's good. It might be one chord, as in Shake Your Hip - or it might be almost symphonic, like Moonlight Mile.
Star Star is all about the lyrics. That's where the piss-take is, not within the music that imo is merely a vehicle for the words.
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DandelionPowderman
To be a bit cynical, the same thing can be said about Rocks Off, Doxa - if we peel off the production, that is.
I can't agree with that. "Rocks Off" sounds sincere and honest, the band inspired and proud. "Star Star", by comparison, is a fake (but a damn good fake). Even Keith Richards does not sound having his all heart in it.
But true that the dangers of 'self parody' and 'by numbers' are also slightly present in "Rocks Off", but I think the reference to past sounds like an inspiration, not a trick.
- Doxa
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René
I'm sorry with sssoul, you're right, bad one this time, I'm the one who has to pay better attention here!
René
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treaclefingers
I think this and Silver Train is where I feel a lot of disdain for GHS.
Silver Train is just a poorer version of the sublime ADTL and this Chuck Berry rehash has some funny lyrics that lose their charm by twelfth listen.
Uninspired, uninteresting, completely replaceable and the first time the Stones have to get bawdy on a song to make it noticeable (C*cksucker Blues notwithstanding).
If this song premiered on ABB we would have all hated it.
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treaclefingers
I think this and Silver Train is where I feel a lot of disdain for GHS.
Silver Train is just a poorer version of the sublime ADTL and this Chuck Berry rehash has some funny lyrics that lose their charm by twelfth listen.
Uninspired, uninteresting, completely replaceable and the first time the Stones have to get bawdy on a song to make it noticeable (C*cksucker Blues notwithstanding).
If this song premiered on ABB we would have all hated it.
Silver Train has a lot of momentum though (no pun intended) - and it has that really great interplay between Keith and Mick T.
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DandelionPowderman
Star Star is all about the lyrics. That's where the piss-take is, not within the music that imo is merely a vehicle for the words.
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electricmudQuote
DandelionPowderman
Star Star is all about the lyrics. That's where the piss-take is, not within the music that imo is merely a vehicle for the words.
No,it´s not. Well, you`r right it seems to be. But at the same time this is a prime example why the Stones are so different compared to most other bands.
A simple Berry rock`n roll? Yes, but..
..building it up, starting without the bass, then Bill comes in with the second verse together with Ian`s piano. Man it`s swinging!! And in the end full sound full playing only the Stones can do. No overplaying, no powerdrums or powerchords or heavy soloing like most other bands would do. Or just boring static playing like the Glam-bands would have done at the time.
Ok the words are doing a lot, but he could use totally different words and it would work perfectly. The melody, the phrasing and swing. Absolutly TOP!!
Tom
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DandelionPowderman
But in no way would I ever criticise the Stones for using the most robust template in rock history to create a song. IMO, it's the execution and the performance that isn't clicking, not the song per se. On LYL it's up there with the El Mocambo numbers, imo.
Once again, it's not degrading in any way musically, to make straight rhythm and blues/real rock'n'roll songs. A 12 bar boogie is not a joke before you make it a joke. And if there is a joke here, it's strongly connected to Mick's words, not the music
Well, I don't critizise them either, but I try to see the song and use of the 'most robust template in rock history' more in context. For example, the Stones hadn't used that template in such a pure form for ages (or if really ever). And I am sure that for them, like any musician of their generation, who get to know rock and roll more or less through that template, through Chuck Berry that is, it meant much more than I guess we generations later born rock fans and musicians - like you and me - can even imagine. They didn't have much choice when they learn the basics. We can start with, say, "Gimme Shelter" or "Bohemian Rhapsody"... When I look Jagger/Richards originals from their most creative days, it sounds like they were intentionally avoiding using that templete, or when used it, they added their own stamp there (even though, tehre is a bit of that in "Star Star" musically too). When they wanted to play Chuck Berry, they played his songs (and proudly, too - as GET YER YA-YA'S OUT! shows).
It almost sounds like when looking at all those 60's British rock bands writing their own songs, their criterion for originality was that of not repeating (or at least copying too much) the Chuck Berry - and other 50's first generation rockers - stuff; that thing was already masterfully used. They wanted to do something novel and different. Mick and Keith too. (Interestingly, some American folks, lead by Bobby Dylan, when he made his 'electric turn', making Berry pastishes, and following the classical three chord pattern, wasn't such a big thing - probably that was because for people like Dylan the melodies didn't mean so much, it was the lyrics. Jerry Garcia once noted that psychedelic stuff from Britain, Pink Floyd especially, was absolutely wild, since they didn't seem to care at all about the traditional patterns, into which the other way wild Grateful Dead still was so much stuck into.)
I wouldn't make such a strong distinction between a song per se and its execution/performance. With the Stones typically those two things go hand in hand. If the song is inspiring, so the performance of it, is too. Or they able to make from a mediocre sketch a fascinating song just by performing it 'rightly'. The Stones are masters finding the right feel and execution in studio, no matter how long it takes. Or that it was before GOATS HEAD SOUP when some problems seem to occur in that front. Something wrong in muse department. Does that concern the songs or their templates or the performance, it doesn't really matter. If they were getting lazy - like Silver Dagger mentions, as has both Mick and Keith said - that could be seen in any stages of creation (from the first ideas in Mick's or Keith's mind to the last mixes).
What goes for live versions, I don't find them making the song essentially better - like they would now play it better by having a better rhythm player now than in original, etc. "Star Star" is a good live song for a band like the Stones to perform - suits them perfectly, and if there is a hot night - wow! It works like, say, "Dance Little Sister" or "You Got Me Rocking" in a good night. Besides, compared to those two, and many many others since then, "Star Star" is still a goddamn genious of a song. But one can hear there some early indications of the band using not so ambitious and original means, that is, going 'Stones by numbers'. But in 1973 the criterion for originality, authenticity and greatness was still damn high. But my claim has always been that the Stones are/were, like all true artists, too honest to fake. You can hear if something is not right.
- Doxa
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desertblues68
Wonder whether they will play it again. Would be great next time they are in London (for purely selfish reasons) hearing thousands of people singing the choir, or they will not perform it anymore as in the name of political correctness? As a woman I do not find it that offensive, it is representative of the Stones not to take themselves too seriously><