I found this review in the Times-News of Twin Falls Idaho from Friday, July 30, 1982.

By RICK SHEFCHIK
Knight-Ridder Newspapers
ROLLING STONES, "Still Life"
{Rolling Stones Records) — The
profit-taking continues; If you weren't
there, this extremely brief version of
their 1981 concert tour won't serve as
an adequate substitute, since several
of these songs ("Shattered" "Let Me
Go") were merely excuses for Jagger
to run around the arenas. The ????* of
Jagger sprinting through a crowd or
riding around on a cherry picker was
of dubious worth, and as the
soundtrack to those adventures, many
of these songs could just as well have
gone unrecorded.
If you were there, you'll probably
appreciate how much better the
guitars and drums sound on record —
almost as though the band members
weren't separated by 50 feet or so,
thanks to their wireless amps. "Just
My Imagination" is the strongest cut,
the lone rave-up from the band which
practically invented the term;
"Twenty Flight Rock" and "Going To
A Go Go," two uninspired covers, are
the only songs they haven't recorded
elsewhere. As Jagger says at the end
of the record, "We'll see you next
year." I'd wait until then.

* It looks like it says "shift" but could be a typo and supposed to be "sight"

Love it, the playing on this tour was raw, lots of great weaving between Ronnie and Keith. Mick was running around a lot but still sang in key and with emotion...love jogging to this and Hampton 81

Love Still Life. I can't wait for a deluxe version.

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exilestones
Love Still Life. I can't wait for a deluxe version.

Wouldn't that be Hampton?

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ChrisL
I found this review in the Times-News of Twin Falls Idaho from Friday, July 30, 1982.

By RICK SHEFCHIK
Knight-Ridder Newspapers
ROLLING STONES, "Still Life"
{Rolling Stones Records) — The
profit-taking continues; If you weren't
there, this extremely brief version of
their 1981 concert tour won't serve as
an adequate substitute, since several
of these songs ("Shattered" "Let Me
Go") were merely excuses for Jagger
to run around the arenas. The ????* of
Jagger sprinting through a crowd or
riding around on a cherry picker was
of dubious worth, and as the
soundtrack to those adventures, many
of these songs could just as well have
gone unrecorded.
If you were there, you'll probably
appreciate how much better the
guitars and drums sound on record —
almost as though the band members
weren't separated by 50 feet or so,
thanks to their wireless amps. "Just
My Imagination" is the strongest cut,
the lone rave-up from the band which
practically invented the term;
"Twenty Flight Rock" and "Going To
A Go Go," two uninspired covers, are
the only songs they haven't recorded
elsewhere. As Jagger says at the end
of the record, "We'll see you next
year." I'd wait until then.

* It looks like it says "shift" but could be a typo and supposed to be "sight"

Huh. Looks like Rick Shefchik permanently gets up on the wrong side of the bed.

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DandelionPowderman

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exilestones
Love Still Life. I can't wait for a deluxe version.

Wouldn't that be Hampton?

HA HA!

The only leftover track they worked on was used as a B-side, (which sounds like it has a cowbell or some kind of percussion clunking away) the silly version of Beast Of Burden, which is on RARITIES.

Think there will ever be a source for what show the end of LSTNT on STILL LIFE is from?

The song is from the 12-18-1981 Hampton show, which was released in 2012 and LSTNT has its original ending (Charlie misses it, keeps going, on STILL LIFE there's no single bass note with the China crash and the little guitar doink that Keith does isn't on HAMPTON).

I just studied both of them and thought there may've been some editing involved but there are too many things missing - it's from a different show.

As I recall my reaction to Still Life was much the same as the reviewer above. Kind of pointless was my thought. Maybe I should go back and listen to this again, I probably only attempted it a couple times before I decided it was dreck destined for my "completist" archive.

Like the reviewer mentioned, riding around on some kind of cherry picker thing does not make for a performance worthy of being memorialized on vinyl and officially sold. It doesn't bode well for a legacy, let me put it that way. But I guess they needed the cash.

jb

Not the greatest or the worst album but I have great memories connected with it. Summertime. Car full of friends, windows down and Under My Thumb blasting out of the stereo.

It's too bad this didn't make it on to STILL LIFE! This is brilliantly awful!!!!






I guess I never realized that there were shows in 1981 that they did not play Satisfaction at, early on, mostly.

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GasLightStreet

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24FPS
If it wasn't for Twenty Flight Rock, and Going to a Go Go, I wouldn't listen to Still Life at all.

You don't like Time Is On My Side? That version is stellar.

Twenty Flight is awesome.

Oh, all right. I guess I associate that with the LSTNT Hal Ashby movie.

Beast of Burden, live, Tempe - Arizona, 1981 (with a nice view of the stadium and stage): [www.youtube.com]

Here's one they could use:

Miss You with Sugar Blue from the 11-24-1981 show near Chicago, the 2nd of 3 nights in a row (Start Me Up is from the 3rd night).

Still life is an odd live album. It sounds very sterile and commercial while at the same time there is still something raw about it. It captures aspects of the 81 tour, but it's not representative of the show they put on. It's a sampler. It's not bad to listen to, it's just strange. LYL is kind of like this too.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 2020-06-05 22:22 by ryanpow.

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ryanpow
Still life is an odd live album. It sounds very sterile and commercial while at the same time there is still something raw about it. It captures aspects of the 81 tour, but it's not representative of the show they put on. It's a sampler. It's not bad to listen to, it's just strange. LYL is kind of like this too.

LOVE YOU LIVE certainly captures the sloppiness, and based on bootlegs etc, the sound of that tour - and, ha ha, does nothing to hide, for the most part, Jagger's grunting.

STILL LIFE sounds nothing like they do in the movie or bootlegs, official or not - it is certainly polished.

At the time, on vinyl, compared to GET YER YA-YA'S OUT! and LOVE YOU LIVE it was a refreshing sound - it's bright and clear but has some oomph to it that FLASHPOINT is missing (talk about sterile) that they managed to somewhat recover with NO SECURITY and LIVE LICKS.

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GasLightStreet

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ryanpow
Still life is an odd live album. It sounds very sterile and commercial while at the same time there is still something raw about it. It captures aspects of the 81 tour, but it's not representative of the show they put on. It's a sampler. It's not bad to listen to, it's just strange. LYL is kind of like this too.

LOVE YOU LIVE certainly captures the sloppiness, and based on bootlegs etc, the sound of that tour - and, ha ha, does nothing to hide, for the most part, Jagger's grunting.

STILL LIFE sounds nothing like they do in the movie or bootlegs, official or not - it is certainly polished.

At the time, on vinyl, compared to GET YER YA-YA'S OUT! and LOVE YOU LIVE it was a refreshing sound - it's bright and clear but has some oomph to it that FLASHPOINT is missing (talk about sterile) that they managed to somewhat recover with NO SECURITY and LIVE LICKS.

Is Bill even in the mix at all on Flashpoint?

That was one thing I noticed too: a distinct lack of bass or at least bass clarity. That leads to a sterile sound which I remember this album seemed to have in spades. Clean, but boring and lacking presence.

jb

I'll be honest, I'm not a fan of STILL LIFE b/c it's so short. It's not a good representation of the '81 tour imo b/c there's only 10 songs of the 25 songs usually performed. It should have been a double album. Here's how I would have made the album better...

Side 1:

Intro: Take the 'A' Train
Under My Thumb
When the Whip Comes Down
Let's Spend the Night Together
Shattered
Neighbors

Side 2:

Twenty Flight Rock
Going to a Go-Go
Let Me Go
Time Is On My Side
Beast Of Burden

Side 3:

Let It Bleed
Little T&A
Just My Imagination (Running Away With Me)
She's So Cold

Side 4:

Hang Fire
Miss You
Start Me Up
(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction
Outro: Star Spangled Banner



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2020-06-06 04:17 by JordyLicks96.

Let’s spend the Night Together and Imagination are great from the movie.Hamptom has some really good performances like jumping Jack flash

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JordyLicks96
I'll be honest, I'm not a fan of STILL LIFE b/c it's so short. It's not a good representation of the '81 tour imo b/c there's only 10 songs of the 25 songs usually performed. It should have been a double album. Here's how I would have made the album better...

Side 1:

Intro: Take the 'A' Train
Under My Thumb
When the Whip Comes Down
Let's Spend the Night Together
Shattered
Neighbors

Side 2:

Twenty Flight Rock
Going to a Go-Go
Let Me Go
Time Is On My Side
Beast Of Burden

Side 3:

Let It Bleed
Little T&A
Just My Imagination (Running Away With Me)
She's So Cold

Side 4:

Hang Fire
Miss You
Start Me Up
(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction
Outro: Star Spangled Banner

I completely agree that that would have been a superb live album. Nowadays we have it in the form of Vault series issues.
At the time, Still Life came only a few years after they already had released a live double album, and it would have been considered overkill to release yet another one, when there were only three studio albums in between. Critics at the time would most likely have called such an album 'unnecessary'. Reviews of Kiss Alive II come to mind, after Kiss Alive, when II had a completely different list of songs. Even when Blue Oyster Cult released a single disc live album in '79, after two studio albums since having released a double live album in '74, it is still considered superfluous, today, by some fans and critics alike.

Even my friends who are borderline Stones fans love this live one. The guitars are great!

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jbwelda
That was one thing I noticed too: a distinct lack of bass or at least bass clarity. That leads to a sterile sound which I remember this album seemed to have in spades. Clean, but boring and lacking presence.

jb

Now you got me thinking if this is a remastering issue.

As I wrote before, I had no love for Still Life until I listened to it again for the first time in years last week. It was am MP3 on a crappy little player--and I'm pretty sure it was a 2009 Itunes remaster.

But listening through ear-pods I was taken by how good I good hear the bass and grooving on it.

(PM if would you would like me to upload you a copy)

I was referring to Flash Point in my post about the lack of bass. It's fine on Still Life. The interplay between Bill and both Watts's is superb on Imagination.

Maybe I should not rely on memory and should go back and listen first. But my memory seems pretty distinct, my original vinyl version just seemed lacking in bottom end. Maybe my cartridge was going out the couple times I listened to the album. The truth could be somewhere in between; when this LP came out I thought they had saturated the market with superfluous live recordings...its funny how things improve when they are taken out of original context. There are plenty of records I thought sucked back in the day but have since developed an appreciation of. Anything by Creedence Clearwater Revival for instance fits into that category. And possibly neglected Stones live material I once thought was subpar for their course. That's one thing I like about this forum: makes me want to go back and review recordings I hadn't even thought of in 40 years.

jb

The Stones official live releases (pre-vault series) are tricky. You have to take the good with the bad. Except for Ya Ya's of course.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2020-06-06 19:28 by ryanpow.

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ryanpow
The Stones official live releases (pre-vault series) are tricky. You have to take the good with the bad. Except for Ya Ya's of course.

Except for Ya Yas, a few insane moments on Got Live If You Want It, Factory Girl off Flashpoint, the aforementioned Going to a Go Go/20 Flight Rock/Time off of Still Life, and the Toronto side of Love You Live, the rest of their live output is pretty forgettable. I don't even know how many there are at this point. They've become so redundant, and moved to DVDs.

Wait, Marquee is live, Brussels, oh hell, and some of the BBC stuff is great.

I replaced my original 1982 lp (European EMI release, great sound) by the first reissue on cd by CBS (European) in, I think 1990 or so, and never bought a newer remastered cd because I felt that the sound was pretty good as it was, unlike some other CBS/Columbia cd reissues back then.

I really liked No Security. Besides having the best cover ever, the newer material better than studio versions. And I like all the others even the Dave Mathews guest spot.

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24FPS

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ryanpow
The Stones official live releases (pre-vault series) are tricky. You have to take the good with the bad. Except for Ya Ya's of course.

Except for Ya Yas, a few insane moments on Got Live If You Want It, Factory Girl off Flashpoint, the aforementioned Going to a Go Go/20 Flight Rock/Time off of Still Life, and the Toronto side of Love You Live, the rest of their live output is pretty forgettable. I don't even know how many there are at this point. They've become so redundant, and moved to DVDs.

Wait, Marquee is live, Brussels, oh hell, and some of the BBC stuff is great.

HAHA! That's funny.

They're still nowhere near as redundant as the Grateful Dead.

Official Live Albums
Got LIVE If You Want It
Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out!
Love You Live
Still Life
Flashpoint
No Security
Live Licks
Shine A Light

Would Hyde Park/Sweet Summer Sun and Havana Moon count? They weren't exactly a FTV issues since they came out the same year of the shows.

Those 2 aside, there are a lot of live releases out now.

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masseywinos
I really liked No Security. Besides having the best cover ever, the newer material better than studio versions. And I like all the others even the Dave Mathews guest spot.

I prefer the YaYas album cover a lot more, but I agree with the rest!