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RollingFreak
I'm shocked EVERYTHING is approved by Mick. I figured it was him and not Keith, but like you say, there's millions of things that I figured "they have a guy for most of it, but bigger stuff like a re-released album and stuff, Mick is aware of and signs off on." Crazy that he literally approves everything.

Indeed, it's great that he's interested to a degree, but at some point it just seems obsessive.

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RollingFreak
I'm shocked EVERYTHING is approved by Mick. I figured it was him and not Keith, but like you say, there's millions of things that I figured "they have a guy for most of it, but bigger stuff like a re-released album and stuff, Mick is aware of and signs off on." Crazy that he literally approves everything.

We - no one - really knows.

It's absurd. Yes. Mick says "yes" to...

Say he get's something, an email, that says... and he just goes

I can't be bothered, yes, whatever

And that's how A-Z shows up wherever.

UMG releasing 23 versions of HACKNEYED DIAMONDS... may be a part of that =, initnitally, but UMG probably doesn't need Mick's permission to release.. with Living In A Ghost Town and...

Someone within UMG thought of... and someone in UMG said YES! and it happens.

The Rolling Stones didn't release HOT ROCKS etc... yet "they" did.

It's no different than with UMG having rights: they don't need The Rolling Stones' permission regarding 1971-whenever; The Rolling Stones agreed to it in 2008 and again in 2015 or whenever it was extended.

Hackney Diamonds sold over 100,000 copies in Japan and had received a Gold Disc Award:



[Universal-Music.co.jp] , Large picture

It's zooming in for second worst Stones LP cover.

Can anyone please post up the Keith Richards interview/article from The Independent which was published on 21st October 2023?

.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2025-05-22 21:40 by treaclefingers.

[www.independent.co.uk]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2025-05-22 21:40 by treaclefingers.

Funny, cause the "band" that plays on most of the tracks on Hackneyed sounds so generic I'd be hard pressed to know its actually the Stones. Without Mick's vocals, there's nothing distinctively Stones about it, and I'd have welcomed experimenting with more modern music recording to see if it would make any better of an album.

I largely agree, Rolling Freak: Dreamy Skies and Live By The Sword being two exceptions, perhaps? Driving Me Too Hard has the ‘Tumbling Dice riff, and Sweet Sounds of Heaven has lost its initial appeal. Mess It Up and Whole Wide World are generic and disposable.

Can someone do a copy/paste ...... Pleeeze



ROCKMAN

I would absolutely hate the idea of a two way toilet in my cave

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Rockman

Can someone do a copy/paste ...... Pleeeze

Free read: [Archive.ph] . Free reading of the original source also possible via browser with integrated reader mode or integrated ad-blocker.


The Rolling Stones’ Keith Richards: ‘Don’t get me going on modern-day music. It’s a one-way toilet’

Mick wanted the new record done quick – and cracked the whip to get the boys to knuckle down, as the ghost of Charlie Watts hovered ‘right there, over our shoulder’ during recording. And Keith? Well, he’s still on crackling street-fighting form (and full of fire and fury about digital music) as he and the rest of The Rolling Stones tell Paul Sexton about the making of ‘Hackney Diamonds’

Saturday · 21 October 2023 · 06:30 BST

The only way to cut a band is to put the boys in a room and play, and look in each other’s eyeballs,” says Keith Richards, fixing me with a glare. “Don’t get me going on modern-day music. Push-button drums and everything synthesised. Digital recording is a one-way toilet.” The Human Riff is, like his bandmates, feeling decidedly bullish about the Stones’ first album of original material in 18 years, Hackney Diamonds, and rightly so. This is the record their fans have wanted them to make for decades, deftly correcting any suggestion of their becoming little more than a heritage act or a money-printing corporation. In the second half of the band’s discography, there are plenty of undervalued gems, but there has sometimes been a nagging feeling that they were gradually turning into the world’s best Rolling Stones tribute act. This time, as Mark Beaumont puts it in his four-star review in The Independent, Mick Jagger delights in conjuring “their bed-hopping mid-Sixties days as rock’n’roll reprobates drenched in ‘the smell of sex and gas’ at ‘the filthy flat in Fulham’”, then “bawls and yowls about blurry nights, media intrusion and relationship ructions like an eternal A-list twentysomething”.

So it was that last December, in the newest chapter of a story latterly written at their own languorous pace – recording haphazardly across continents, sometimes going months without speaking to each other – The Rolling Stones set themselves a collective wake-up call. After taking their 60th anniversary tour around the arenas of Europe, and just when they might have been thinking of retreating back to their respective opulent boltholes, along came a concept from their formative days: studio sessions with a strict deadline. Hackney Diamonds is the result, and to the band’s quiet satisfaction, it turned into more than they dared hope. Even without getting drawn into the hoary “best album since...” debate, it’s a very long time since they sounded this spirited, cohesive or relaxed with their legacy. The irony of such discipline is not lost on Richards. “It’s a weird thing, right?” he muses. “You work all your life to say ‘No deadlines!’ This is what I’ve worked for. But no, you do need them, and that was the thing about this record. I would have called the damn album ‘Deadline’.” When Mick Jagger told his bandmates that they must aim to finish their new record by Valentine’s Day, just three weeks after tracking dates in Los Angeles started in earnest, there were murmurings of doubt and disquiet. They may have spent their recent era breaking their own box office records on a series of global excursions, but the rest of the 18 years since their last studio album of new songs, 2005’s A Bigger Bang, had been characterised by drift and delay.

Richards, beaming and chortling at the end of a Zoom connection, is happy to apportion praise. “I’ve got to give Mick hats off for this push,” he tells me. “He said ‘Come on, we’ve just got to do something. Doesn’t matter what we do, we’ve got to make a record.’ I said ‘Ok, let’s not pussyfoot about. You’ve got what you want to sing, let’s go.’ And the man had got a lot stored up.” These latest of my dozens of encounters with the Stones over some 30 years find them undeniably refreshed by a triumphant late entry in their bejewelled catalogue. There’s an almost intangible sense of renewed camaraderie about them, and an awareness of their collective responsibility to the most famous marque in rock history. Yes, it has to do with advancing years and the passing of their truly beloved Charlie Watts, but it’s also born of an unspoken realisation of what they mean to us, and to each other. Jagger, just done with filming duties for the day, is warm, chatty and impossibly spry. Ronnie Wood, a few days earlier, looks healthier than for a long while, greeting me with a hug as his wife Sally patiently awaits their dinner date afterwards. Mick is disarmingly honest about the Stones’ failure to grasp the recording nettle in the past decade and a half, during which time they became a fabulous touring jukebox, but a jukebox nonetheless.

“We weren’t doing nothing, but I think we were just content with touring, to be honest,” he says. “We found that enough, and we didn’t want to work hard enough in between tours. I mean, I was writing the whole time, but we weren’t getting together and finishing things. We recorded a lot of stuff and we did a lot of sessions, but there was no deadline, there was no ‘Let’s finish these next week.’ It was just, ‘Do two weeks’ recording,’ and then there were no plans to come back together again.” Hackney Diamonds began with two try-out sessions that bore fruit as soon as they progressed to Henson Recording Studios in LA. The secret sauce was the audacious choice of a new producer in 32-year-old New Yorker Andrew Watt, described by Wood as “full of front” and by Richards as a “pushy little f***er”. Watt’s rise to a 2021 Grammy as Producer of the Year was simultaneously observed by both Jagger, ever vigilant of new music, and Paul McCartney, who recommended him to Wood. Watt had been working with Macca and Elton John, both of whom make splendid cameos on the Stones album. “Andrew bosses us around, and it’s so encouraging and pleasing to follow his orders,” says Wood. “And I get off when Keith listens to him. Normally, Keith would go ‘Get the f*** out,’ which he has done, but the thing is, it’s backed up by the fact that Andrew can play. He’s got an amazing feel with the board in the studio. This is exactly what we needed.” With long-time bassman Darryl Jones unavailable for the sessions, Watt filled that role for much of the record, with both Richards and Wood also taking turns. So did the returning Bill Wyman, on “Live By the Sword”, on which Elton invokes his early days of bar-room piano. “I spoke to Elton on Zoom,” says Wood, “and he said, ‘I’ve got to play on some songs, Ron!’ I went ‘Join the queue!’”

In a charming tribute, that’s one of two tracks with drum parts recorded in 2019 by Watts. “I am emotional about that, but I like the fact that he’s on it, in another way,” says Jagger. “We do have some really great tracks with Charlie on, that we recorded in that period, so who knows, we might put some others out.” Watts subsequently gave his blessing for compadre Steve Jordan to take his seat if he was ever unavailable, and Richards praises the “sterling job” that Jordan does on the rest of Hackney Diamonds. Adds Wood: “It’s that unspoken word of trust, once you’ve set the all-important tempo. Say it’s Mick’s song, he would establish the tempo, and Steve’s right in there. We adjust the sails, as it were, and float on.” Jagger explains how the classic lineup from the 1960s to the 1990s was recreated on “Live By the Sword”. “We asked Bill to come in. I said ‘Do you want to do this? It’s an old track with Charlie, not one of the ones we just recently did,’ and he said ‘Yeah, I’d love to do it.’ So it does have a slightly different groove, that song, because you’ve got Bill and Charlie, who are the original rhythm section.” I’ve never had a conversation with Richards in which he didn’t mention how honoured and lucky he felt to have Watts behind him on stage and in the studio. Now he wears his heart even more openly. “I have a picture of him, as I walk out of my bedroom every day,” he says. “The first thing I see is a portrait of Charlie Watts, and we tip our hats. “He’s right there, over the shoulder, and all I know is that he’s very happy that the band’s still going. So now I work for [original Stones pianist and road manager] Ian Stewart [who died in 1985] and Charlie Watts. They’re both my bosses now, and I’ve got to keep it going, man.”

McCartney’s part is a rumbling fuzz bass solo on “Bite My Head Off”, which recalls the loose-limbed deconstruction of “Respectable” and other post-punk Stones rockers of the late 1970s. “I get you, yeah,” nods Keith. “That does remind me of a Some Girls track. And then Macca walked in, and we were short of a bass player! ‘Guess what you’re doing, pal!’ Hey, Paul’s great fun to play around and be around. He’s a survivor.” The sessions also included personal visits from Lady Gaga and Stevie Wonder, who make brilliantly spontaneous contributions to the testifying gospel soul that is “Sweet Sounds of Heaven”. But there was never any suggestion of casting megastars for the sake of it. “It’s not like a guest appearance for nothing,” says Jagger. “They really fit, they’re the perfect players for those particular things. Elton fits in very well playing his boogie thing, it’s very simple, a bit like our original piano player, Stu [Ian Stewart] used to play. And Stevie – we used to have Billy Preston, who used to play with us a lot. You needed Stevie’s very effusive piano style to bring that song out.” “I think maybe the other thing about the Stones, the other glory we can put in our cap, is that we’ve managed to hook so many generations now,” says Richards. “‘Sweet Sounds of Heaven’ is, in a way, indicative of it, with Stevie Wonder from that generation and Gaga from the next. There’s a warmth and a feeling that music is music, and here it all is. It feels good, y’know.” Such is the fresh momentum that live shows next year are looking distinctly possible, as is a second album at some point from these fertile sessions. At this improbably late juncture, the glint is back in their eye. “I do wish we’d done it sooner,” admits Jagger. “We’d been messing around too long and not concentrating, and not being clear enough about our goals. “I’m not really going to blame everyone for that. It’s my own fault as much as anyone else’s. But I did realise that we couldn’t let it drift any more, and we had to do it properly, and in a quick way, with someone that was going to really concentrate on it. And that’s what we did.”

‘Hackney Diamonds’ is out now. Paul Sexton’s book ‘Charlie’s Good Tonight: The Authorised Biography of Charlie Watts’ is published by Mudlark/HarperCollins.

[Independent.co.uk]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2025-05-23 00:15 by Irix.

Fanks Irix ... you're a champ ....



ROCKMAN

Thank god Darryl wasn't available. (If that's entirely true.) Those fresh bass parts really make the album. I would be initially disappointed if I heard he was playing bass if there's a next record. Keith, Paul, and Bill really stand out, giving a Stones record what it hasn't had in decades. Maybe he's okay for the road, when you can't really hear the bass in a live situation. But when it really counts, at home, on your own system, that's when you hear the detail.

Keith is stuck in the 50s. When he grew up. His idols are from the 50s. No one can change that and there is no use arguing about it. He doesn't care about "modern music".

The standout track from HD is "Sweet Sounds of Heaven". It holds up. Then there are two typical Keith ballads - for those of you who like that (I find them monotonous and boring) - but at least they are easily recognizable as Rolling Stones songs. The rest is comparable with a latter day Jagger solo album to me. Bill Wyman's, Elton John's and Paul McCartney's contributions are all buried in the mix. Makes no sense.

I don't think McCartney is buried in the mix. His fuzz bass sounds like a laser gun shooting at the heart of darkness...

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24FPS
Thank god Darryl wasn't available. (If that's entirely true.) Those fresh bass parts really make the album. I would be initially disappointed if I heard he was playing bass if there's a next record. Keith, Paul, and Bill really stand out, giving a Stones record what it hasn't had in decades. Maybe he's okay for the road, when you can't really hear the bass in a live situation. But when it really counts, at home, on your own system, that's when you hear the detail.

I mean, most people don't seem to like A Bigger Bang (I do) and Darryl is only on half of that? Keith and Mick play a ton of bass on that record if I recall correctly, and I don't remember those tracks being touted for "fresh bass parts". Mostly meaning I wouldn't say its a Darryl problem.

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Munichhilton
I don't think McCartney is buried in the mix. His fuzz bass sounds like a laser gun shooting at the heart of darkness...

zackly.

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RollingFreak
Funny, cause the "band" that plays on most of the tracks on Hackneyed sounds so generic I'd be hard pressed to know its actually the Stones. Without Mick's vocals, there's nothing distinctively Stones about it, and I'd have welcomed experimenting with more modern music recording to see if it would make any better of an album.

Well said RF, I gave the album a spin the other day after months of not listening to itand I couldn´t believe how mediocre it was , it left me depressed... I used to like Get Close, but I found it terrible this time, mostly because of the terrible production , especially the guitar sound... they sound like cheap guitars with 0 personality. I wanted to like it so bad...but finally I can admit to myself the album is bad. For me the band ends with B& L. Please get rid of that idiot Watt, he ruined Iggy Pop and Elton´s album too.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 2025-05-23 05:49 by dedospegajosos.

Stuck in the past Stones fans have extreme difficulty hearing or listening to anything new - going back to 1983's UNDERCOVER.

"Oh they're not... (enter excuses here) anymore".

HACKNEY DIAMONDS is a brilliant album.

So sorry for your loss.

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GasLightStreet
Stuck in the past Stones fans have extreme difficulty hearing or listening to anything new - going back to 1983's UNDERCOVER.

"Oh they're not... (enter excuses here) anymore".

HACKNEY DIAMONDS is a brilliant album.

So sorry for your loss.

I had no problem to listen to ANY other recent stones album, I became a Stones fan in 1995, Ilove every album up to ABB. B&L I found a little boring but still feels right. Brilliant?? Never underestimate the power of denial my friend. I was on denial too regarding Hackney...just...let it go..hope the next one is better though.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2025-05-23 07:23 by dedospegajosos.

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24FPS
Thank god Darryl wasn't available. (If that's entirely true.) Those fresh bass parts really make the album. I would be initially disappointed if I heard he was playing bass if there's a next record. Keith, Paul, and Bill really stand out, giving a Stones record what it hasn't had in decades. Maybe he's okay for the road, when you can't really hear the bass in a live situation. But when it really counts, at home, on your own system, that's when you hear the detail.

I totally agree.

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GasLightStreet
Stuck in the past Stones fans have extreme difficulty hearing or listening to anything new - going back to 1983's UNDERCOVER.

"Oh they're not... (enter excuses here) anymore".

HACKNEY DIAMONDS is a brilliant album.

So sorry for your loss.

Hackney Diamonds is not "anything new". Tattoo You sounds fresher and newer than Hackney Diamonds. Even DW, one of their worst albums ever, at least they stuck their neck out and tried to mess things up a bit. Badly, sure. But at least they tried. HD is an album full of well-played middle of the road polished meaningless rock songs without any edge or conviction.
Sure, it's very profesionally done, for which we have to thank Andrew Watt, I suppose. It's a deep-frozen pizza or a paella on the Ramblas of Barcelona. It will pass the health inspection but nothing more.
For a band themselves, every new song should be an adventure, they should have the feeling they're on to something, that one way or other they just gave a new turn on what they do and what they can do. HD is none of that. Give it 5 more years and nobody will listen to it anymore.

What A Bigger Bang has over Hackney Diamonds is all in the sound: it sounds organic, real and alive. Hackney Diamonds, to my ears, is too polished; too 'pop' I'm articulating my point as well as I would like, I confess.

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Big Al
What A Bigger Bang has over Hackney Diamonds is all in the sound: it sounds organic, real and alive. Hackney Diamonds, to my ears, is too polished; too 'pop' I'm articulating my point as well as I would like, I confess.

That's true for some songs. However, Dreamy Skies and Live By The Sword don't sound as polished as, say, Rain Fall Down and Streets Of Love.

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DandelionPowderman

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Big Al
What A Bigger Bang has over Hackney Diamonds is all in the sound: it sounds organic, real and alive. Hackney Diamonds, to my ears, is too polished; too 'pop' I'm articulating my point as well as I would like, I confess.

That's true for some songs. However, Dreamy Skies and Live By The Sword don't sound as polished as, say, Rain Fall Down and Streets Of Love.

It's not just a matter of production. It's a matter of sticking out somehow. I haven't listened to ABB in many years but I still remember the melody and the riff of Rain Fall Down. Not a particular favorite of mine, but it's something one remembers. I don't remember Dreamy Skies or Live By the Sword (apart from the lame lyrics). Even Streets Of Love (nobody's favourite, although personally I don't hate it either) is at least memorable. Hate it or not, but it's something else (although admittedly, it's a sibling of Out Of Tears).
Gaslightstreet mentioned Undercover. Many people didn't like some of the more "experimental" songs like Undercover of Too Much Blood, but at least it wasn't predictable mush.

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DandelionPowderman

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Big Al
What A Bigger Bang has over Hackney Diamonds is all in the sound: it sounds organic, real and alive. Hackney Diamonds, to my ears, is too polished; too 'pop' I'm articulating my point as well as I would like, I confess.

That's true for some songs. However, Dreamy Skies and Live By The Sword don't sound as polished as, say, Rain Fall Down and Streets Of Love.

Yes, that's quite true. Dreamy Skies is classic Stones, IMO, and Live By The Sword reminds me of a Voodoo Lounge B-Side, for some reason. It's filler, but 'good' Mess It Up and Whole Wide World are pretty 'marmite'; you ever like them, or you don't.

I have wondered how Hackney Diamonds would sound if, say, produced by Don Was: same songs; same arrangements; just produced differently.

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Big Al

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DandelionPowderman

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Big Al
What A Bigger Bang has over Hackney Diamonds is all in the sound: it sounds organic, real and alive. Hackney Diamonds, to my ears, is too polished; too 'pop' I'm articulating my point as well as I would like, I confess.

That's true for some songs. However, Dreamy Skies and Live By The Sword don't sound as polished as, say, Rain Fall Down and Streets Of Love.

Yes, that's quite true. Dreamy Skies is classic Stones, IMO, and Live By The Sword reminds me of a Voodoo Lounge B-Side, for some reason. It's filler, but 'good' Mess It Up and Whole Wide World are pretty 'marmite'; you ever like them, or you don't.

I have wondered how Hackney Diamonds would sound if, say, produced by Don Was: same songs; same arrangements; just produced differently.

Or by Chris Kimsey.

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RollingFreak
Funny, cause the "band" that plays on most of the tracks on Hackneyed sounds so generic I'd be hard pressed to know its actually the Stones. Without Mick's vocals, there's nothing distinctively Stones about it, and I'd have welcomed experimenting with more modern music recording to see if it would make any better of an album.

I totally agree. And I thought I was the only one here who didn't like the album. A weak "Stones by Numbers" single, mostly boring songs, a conventional mainstream production, and one of the worst covers ever produced by anyone. It even tops Undercover. It's still a miracle to me how this could pass Jaggers quality controll. I maybe wrong (I am not a musician), but my first impression was that most of the guitars were played by Andrew Watt. For me, HD is a complete disappointment.
A word about Keith. I love him. I've been a fan for over 50 years. But his musical horizon ends with Otis, Chuck, Jerry Lee, Gregory Isaacs, Robert Johnson, and so on. He hasn't been open to new music since the 1970s. He doesn't have to be; he's Keith. But he shouldn't judge music he doesn't understand anything about. Just my opinion.

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django

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RollingFreak
Funny, cause the "band" that plays on most of the tracks on Hackneyed sounds so generic I'd be hard pressed to know its actually the Stones. Without Mick's vocals, there's nothing distinctively Stones about it, and I'd have welcomed experimenting with more modern music recording to see if it would make any better of an album.

I totally agree. And I thought I was the only one here who didn't like the album. A weak "Stones by Numbers" single, mostly boring songs, a conventional mainstream production, and one of the worst covers ever produced by anyone. It even tops Undercover. It's still a miracle to me how this could pass Jaggers quality controll. I maybe wrong (I am not a musician), but my first impression was that most of the guitars were played by Andrew Watt. For me, HD is a complete disappointment.
A word about Keith. I love him. I've been a fan for over 50 years. But his musical horizon ends with Otis, Chuck, Jerry Lee, Gregory Isaacs, Robert Johnson, and so on. He hasn't been open to new music since the 1970s. He doesn't have to be; he's Keith. But he shouldn't judge music he doesn't understand anything about. Just my opinion.

An album recorded in 2023 sounds like it was recorded in 2023 and not in the 60-ies or 70-ies. OMG, how could that happen?