Quote
Olly
can the whole period from 1979 until 2016 really come under one era?

Yes, at the level of the quality/ value of the new music that they were creating.

That's not to say that there aren't good albums that were released after 1979, just that they in no way compare with the material made before 1979--and a good amount of the best post-1979 material had been written in or had its genesis in a period before 1980.

Tattoo You isn't really a post-1979 album. It's a much earlier work that was finished and released later. But very little of it was written after 1979.

The drums/ percussion on much of Undercover approach a baroque expression for the Stones--not to mention Undercover's Soul Survivor imitation--as do songs like Emotional Rescue, Little Indian Girl, and Send Her To Me.

Dirty Work is an anomaly of an album, a perfect storm: some really bad production, some really bad songs, and some really bad feelings between principals in the band made for a really bad outcome--just my opinion.

Voodoo Lounge seems like an attempt to recapture the Stones classic sound and I think Love Is Strong comes close. But songs like Blinded By Rainbows, Out of Tears, New Faces, Moon is Up, and Suck on the Jugular don't cut it, to say the least. You Got Me Rocking summarizes the problem well: it's an imitation Stones song by the Stones, a going through the motions number that approaches parody of their greatest work.

Stripped is a revisionist work, literally speaking, but it's a one-off and by definition it's made up of material written long before 1979. The release of this album (rather than an album of new material) speaks to where the band was at in the experimental-Baroque continuum, trying to stave of the baroque.

I'd say the production of Bridges to Babylon is baroque as well, with the Dust Brothers, etc. "modernizing" the Stones sound to a point that a song like kd lang's Anybody Seen My Baby could be a lead single. That's beyond comprehension in the context of Sticky Fingers, Let it Bleed, or Exile.

A Bigger Bang could be considered a revisionist album, I submit--a return to roots in many ways with pared down production and songs that are closer to their earlier albums. However, songs like Neo Con, Streets of Love, She Saw Me Coming and Infamy (just as examples) are pale pastiches of the Stones that would never win over listeners without the foundation of the work done in the earlier periods of their career.

Hopefully the new album will be stronger, but it's a rare thing that mature artists can match or come close to their great works late in their careers. And I'm assuming that they're late in their careers but they could easily prove me wrong and just be at the half way point. Here's hoping.


On the internet nobody knows
you're Mick Jagger



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 2016-05-11 01:49 by camper88.

Quote
Olly
Interesting observations.


Alimente, are you suggesting the Stones reached perfection in 1978?

Not at all. Stuff like Around And Around, Confessing The Blues, Down The Road Apiece (to name a few) were as perfect as it could ever get already in 1964, and that's after only a few years of "learning".

No, I mean "perfecting their art" in general - music, musicianship, stage presence, public image and so on. That was achieved between 1962 and 1978.

In strictly musical terms, by 1978 the Stones universe was more or less complete after adding Disco and Punk as then-current musical trends to their soundscape. Some Girls was the last "fresh injection" to their sound, at least the last fresh injection that worked and mattered, so to speak. After that, it was more or less repetition.

I'm not saying that they did not record any good music after 1978 (Tattoo You does not quite count anyway because it was to a large extent a "70's archive exploitation" project), I'm not saying that they at least did not try to find new angles, but by 1978 creatively almost everything was said and done.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 2016-05-11 05:03 by alimente.

I'm still surprised that no one is giving the formative years way more importance, than just "Early Formative" and then right to "Pop Artists".
It is these early years that shape it all; everything that is to come. They are still playing and living off those songs.
learning the Blues, and playing them was one thing. But moving on to Soul, coinciding with the physical move to the USA, soaking up Motown, Stax, meeting the guys, and ALO making them write had to be crucial in their young years.
The 'Pop Artist" era,and the Aftermath/Buttons album,s are results of that.
IMO these groupings make way more sense than dividing up 2003 vs 2013

Quote
Palace Revolution 2000
I'm still surprised that no one is giving the formative years way more importance,

Completely agree on the importance of the first 5 years of the band. You don't get to Beggars or Sticky Fingers without going through the early blues work or Aftermath.

You don't get to Taxi Driver or Raging Bull without going through Mean Streets.

And that's not to dismiss the greatness of the experimental years. They can be the most mind-blowing to a contemporary audience, but harder to appreciate when we have distance and the later work for context and comparison.


On the internet nobody knows
you're Mick Jagger



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2016-05-11 05:50 by camper88.

Quote
Palace Revolution 2000
I'm still surprised that no one is giving the formative years way more importance, than just "Early Formative" and then right to "Pop Artists".
It is these early years that shape it all; everything that is to come. They are still playing and living off those songs.
learning the Blues, and playing them was one thing. But moving on to Soul, coinciding with the physical move to the USA, soaking up Motown, Stax, meeting the guys, and ALO making them write had to be crucial in their young years.
The 'Pop Artist" era,and the Aftermath/Buttons album,s are results of that.
IMO these groupings make way more sense than dividing up 2003 vs 2013

Exactly! Something happened indeed between The Rolling Stones and Out Of Our Heads.

Quote
DandelionPowderman

Quote
Palace Revolution 2000
I'm still surprised that no one is giving the formative years way more importance, than just "Early Formative" and then right to "Pop Artists".
It is these early years that shape it all; everything that is to come. They are still playing and living off those songs.
learning the Blues, and playing them was one thing. But moving on to Soul, coinciding with the physical move to the USA, soaking up Motown, Stax, meeting the guys, and ALO making them write had to be crucial in their young years.
The 'Pop Artist" era,and the Aftermath/Buttons album,s are results of that.
IMO these groupings make way more sense than dividing up 2003 vs 2013

Exactly! Something happened indeed between The Rolling Stones and Out Of Our Heads.

I thnk they realsied they were something in their own right... rather than just good imitators.

Even though they peaked 68-72 they carried on during the rest of the seventies trying to adapt to the business. Which they did quite well. But by the end of the seventies they were pretty much done.
In a way "Still Life" was the last tour and Start Me Up and Tattoo You their last hit single and album. During the breakup in the eighties they kind of lost their touch. Sure, they reinvented themselves
in 1989 but it wasn't the same anymore. More of a business than a band, so to speak.

How about Stones eras regarding the live act?
1962 - 1968 - Learning how to become a thrilling live act despite numerous technical difficulties, such as not being able to hear themselves without proper monitors.

1969 - 1973 - The start of the modern rock concerts. With proper monitors they could hear themselves and played better than ever. Mick Taylor brings a new element of musical fluidity and the band plays with a vengeance! Solo sections are marked by brilliant improvisation.

1975 - 1982 - The band still plays loose and dangerous. Taylor is out. Wood is in, bringing a simpler and nastier approach to soloing. His style lends itself to the famous weaving between him and Keith. The lines between rhythm and lead guitar are blurred and interchangeable. The jamming continues, especially in 1981 with Ernie Watts on sax.

1989 - 1999 - No longer a stripped down unit but a live recreation of the studio albums. Horn sections, synths and backing vocalists are added to duplicate studio sounds. A very solid professional show but lacking in the spontaneity seen from 1969 - 1982. Many criticize the band for employing a piano, rather than guitar based sound.

2002 - 2007 - A guitar based sound comes back but the overall vibe is still similar to 1989 - 1999.

2012 - present. Somehow, they are sounding a little dirtier and raw; backing musicians are stripped down a bit but still a corporate recreation of the recorded versions. The glory days of 1969 - 1982 are a thing of the distant past, but for what it is, it's still damn good.

Quote
Palace Revolution 2000
I'm still surprised that no one is giving the formative years way more importance, than just "Early Formative" and then right to "Pop Artists".

It's just a matter of individual perspective, I guess, and that has to do with the age of each contributor and, consequently, the time when one became a fan.

I sometimes get the impression here that people who obviously did not (or at least did not actively) witness the Stones in the 60's regard the years before Beggar's Banquet as "pre-fame years" with one exception, the hit single "Satisfaction".



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2016-05-11 17:59 by alimente.

Quote
powerage78

Quote
Stoneage
68-72 is it. Everything else is before or after.

1968-1974

62-64, 68-72, 76-81.
These are the shizzle...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2016-05-11 18:35 by RoughJusticeOnYa.

I agree with the statement made my Stoneage: "Even though they peaked 68-72 they carried on during the rest of the seventies.........by the end of the seventies they were pretty much done. Still Life was the last tour and Start Me Up and Tattoo You their last hit single and album."

I also agree with the statement made by RoughJusticeOnYa: "62-64, 68-72, 76-81.
These are the shizzle..."

Not 1965??

Alright. 1965 also.

Stoneage - "In a way "Still Life" was the last tour and Start Me Up and Tattoo You their last hit single and album..."

Agree about the tour. As I've said ad nausea, it was the end of that reckless, no safety net era. Though they've toured extensively from 1989 to today, it's never been the same; a slick professional show. However, I don't know if you could really call TY and SMU their last hits. Maybe last huge hits but their albums did well, and at least where I live, the local rock station played a lot of their newer songs right up to Bridges To Babylon. By the time A Bigger Bang came out, classic rock radio was more interested is spinning Brown Sugar for the millionth time.

Quote
HonkeyTonkFlash
Stoneage - "In a way "Still Life" was the last tour and Start Me Up and Tattoo You their last hit single and album..."

Agree about the tour. As I've said ad nausea, it was the end of that reckless, no safety net era. Though they've toured extensively from 1989 to today, it's never been the same; a slick professional show. However, I don't know if you could really call TY and SMU their last hits. Maybe last huge hits but their albums did well, and at least where I live, the local rock station played a lot of their newer songs right up to Bridges To Babylon. By the time A Bigger Bang came out, classic rock radio was more interested is spinning Brown Sugar for the millionth time.

Just look at their setlists. Start Me Up is the youngest "warhorse" = being played at every show. And it's not even an all-new 1981 composition... Nothing afterwards, be it Undercover Of The Night, Harlem Shuffle, Mixed Emotions, Love Is Strong, Anybody Seen My Baby or Streets Of Love as "hit singles" from their post-Tattoo You albums comes even close, not to even speak of Don't Stop or Doom And Gloom, which had left the building too recently. It just shows how the band members themselves see these things IMHO.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2016-05-11 21:37 by alimente.

Quote
alimente

Quote
HonkeyTonkFlash
Stoneage - "In a way "Still Life" was the last tour and Start Me Up and Tattoo You their last hit single and album..."

Agree about the tour. As I've said ad nausea, it was the end of that reckless, no safety net era. Though they've toured extensively from 1989 to today, it's never been the same; a slick professional show. However, I don't know if you could really call TY and SMU their last hits. Maybe last huge hits but their albums did well, and at least where I live, the local rock station played a lot of their newer songs right up to Bridges To Babylon. By the time A Bigger Bang came out, classic rock radio was more interested is spinning Brown Sugar for the millionth time.

Just look at their setlists. Start Me Up is the youngest "warhorse" = being played at every show. And it's not even an all-new 1981 composition... Nothing afterwards, be it Undercover Of The Night, Harlem Shuffle, Mixed Emotions, Love Is Strong, Anybody Seen My Baby or Streets Of Love as "hit singles" from their post-Tattoo You albums comes even close, not to even speak of Don't Stop or Doom And Gloom, which had left the building too recently. It just shows how the band members themselves see these things IMHO.

One notable exception might be the frequent playing of Out Of Control lately!

Life is simply too short, you realize that as the clock ticks and there is more behind than ahead.

A supermodel at 24 is no longer a supermodel at 39. Same goes for musical artists and same goes for the Stones, no matter how much you hear, "Looking and playing as if they were 10 (20?) years younger." The "sweet spot" is too damn short.

At least the Stones have grown older pretty gracefully. I feel sorry for some artists where their image is locked into their youth. What does Joan Jet mean to me? Joan Jet is forever between 18 and 21 and "cannot age." A 50-year-old Joan Jet doesn't even make sense.

So by definition, 1981 was the "last hurrah" in many ways. Certainly it was the last hit album and the last big hit single. I remember being very happy and pleasantly surprised that "the Stones came back big" and they were in the contemporary consciousness.

What they are doing now is not "an amazing rock show experience with the Rolling Stones" like it would have been in 1973. But they do get my respect for what they are doing now. However, they are on the edge of losing it in the sense that they simply have to stop and it has to be quite soon. The "Last Hurrah Guitar Stones" era is ending soon and the "Twilight Years Retirement/Vault Stones" era will begin.

Nobody should complain when they stop. I view everything after 2003 as cream.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2016-05-11 23:48 by MileHigh.

Jeeze, I wish this bulletin board software would give you say three hours' grace period to go back to your original posting and edit a typo without broadcasting it to the world.

Quote
MileHigh
Life is simply too short, you realize that as the clock ticks and there is more behind than ahead.

A supermodel at 24 is no longer a supermodel at 39. Same goes for musical artists and same goes for the Stones, no matter how much you hear, "Looking and playing as if they were 10 (20?) years younger." The "sweet spot" is too damn short.

At least the Stones have grown older pretty gracefully. I feel sorry for some artists where their image is locked into their youth. What does Joan Jet mean to me? Joan Jet is forever between 18 and 21 and "cannot age." A 50-year-old Joan Jet doesn't even make sense.

So by definition, 1981 was the "last hurrah" in many ways. Certainly it was the last hit album and the last big hit single. I remember being very happy and pleasantly surprised that "the Stones came back big" and they were in the contemporary consciousness.

What they are doing now is not "an amazing rock show experience with the Rolling Stones" like it would have been in 1973. But they do get my respect for what they are doing now. However, they are on the edge of losing it in the sense that they simply have to stop and it has to be quite soon. The "Last Hurrah Guitar Stones" era is ending soon and the "Twilight Years Retirement/Vault Stones" era will begin.

Nobody should complain when they stop. I view everything after 2003 as cream.

Totally agree with most of your post. However, taste being subjective, I would view anything after the Bigger Bang Tour to be the cream. I know that tour doesn't get a lot of love here - and maybe I'm just lucky that I got two good shows on it - but it was truly the last tour where they actually had a new album to promote. 2012 on was pure nostalgia, Doom and Gloom notwithstanding.

ive always likened the stones output to the atmosphere, starting at sea level and working your way up, through thick air but getting thinner as you climb till you reach the point now which is quite thin and then soon there will be no air, same with the music, as it was a heavy otrput both in the 60,s and 70,s, thinning out in the 80,s and getting even thinner and thinner as the decades pass.

as for era,s that often changes and falls into sub era,s too.

early blues and rock and roll-1962-65
mid 60,s rock and pop-1965-66
psychodelic years-1967-68
the great years-1968-72
mid 70,s rock,blues and soul-1973-76
punk and new wave era-1978-86.
tribute group era-1989-present.


sometimes i see them as this.

golden era. 1968-72
silver era. 1963-67
bronze era. 1973-83

or the brian, mick and ronnie era,s

They've made a couple of errors over the years but I've always forgiven 'em ...



ROCKMAN

Quote
MileHigh
Life is simply too short, you realize that as the clock ticks and there is more behind than ahead.

A supermodel at 24 is no longer a supermodel at 39. Same goes for musical artists and same goes for the Stones, no matter how much you hear, "Looking and playing as if they were 10 (20?) years younger." The "sweet spot" is too damn short.

At least the Stones have grown older pretty gracefully. I feel sorry for some artists where their image is locked into their youth. What does Joan Jet mean to me? Joan Jet is forever between 18 and 21 and "cannot age." A 50-year-old Joan Jet doesn't even make sense.

So by definition, 1981 was the "last hurrah" in many ways. Certainly it was the last hit album and the last big hit single. I remember being very happy and pleasantly surprised that "the Stones came back big" and they were in the contemporary consciousness.

What they are doing now is not "an amazing rock show experience with the Rolling Stones" like it would have been in 1973. But they do get my respect for what they are doing now. However, they are on the edge of losing it in the sense that they simply have to stop and it has to be quite soon. The "Last Hurrah Guitar Stones" era is ending soon and the "Twilight Years Retirement/Vault Stones" era will begin.

Nobody should complain when they stop. I view everything after 2003 as cream.

excellent posting

Quote
MileHigh
Life is simply too short, you realize that as the clock ticks and there is more behind than ahead.

A supermodel at 24 is no longer a supermodel at 39.

How about at 29 (on the left) and 62 (on the right)?




On the internet nobody knows
you're Mick Jagger



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2016-05-12 09:05 by camper88.

Quote
camper88

Quote
MileHigh
Life is simply too short, you realize that as the clock ticks and there is more behind than ahead.

A supermodel at 24 is no longer a supermodel at 39.

How about at 29 (on the left) and 62 (on the right)?

She really does look great but unfortunately she is the exception.

Quote
MileHigh
.................

So by definition, 1981 was the "last hurrah" in many ways. Certainly it was the last hit album and the last big hit single. I remember being very happy and pleasantly surprised that "the Stones came back big" and they were in the contemporary consciousness.

.....................

My experience, as one apparently belonging to a minority here, was quite different. Instead of your presented point of view, the album you referred to, was to me the sad moment, when all seemed to be over. And the first of the two concerts I was present at in 1982, was an unmotivated affair. However, the second concert on the following day was completely different, and I regained my hopes. Hopes, which were fulfilled, or rather surpassed, with the arrival of UNDERCOVER, their latest really great album.

I would say that we sometimes downplay the significance of 1963-1967. First of all I don't think you can top the Stones in that era when they played blues or rock n roll covers. Listen to The Beatles take of Carol from the BBC sessions and compare it to the Stones and there's no doubt in my mind that the Stones sound better. They were a great band from the start and the 63-67 era also featured a number of truly great singles - The Last Time, Satisfaction, Cloud, 19th NB, Ruby Tuesday/LSTNT. The British compilation High Tide And Green Grass is amazing, right up there with The Who's Meaty Beaty Big And Bouncy for an amazing singles collection. I suppose the groundwork for the golden era was laid with Aftermath but JJF and Beggars Banquet sounds like a new band to me. They began to mine more obscure American sources and began writing songs that were the equal of the sources they once mined. It was also the era where Keith began to really experiment with tunings and this, I believe, was a significant development. But 68 to 72 was to me an unparalleled era but combined with 63 to 67, it gives a ten year blueprint in how to be a rock n roll band. If they had quit then they would have been Beatles-like legends. However, they continued and sometimes their 70s material is slighted because of what came before it. Some Girls strikes me as a new era. The break from touring from 82 to 89 was significant and changed the band forever. When they emerged in 1989 they were never as "devil may care" live as they had been in their 70s heyday. The fact that there have been only three new records since Wyman left tells me a lot. Firstly, they subscribed to a new business model. The Stones were always outsold by many other supposedly less significant bands but the Stones (and Jagger in particular) knew that no band could outdraw the Stones and there was money to be made by playing live. No band in history has played to more people than the Stones. The show became the thing. As late as 2002 they did something no one else had done - doing tours of cities with the set list tailored to the size of the venue. It was a great idea. How do I know that? Because Bob Dylan ripped it off in late 2003 (London) and early 2004 (various North American cities). But as the years rolled on the shows became more predictable. Not necessarily worse but predictable. The band's recent success on the road I think owes as much to their relative sobriety (especially Ron Wood) as anything else.

Stewedandkeefed - "The band's recent success on the road I think owes as much to their relative sobriety (especially Ron Wood) as anything else."

Yep - Ronnie has gotten better than ever, which helps tremendously given that Keith has slowed down significantly. Ron's solo on YCAGWYW from Hyde Park Live is stellar!

Quote
Witness

Quote
MileHigh
.................

So by definition, 1981 was the "last hurrah" in many ways. Certainly it was the last hit album and the last big hit single. I remember being very happy and pleasantly surprised that "the Stones came back big" and they were in the contemporary consciousness.

.....................

My experience, as one apparently belonging to a minority here, was quite different. Instead of your presented point of view, the album you referred to, was to me the sad moment, when all seemed to be over. And the first of the two concerts I was present at in 1982, was an unmotivated affair. However, the second concert on the following day was completely different, and I regained my hopes. Hopes, which were fulfilled, or rather surpassed, with the arrival of UNDERCOVER, their latest really great album.

Important word (and correct, too)

Quote
DandelionPowderman

Quote
Witness

Hopes, which were fulfilled, or rather surpassed, with the arrival of UNDERCOVER, their latest really great album.

Important word (and correct, too)

Yes, and as you noticed: This is an investment in words in the hope of an album of outright greatness once again.
As has been the case for approximately twelve albums before.

With this topic there's no escaping the issue of how old they are, as well as how funny it seems that people have said they're too old back when they were rather youthful. I remember watching 4 Flicks when it came out and my 8 year old daughter came in the room with a horrified look on her face and said, "Daddy, how old ARE they?" Looking back, they looked pretty good on that tour, especially Keith compared to now!