Ran across this, don't know if it was posted here yet. Funny tho.

May 18, 2005

latimes.com : California
Dana Parsons:


Rolling Dinosaurs Still Roam the Earth
I went down to the hip section of Costa Mesa on Tuesday — the stretch on the opposite side of town from my office. A coincidence of geography? I'd like to think so.

The amount of tuna I eat in a week notwithstanding, I think of myself as knowing what's up in the world. Hey, man, I get it. With that in mind, I need to know: Why another Rolling Stones world tour?

Can't these guys ever get enough? Let Johnny Mathis tour into his 70s, but, please, not the Stones. Mathis can sing "Chances Are" as long as four people in a piano bar want to hear it, but is that the Stones' plan with "Get Off My Cloud"?

Why does this rattle me so?

Quick answer: Mick Jagger turns 62 in July.

The truth is, another Stones tour merely underscores what everybody hates about us baby boomers. Namely, that we live in the past and insist on endlessly trotting out our cultural icons, all the while nodding knowingly to one another about how we grabbed and shaped contemporary American culture in the '60s.

With a few notable exceptions (Dylan can tour forever), I get the point, especially when it comes to the Stones.

I saw them at the Los Angeles Coliseum in what I thought would be a final tour some 25 years after I'd first heard them on radio. That tour was in 1989.

On that night, which now seems like a lifetime ago, I liked the opening act more than the Stones — a little band called Guns N' Roses fronted by a bad boy named Axl Rose.

The Stones were supposed to be the bad boys, not guys who'd do sendups of their own material. Now they're back, and I fear they'll be doing a spot-on impression of Spinal Tap. Their lone Orange County date is scheduled Nov. 4 at Angel Stadium, with Ticketmaster listing prices from $60 to $450.

As I was saying, I headed Tuesday for the hip part of town. I wanted to let them know that, like them, this baby boomer disapproves of another Stones tour.

"Would you go to a Rolling Stones concert," I asked Aaron Van Geen, 20. "Yes," he said immediately. "If I had the money."

Temporarily discombobulated, I asked why. "There's some music that spans time and relates to kids of all generations," he said. Agreed, but the question is whether the Stones, at 60, can still deliver the goods.

"Now that I think about it," Van Geen says, "I don't know if I would go to their concert, because it wouldn't be the same as it was. In the '60s, it was more of an underground thing. It's just such a different experience than what it would have been."

Yes, yes. Now, the young hipster gets it.

I bopped farther up the street to a body jewelry shop. You don't get any hipper than the two guys behind the counter. "I wouldn't pay for it, but I'd go," said 28-year-old Brian Slusher. "I wouldn't even pay 20 bucks to see them. I'm just not in touch musically with them at all."

His comrade, 26-year-old Jeff Myers, chipped in. "I tend to think a lot of these bands, like the Stones and Aerosmith, are pretty much parodies of what they used to be. They haven't innovated much in the last few years. They're still playing the same blues riffs."

If that sounds like Myers discounts the Stones, no way. "I would listen to 'Sticky Fingers' over and over again," he says, referring to the 1971 Stones album that spawned 'Brown Sugar.' "It's still a great record. I would have loved to have been born early enough, when they were closer to my age. Not dinosaurs."

When the man's right, he's right.

I was a high school freshman in Nebraska when the radio was playing "Not Fade Away." As an introduction to the Stones, I wasn't impressed. But over the next 15 years, through the '60s and well into the 1970s, their indisputable legacy grew. But last time I checked, this is 2005.

Call me old-fashioned, but I don't want to see former bad boys smiling and winking — as their audience sips bottled water — when they should be indignant and impetuously youthful while insisting, "Hey, you, get off of my cloud!"


Dana Parsons can be reached at (714) 966-7821 or at dana.parsons@latimes.com. An archive of his recent columns is at [www.latimes.com] .
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"Fuc the Rock babe, I want the Roll." (KR)

bof...

Yeah. This resonates somewhat. I am a huge Stones fan, am seeing them 5 times on this tour. I am older, I can afford it (not the $450 seats, tho), and to be perfectly honest, nostalgia is a big part of it. I would not even pretend that their new music is relevant. In 1973, when I first saw the Stones, they played 15 songs in about 80 minutes, with 12 of the 15 songs from their 3 latest albums (Exile, Sticky Fingers, LI. The only "oldies" were I'ts all over now, JJF and SFM. I would certainly not enjoy a show that concentrated on their last few albums. FYI, the set list in Jan 73:

Brown Sugar
Bitch
Rocks Off
Gimme Shelter
It's all over now
Happy
Tumbling Dice
Sweet Virginia
Dead Flowers
You Can't Always Get What you Want
All Down the Line
Midnight Rambler
Rip This Joint
Jumping Jack Flash
Street Fighting Man

With a few new and some other songs this is the 89-90, 94/95, 97/98/99 and 02/03 and 05/06-setlist. Last tour that concentrate on their last albums was 81/82 (Some Girls/Emotional Rescue and Tattoo You).


'In the sweet old country...'

Hang Fire Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> With a few new and some other songs this is the
> 89-90, 94/95, 97/98/99 and 02/03 and
> 05/06-setlist. Last tour that concentrate on their
> last albums was 81/82 (Some Girls/Emotional Rescue
> and Tattoo You).
>

Exactly; the last 'relevant' period for the mentioned SG/ER/Tattoo You-period, 'relavant' meaning that the band was so sure and proud of their fresh material that they could base their set on it.

Since that we are happy to see the legends 'one more time' on stage, plus hearing few rarities from the back catalog, and decent versions of the same list of war heroes that were fresh and 'relevant' in '73. And oh yeah: we get some extra 20-30 show minutes, with better seats and hostilities I guess; in quantity terms everything is bigger nowadays, starting with ticket prices, the number of side musicians, ligths, stage, and the age and weight of the fans.

Not that I wouldn't go to see them this time around; but facts like that puts all this hype to a certain perpective.

- Doxa

Doxa:

"Hostilities"?

Aah, a freudian lapsus.. hospilities I think I thought to mean.. or then not?

hospitalities?

1973 - no phallic balloon, no snake, no bridge, no backup vocalists.

Well, it seriously looks like that I need to get an English dictionary

- Doxa

Is this an "interesting article"? The same boring trivialities about the “former bad boys”, blah, blah, blah. Come on, say something new...The question “why do the Stones a new tour” it’s simply a stupid question. Because out there some million of people want to see them, that’s why! It’s so obvious. Since 1989 they played to 23 million people, so they attracted new fans too. So stop talking about “nostalgia” again and again. Must tour Bob Dylan but not the Stones ??!! What a joke! The editior in the 1989 liked Guns ’n Roses more than the Stones (if you ask Slash he’ll answer that the Stones is much better live). OK, it’s a matter of taste, i respect it. But why must be a serious criterion the opinion of a bunch of giornalist or other guys who don’t like the Stones, who never loved their music? Why must be a "criterion" the envy? Why are the Stones "dinosaurs" and is not "dinosaur" for example Lou Reed, Iggy, or Van Morrison, who makes lovely music (no doupt) but the same music since "Astral Weeks" period? Because the Stones are much more successful??!!. Gimme a break...

It is inevitable that to be fashionable to their cohorts and readers that before every Stones tour people write this crap and it's getting pretty boring. What is so wrong about performing and doing what they've done all their lives? If an electrician or a plumber works into is later years is he a dinosaur who should quit? Or should he be allowed to carry on as long as people are satisfied with their work and are willing to pay for it? F-ing ridiculous. And to touch on another point of course the set list will have more older tunes because the catalogue of songs (hits) is much larger now than back in the early days when everything was new. Yes people want to hear the songs they grew up with and there is nothing wrong with that. And they are more than happy to hear a few new tunes as well. There are many contributing factors as to why older bands don't sell as many albums but I don't have the time to elaborate here now. Most of you know anyway. Man I 'm so sick of hearing this shit.

Jackass wrote:

"Of course the set list will have more older tunes because the catalogue of songs (hits) is much larger now than back in the early days when everything was new. Yes people want to hear the songs they grew up with and there is nothing wrong with that. And they are more than happy to hear a few new tunes as well."

Totaly agree. I just saw a poll on a site (keno's). Question: "Do you want the Stones to play 'Satisfaction' on the new tour?". Answers: "Yes 68%", "No" 32%. During Licks Tour in San Siro, Stade de France and Prague and i had seen a lot of fans 19, 25, or 30 years "old" who raved about "Satisfaction" and the other classics. Is this a kind of ..."nostalgia"??!! I don't think so. Nostalgia has nothing to do with the age of a song. Nostalgia has to do with the feelings that the song cause. You can feel nostalgic (or not) when are listening to a new Dylan's song. You can feel ful of power and energy hearing JJF or "Brown Sugar". I never felt nostalgic in a concert of the Stones!

I think that it would be great if they would come out with 2-3 typical starters (Start Me Up, Satisfaction etc.) for first 15 minutes, then Mick tells the audience "I know the songs you want to hear and we'll get to those in the second half of the show; first, tho, we're going to play some songs from our new album and some songs we've never done live before . . . ." Then, they could devote 45 minutes or so to a varying lineup of new/obscure numbers. The second hour+ could be "greatest hits live". Everyone would go home stoked.

I think 10 classics + 10 new/obscure tracks would be a good balance.