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Irix
Maybe the Groninger Museum could show their online version of Unzipped occasionally again, e.g. when the Stones are on tour.

[shop.groningermuseum.nl]

Here is a story about a glaring error that I discovered at Exhibitionism back in 2016 before the opening of the show in New York City. (I also posted this story recently on the thread in memory of with sssoul.)

In 2016, I saw Exhibitionism in NYC, on the Sunday before it was opened to the public, as a guest of Matt Lee.

In one of the galleries there was a display dedicated to many of the most notable people who’ve played with the Stones over the years: Nicky, Stu, Bobby, Daryl, Lisa, etc. Comprised of four synchronized video monitors, all four screens changed together to the next person, and one of the four had the person’s name. It was on a continuous loop. Around a dozen people that all of us Rolling Stones fans know.

I was watching the display, and the featured sideman was Billy Preston. Screen #1 had a photo of Billy along with the caption “Billy Preston, keyboards.” The other screens #2, #3 and #4 showed other photos … BUT THE PICTURE ON SCREEN #3 WASN'T BILLY PRESTON!… It was Ollie Brown!! I couldn't believe it! Ridiculous! Very bad! Some other African-American? Seriously??

I mentioned this serious error to a few people at the show: An attendant in the gallery, Matt Lee, a woman in the souvenir shop. No one seemed to understand or care... The opening party was about to happen in two days...

And Sunday night, with sssoul to the rescue! I emailed her. She is amazing, which I already knew. Sssoul quickly provided me with a link to the name and phone number of the head curator and designer of Exhibitionism, Ilene Gallagher. I soon learned that she’s well known. And sssoul also got me the office telephone number for Rainbow Services… aka Jane Rose’s office. Wow, sssoul!

On Monday morning, the first number I called... a woman’s voice answered, she said “Ilene Gallagher.” I introduced myself and explained this serious problem. She immediately grasped the seriousness of the mistake; and assured me that I had reached the right person at the top. She later emailed me back that the problem was getting fixed in time for Tuesday's opening! For good measure, I also called Rainbow Services and was able to explain the serious problem at hand to someone who said she’d inform Jane Rose personally.

So I trusted that this mistake was fixed quickly. Thanks to yours truly. And with sssoul, of course.

On Tuesday night I stood behind barricades next to the red carpet at the club... There, I recognized Ilene Gallagher going into the show. (I had seen her LinkedIn picture online when I contacted her.) I called out to her and she came over… She shook my hand when I told her that I was the guy who had tipped her off. I was hoping that she’d invite me in on the spot... but I already knew that she couldn’t… I had actually asked her politely the day before if she could reward me with an invitation… but No Tumbling Dice.



Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 2024-04-10 01:41 by schillid.

Overall a fantastic book.

Anthony DeCurtis opens the book with a career review. Under ALL THE WORLD'S A STAGE he says, in part, "Possibly the most underrated album of the Stones' career, DIRTY WORK (1986) finds the band at its rawest and most rhythmically charged, a reflection of the tumult within the band when it was recorded."

It gets worse.

"They've made strong, credible studio albums during this period... The Dust Brothers and Kenny 'Babyface' Edmunds helped produce tracks on BRIDGES TO BABYLON..."

For one, DIRTY WORK is not their most underrated album, which implies it's good; it's their least rated album, appropriately so, because it sucks in comparison to all their other albums.

Even they have essentially admitted that.

Two, Babyface did not help produce anything on BRIDGES - his involvement was excluded. Nowhere is he credited as a producer. What he did do was not used. Why he's mentioned as a producer is an error of such degree that DeCurtis clearly didn't look at the liner notes of BRIDGES. Had Bite My Head Off not been included on HACKNEY then Paul McCartney wouldn't be on the album.

It's that simple.

The weakness of saying "strong, credible albums" is bizarre; the basic admittance of how they are nowhere near anything from 1968-1973 and the other two, although not stated but obviously implied, instead of just allowing them to be equivalent to the albums that weren't those classics, undermines DeCurtis' position as one to open the book with the story of the Stones.

To realize no one in the Stones had any discussion with him about any of those aspects is a reminder of LIVE LICKS and SHINE A LIGHT: the Stones handing things off because they can't be bothered anymore.

Very strange. But then again, "they" used HACKNEY DIAMONDS recording tracks to overdub the RACKET live album.

Whoever "they" are. Probably Watt.

dirty work

it's only there worst album (but i like it)

agree with you though about the book it's great

on a side note

isn't it annoying once you get knowledgeable enough about the band that you end up spotting all the mistakes in the books that you used to love but now can't read more then two pages without noticing the author got someting wrong

makes it hard to take those books as seriously as you used to

i miss when i was more ignorant of there history and could just enjoy reading a book about them

HA!

Absolutely.

I've found Tony's book to be a riot. There are some others where the details are a bit cloudy - not as intense.

Robert Greenfield's book is top notch but my all time fave is Chet Flippo's.

The gear book is fantastic with the only error I've noticed is a pic of Keith from 1997 but stated as 1994.

Bill's book, about the releases and tours, gets the numbers of the albums wrong but whatever, that's an awesome book.

Dalton's... I haven't looked at it in a while but it seems to be a compilation, basically, of media clips, which makes an interesting read.

Some years ago I bought the book "Sympathy for the Devil: The Birth of the Rolling Stones and the Death of Brian Jones" by Paul Trynka.

It'e been the only book on the Stones I never finished. Unbelievable bullshit stories, a constant bashing of Mick and Keith about how bad they'd been behaving against Brian. Pages of boring information about school politics and cultural institutions (plus history) in Cheltenham, and on and on ...

Didn't even make it to the half of the book. Put it aside and will never touch it again (I guess).



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2025-09-02 09:52 by Meise.

I’ve started James Phelge’s book several times but never finished it. So ploddy, it needed a good editor to liven it up.

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ProfessorWolf
dirty work

it's only there worst album (but i like it)

agree with you though about the book it's great

on a side note

isn't it annoying once you get knowledgeable enough about the band that you end up spotting all the mistakes in the books that you used to love but now can't read more then two pages without noticing the author got someting wrong

makes it hard to take those books as seriously as you used to

i miss when i was more ignorant of there history and could just enjoy reading a book about them

Spot on Professor!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2025-09-02 11:01 by MadMax.

Hi All -

While we discuss RS books, I'll take this opportunity to mention the spreadsheet of RS books I've been compiling:

Rolling Stones Library

I recently read and very much enjoyed ROLLING STONED, the edited/compiled version of Andrew Oldham's two previous memoirs.