Been reading a recent thread about Goats Head Soup...want to make a point about that album, Black & Blue & Tattoo You and the survival of the Stones...which had two survival points in 1981 & 1989.

As most fans know, Waiting on A Friend & Tops were recorded during the Goats Head Soup sessions. Start Me Up was recorded during the Black & Blue Sessions.

What would your opinion of GHS be today if this was the tracklisting:

Dancing With Mr. D
100 Years Ago
Angie
Heartbreaker
Star Star

Silver Train
Tops
Winter
Coming Down Again
Waiting On A Friend

A whole different ballgame! Pretty awesome!

And if Black & Blue included Start Me Up...where on earth would the Stones be today without their two singles from Tattoo You (which we all know was a raiding of the vaults) and kept them alive throughout the 80's despite two lackluster efforts...Neighbors was the only song recorded for Tattoo You.

Not to knock off Sheryl Crow, but I guess they call it "The Greatest Mistakes".

Could you imagine the 81/82 tours happening without SMU & WOAF as singles driving the tour...I don't think so...

This gives hope that in those vaults (and I know NO SPARE PARTS from SG sessions is one of them) is Gold!

Pecman

Start Me Up was a reggae track at B&B sessions. So you would have had two Reggae numbers. Actually I prefer Munich Reggae from same sessions.

I prefer Slave and Worried About You from those '75 sessions. If it hadn't been vinyl then at least one them moght have made it on.

Tops is not that great, imo. Waiting On a Friend is great. But I wouldn't want to lose Hide Your Love or Can You Hear The Music. So, I'd leave GHS alone but I would have put WOAF on IORR album instead of Till the Next Goodbye or IYRWTBMF. Tops could have easily replaced Short and Curlies.

Your thread does show that Tattoo You was not a 'trus return to form' but just a recycling of old songs, albeit mainly good ones.