They don't need the excuse of a studio album to tour anymore. Those days are over. Other artists don't release albums and tour. Hell, the Stones have now done THREE tours with a hits comp as the release they were "touring", which, of course, is bullshit since they're always touring their greatest hits albums. And two of those compilations are from the Twenty Hundreds! How funny these past few years are for new releases:

2002 FORTY LICKS
2005 A BIGGER BANG
2012 FIFTY LICKS (or that other stupid title)

That's it. That's all they've done since 1997!!!!!!!

2015 tour was one without a release. Zip Code tour. Zip was tied in with STICKY FINGERS - really? That's convenient!

What a load.

At least they showed the zip codes on the big screen.

to be fair they were pushing the sticky fingers reissue with the bonus disc

A new World Tour 2016/17 without a new studio album would be "Too much"...It would be a disappointment come back in the major US cities or in Europe without new stuff...Come on!!

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Hairball
If there is a new album - which I really hope there will be - I can't emphaszie enough that they should throw away any notion of making it contemporary.
They're all old-timers now, so why try and compete with what's on the charts now?

It would be like Bing Crosby or Perry Como coming out with an electrified guitar heavy pyschedelic album in the late '60s in an attempt to be hip...it simply doesn't make sense.

And now Keith has released another solo album that's basically stripped down, and free from any notion of what's 'happening' on the charts right now.
It's as if Keith has painted a beautiful scene of a dark misty forest, perhaps with the moon rising over the hills in the background. Not to knock Mick, but if he had any say about this beauty,
he'd probably want to put a flashing neon frame around it all to make it 'fresh' sounding and to appeal to those who want something contemporary - it just wouldn't work!

Mick could have (and probably should have) officially released his solo work he did with the Red Devils. Can't understand why he never did,
but more than likely it's because it wasn't contemporary enough with what was happening on the charts at the time...

Nice, hb! Would hate to see what you'd write if you WERE knocking Mick!

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LongBeachArena72

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Hairball
If there is a new album - which I really hope there will be - I can't emphaszie enough that they should throw away any notion of making it contemporary.
They're all old-timers now, so why try and compete with what's on the charts now?

It would be like Bing Crosby or Perry Como coming out with an electrified guitar heavy pyschedelic album in the late '60s in an attempt to be hip...it simply doesn't make sense.

And now Keith has released another solo album that's basically stripped down, and free from any notion of what's 'happening' on the charts right now.
It's as if Keith has painted a beautiful scene of a dark misty forest, perhaps with the moon rising over the hills in the background. Not to knock Mick, but if he had any say about this beauty,
he'd probably want to put a flashing neon frame around it all to make it 'fresh' sounding and to appeal to those who want something contemporary - it just wouldn't work!

Mick could have (and probably should have) officially released his solo work he did with the Red Devils. Can't understand why he never did,
but more than likely it's because it wasn't contemporary enough with what was happening on the charts at the time...

Nice, hb! Would hate to see what you'd write if you WERE knocking Mick!

Hahaha ahhh man, I was trying to be honest and not knock Mick at all.
But it's safe to assume that if Mick was presented with Keith's album, he would more than likely want to slick it all up a bit. Maybe a drum machine here, a synthesizer there, maybe even a couple samples and/or some hip hop thrown into the mix, and make sure there's absolutely no 'mistakes'. But then again, maybe not? Nothing really wrong with that, just not what I would hope for in a new Stones album. But look at Doom and Gloom - not a great song to begin with imo, but the studio version is a bit sterilized. As someone once said it sounds like an overproduced ZZ Top song from the early '80's. Live on the other hand, the tune sounded much better (but not by much I suppose). And then there's the Stones' studio version of One More Shot...something just doesn't sound right to me, but when it was played live it took on a different life. One can only wonder how Keith's version left off his new album would sound. As Steve Jordan said "it's a much better version", and based on the overall sound of Keith's album I'd have to agree - wish we could hear it!

I'm not saying Keith is God or has all the right answers, it's all just a personal preference really - simply my opinion.
Some like it plain, simple, and maybe a bit muddy, while others like it bright, loud, and flashy...like a flashing neon frame.

_____________________________________________________________
Rip this joint, gonna save your soul, round and round and round we go......

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24FPS
Pop Music simply doesn't have the cache it did in earlier times. The era of the mid-60s had composers like Leonard Bernstein dissecting chart toppers in wonderment for songs like Paint It Black. (This actually happened.)

The elements that comprise a top selling pop single now would not be there in a Rolling Stones release. Not only are the Stones geezers, they don't make the kind of danceable music the kids listen to, and that's who downloads singles for the most part.

The Stones don't have to play down to that audience. Neither do they have to be distasteful and try and act an age they have long passed. I know people like to piss on Super Heavy, but Warring People is the sort of song I wish the Stones could still pull off.

I HAVE SAID IT SO MANY TIMES...SUPERHEAVY IS A GREAT ALBUM.... HALF OF IT SEEMS LIKE A MICK JAGGER SOLO PROJECT. IT IS VERY, VERY GOOD.

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Hairball

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LongBeachArena72

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Hairball
If there is a new album - which I really hope there will be - I can't emphaszie enough that they should throw away any notion of making it contemporary.
They're all old-timers now, so why try and compete with what's on the charts now?

It would be like Bing Crosby or Perry Como coming out with an electrified guitar heavy pyschedelic album in the late '60s in an attempt to be hip...it simply doesn't make sense.

And now Keith has released another solo album that's basically stripped down, and free from any notion of what's 'happening' on the charts right now.
It's as if Keith has painted a beautiful scene of a dark misty forest, perhaps with the moon rising over the hills in the background. Not to knock Mick, but if he had any say about this beauty,
he'd probably want to put a flashing neon frame around it all to make it 'fresh' sounding and to appeal to those who want something contemporary - it just wouldn't work!

Mick could have (and probably should have) officially released his solo work he did with the Red Devils. Can't understand why he never did,
but more than likely it's because it wasn't contemporary enough with what was happening on the charts at the time...

Nice, hb! Would hate to see what you'd write if you WERE knocking Mick!

Hahaha ahhh man, I was trying to be honest and not knock Mick at all.
But it's safe to assume that if Mick was presented with Keith's album, he would more than likely want to slick it all up a bit. Maybe a drum machine here, a synthesizer there, maybe even a couple samples and/or some hip hop thrown into the mix, and make sure there's absolutely no 'mistakes'. But then again, maybe not? Nothing really wrong with that, just not what I would hope for in a new Stones album. But look at Doom and Gloom - not a great song to begin with imo, but the studio version is a bit sterilized. As someone once said it sounds like an overproduced ZZ Top song from the early '80's. Live on the other hand, the tune sounded much better (but not by much I suppose). And then there's the Stones' studio version of One More Shot...something just doesn't sound right to me, but when it was played live it took on a different life. One can only wonder how Keith's version left off his new album would sound. As Steve Jordan said "it's a much better version", and based on the overall sound of Keith's album I'd have to agree - wish we could hear it!

I'm not saying Keith is God or has all the right answers, it's all just a personal preference really - simply my opinion.
Some like it plain, simple, and maybe a bit muddy, while others like it bright, loud, and flashy...like a flashing neon frame.

I know, man, just giving you a hard time.

I don't agree with your depiction of Mick's musical instincts ... but I think there are probably far more people on this board who agree with you instead of me, so you're in good company!

I do like the "darker" Mick of the 60's/70's, in general -- "Memo from Turner," "Sway," e.g. -- and feel it's totally fair to say he lost his way to a certain extent thereafter. It's easy to see him as following fashion, rather than leading, of trying to react to more modern trends, instead of creating trends like he used to be able to.

But I think you can also say that Mick TRIED, that he kept his ear to the ground, tried to assimilate dance music of various kinds into his own sensibility. Sometimes the results were embarrassing, sometimes they were OK. You can say he lost his way, I suppose, that he should have stayed "locked in" to his original inspirations, which is my perception of the path that Keith took.

I don't know who was right, who was wrong. I don't like much Stones work after the mid-70's because I just think that they stopped writing great songs together for whatever reason. And as for the solo work: Mick's was cringeworthy and occasionally interesting; Keith's, for me, just boring.

I was sorry to read that Jagger has prepared demos for the next album. I think these demos are the enemy of the spontaneity that brings the true Stones sound. We all know how songs like Sympathy and Shattered came about; the band kicked them around for hours and hours until a jewel emerged from the rough. I can appreciate Mick has tired of watching Keef play the same riff for days in the studio but it used to bring such great results.
A track like 'Laugh I Nearly Died' could have been a classic if it held a little more raggedness but instead it sounds pristine and stillborn to me like the band are 'colouring by numbers' i.e. following a demo laid down by Mick.
Also, they need to bury Mick's voice a little deeper in the mix, they don't sound like the Stones with Mick so way up front as he was on ABB.
Don't get me wrong I'm a huge fan of Mick but one of the few oft-repeated lines of Keith's with which I agree is that you get the best out of Mick when he has a harmonica at hand. A loose back to basics disc is what we want, not a polished sound that chases the trends.I want to hear Charlie Watts, not a digital echo of him, a la 'Doom and Gloom'.
Finally, I think that as a bonus disc they might book-end their career by re-recording the first album - but it would only be good if they do so under the same conditions i.e get the job done in two days max.
Whatever they do it will be great to have it. Keith has set a very high standard with 'Crosseyed Heart'. I hope Mick is wise enough to appreciate its organic, honest nature and how this approach might help the band produce one last classic,

whatever the stones do or dont do, the one thing they shouldnt even attempt to do is compete with the younger artists. the stones have nothing to prove, they can chuck the whole thing in right now and they will always be known as the greatest ever. the stones will be remembered long after they finish, cant say the same about many of todays musicians.

hope they dont go yet, maybe make a couple more studio albums.

They should fall back on their old one album per year routine

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LongBeachArena72
But I think you can also say that Mick TRIED, that he kept his ear to the ground, tried to assimilate dance music of various kinds into his own sensibility. Sometimes the results were embarrassing, sometimes they were OK. You can say he lost his way, I suppose, that he should have stayed "locked in" to his original inspirations, which is my perception of the path that Keith took.

I don't know who was right, who was wrong. I don't like much Stones work after the mid-70's because I just think that they stopped writing great songs together for whatever reason. And as for the solo work: Mick's was cringeworthy and occasionally interesting; Keith's, for me, just boring.

This is exactly how I feel about their latter-day work. I think a significant reason why they stopped producing stuff at their previous level is simply that their musical interests diverged, as you point out.

As an aside, my guess is that one reason their solo output isn't as good is that they first learned to write songs together. Neither had any experience at all writing music before, either individually or in collaboration, and their way of coming up with musical ideas must be shaped by that.

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GasLightStreet
They don't need the excuse of a studio album to tour anymore. Those days are over. Other artists don't release albums and tour. Hell, the Stones have now done THREE tours with a hits comp as the release they were "touring", which, of course, is bullshit since they're always touring their greatest hits albums. And two of those compilations are from the Twenty Hundreds! How funny these past few years are for new releases:

2002 FORTY LICKS
2005 A BIGGER BANG
2012 FIFTY LICKS (or that other stupid title)

That's it. That's all they've done since 1997!!!!!!!

2015 tour was one without a release. Zip Code tour. Zip was tied in with STICKY FINGERS - really? That's convenient!

What a load.

At least they showed the zip codes on the big screen.

Well I thought the SF Live release they did was probably better than anything they could have come up with in the studio so it's not all bad. Besides, the Vault releases is what they have been concentrating on, it's not like we haven't been getting new Stones records. They are giving most Stones fans what they want, recordings of them playing their best songs.

I certainly agree with you about the unfortunate lack of more SF tunes this past tour though, thought it was a rather slick and devious marketing trick and the joke was on all of us who expected more. I feel a bit slighted by it all. At least I got to see Moonlight Mile live.

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blivet

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LongBeachArena72
But I think you can also say that Mick TRIED, that he kept his ear to the ground, tried to assimilate dance music of various kinds into his own sensibility. Sometimes the results were embarrassing, sometimes they were OK. You can say he lost his way, I suppose, that he should have stayed "locked in" to his original inspirations, which is my perception of the path that Keith took.

I don't know who was right, who was wrong. I don't like much Stones work after the mid-70's because I just think that they stopped writing great songs together for whatever reason. And as for the solo work: Mick's was cringeworthy and occasionally interesting; Keith's, for me, just boring.

This is exactly how I feel about their latter-day work. I think a significant reason why they stopped producing stuff at their previous level is simply that their musical interests diverged, as you point out.

As an aside, my guess is that one reason their solo output isn't as good is that they first learned to write songs together. Neither had any experience at all writing music before, either individually or in collaboration, and their way of coming up with musical ideas must be shaped by that.

Hi, blivet. You raise a fascinating point. I've been thinking about this a lot, too.

I don't know anything about collaboration in songwriting. My field is prose writing and I cannot imagine collaborating on that with ANYONE else. Just don't see how it would work. (I had buddies years ago who were investigative reporters and they would sometimes work as teams for big features, divvying up the investigative work and pooling their resources--that did make sense.)

There have been songwriting teams, of course, for a long time, but (and please correct me here if I'm wrong), generally speaking, the ones that I'm familiar with before the rock era--Rodgers/Hart, the Gershwins, Kander/Ebb, Lerner/Loewe, Rodgers/Hammerstein, Webber/Rice--consisted of a lyricist and the person who wrote the music. I think it got messier during the rock era--again, unless I'm wrong--when there were duos whose roles were less distinctively defined.

I don't know how Jagger and Richards wrote songs in their primes, what they each brought to the table. How many lyrics did Keith write? How much music did Mick write? They probably worked in several different ways. They could each individually come up with ideas that they then fleshed out together. They could jam something out in a studio session, suddenly discovering a promising direction, and then following it till it became the basis for a song. They could "lock themselves in a room" and not come out till they'd written some tunes (never exactly understood this one.)

But, in nearly all those approaches, their chemistry together is what ultimately made for great songs. You're right. Maybe they just never learned how to do things all by themselves, or with other, lesser collaborators.

I've been thinking a lot about the 12 singles they wrote and released in 23 months between Feb 65 and Jan 67:

The Last Time
Play with Fire
Satisfaction
Get Off My Cloud
As Tears Go By
19th Nervous Breakdown
Paint It, Black
Mother's Little Helper
Lady Jane
Have You Seen Your Mother
Let's Spend the Night Together
Ruby Tuesday

Think about that: EVERY TWO MONTHS, a minor or major pop masterpiece--that is just RIDICULOUS talent and productivity.

How did they write those songs? Jammed them out in the studio? Locked themselves in rooms? Worked totally separately and then mind-melded their work when they came together?

(I know I'm expressing my ignorance here, again; there are no doubt posters who know exactly how each of the songs above came to life. I await edification!)

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redowen66
I was sorry to read that Jagger has prepared demos for the next album. I think these demos are the enemy of the spontaneity that brings the true Stones sound. We all know how songs like Sympathy and Shattered came about; the band kicked them around for hours and hours until a jewel emerged from the rough. I can appreciate Mick has tired of watching Keef play the same riff for days in the studio but it used to bring such great results.
A track like 'Laugh I Nearly Died' could have been a classic if it held a little more raggedness but instead it sounds pristine and stillborn to me like the band are 'colouring by numbers' i.e. following a demo laid down by Mick.
Also, they need to bury Mick's voice a little deeper in the mix, they don't sound like the Stones with Mick so way up front as he was on ABB.
Don't get me wrong I'm a huge fan of Mick but one of the few oft-repeated lines of Keith's with which I agree is that you get the best out of Mick when he has a harmonica at hand. A loose back to basics disc is what we want, not a polished sound that chases the trends.I want to hear Charlie Watts, not a digital echo of him, a la 'Doom and Gloom'.
Finally, I think that as a bonus disc they might book-end their career by re-recording the first album - but it would only be good if they do so under the same conditions i.e get the job done in two days max.
Whatever they do it will be great to have it. Keith has set a very high standard with 'Crosseyed Heart'. I hope Mick is wise enough to appreciate its organic, honest nature and how this approach might help the band produce one last classic,

Except for the part about re-recording the first album, I agree with your post 100%.

_____________________________________________________________
Rip this joint, gonna save your soul, round and round and round we go......