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DandelionPowderman
From which tour is your favourite version?
1973:
1975:
1976:
1978:
1979:
1981:
1997:
Rehearsal
Live (with echo)
2002/2003: Couldn't find the Licks Tour-versions on Youtube...
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DandelionPowderman
1979 is a lovely mess. Mic trouble, Ronnie fvcks up, then corrects it so Mick can enter - and eventually, after singing one verse, Mick wrecks it completely by going straight to the chorus ><
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DandelionPowderman
That's true, but you never know with these guys. I never thought I'd hear I Wanna Be Your Man ... in London in 2012
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camper88
You might say that Star St*r opened the door to this kind of perspective in the lyrics.
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Doxa
What do you people think? Can we say that "Star Star" is a classic? I think we can.
- Doxa
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camper88
Doxa,
I see your point, but aside from "the way I held the microphone," Spider and the Fly could be about any relationship or nearly any night out whereas Star Star is a sustained narrative about the jet set life, complete with colourful references to the rich and famous. It's explicitly self-reflexive in a way that no other Stones song had been before it--even I'm Going Home, where the character in the song could be anyone who's "spent too much time away." The Under Assistant West Coast Promotion Man is close--as far as its about the industry--but even TUAWCPM doesn't break the forth wall in the way that Star Star does.
I find this significant because it's a far ways from the blues (a genre that hits you at the level of common experience and suffering) to get to self-reflexive or pastiche of foundational forms of rock 'n roll. The challenge is that once you get too self-relflexive stuff it's hard to go back to being perceived as "authentic." or true. It's as if Star Star is serves as a song to announce the shift from Classic to Revisionist in a genre context.
For convenience sake I'll argue that the Stones have four phases of development:
1. Experimental (ending around Beggars)
2. Classic (starting with JJF)
3. Revisionist (starting with GHS)
4. Baroque (starting with ER)
All dates are approximate lines in the sand--for example TY may be more of a revisionist work than a baroque one. Had they continued to work Start Me Up as a Reggae song it may have been more baroque. But I digress . . . Star Star sits as an example of heightened self-awareness, self-consciously reworking familiar forms, and a potentially mocking or parodic tone. As well, only after Star Star do we really get more of this kind of perspective and self-mocking or parody in songs like Some Girls, Respectable, Far Away Eyes, or IORR, etc.
Cheers,
Camper