I've only seen a few clips, looks pretty cool, but I would suggest they need to up the distortion on those guitars!

One thing I loved about the recent London shows I saw (2022ish and 2018ish) is that the guitars were LOUD and CRUNCHY throughout.

(I know these are cell-phone recordings played through my computer)

Rolling Stones Kickstart ‘Hackney Diamonds’ Tour With Thrilling Houston Concert

An ageless Mick Jagger glided across the stadium stage for two hours, delivering hits like "Miss You" and "Gimme Shelter" along with three selections from their newest record

By Andy Greene
April 29, 2024



Over the last couple of decades, the Rolling Stones have looked for any reason to hit the road besides the release of a new album of original songs. They’ve launched tours celebrating their 50th anniversary, reissues of select archival records, their 2016 covers LP Blue & Lonesome, and their 60th anniversary. Some years they headed out on the stadium circuit for no particular reason whatsoever, knowing a Stones tour is a major event in and of itself.

But after a nearly two-year break from touring, the Stones emerged this year with the shockingly great Hackney Diamonds. It’s a rock-critic cliche to label any Stones album their “best since Tattoo You,” so we’ll avoid that. Let’s just say it’s their strongest album since the Eighties. (We maintain that 1983’s Undercover is wildly underrated.) Making something like Hackney Diamonds is a feat that virtually nobody anticipated for a group that formed months before the Cuban Missile Crisis, and it sent them onto the road this year with a renewed sense of purpose.

The first step was Houston’s NRG Stadium on Sunday night. After a strong opening set by Gary Clark Jr. that centered around his new LP, JPEG Raw, the band took the stage to the familiar opening notes of “Start Me Up.” This is the first time Mick Jagger has faced a stadium crowd since his 80th birthday last year, but his voice and body seem like they stoped aging sometime around Steel Wheels. It’s almost impossible to fully believe until you see it in person. (“People say Joe Biden is too old to be president,” an elderly woman behind me said early in the night. “They need to look at Mick!”)

After “Start Me Up,” the clock went back to 1965 for a loose “Get Off of My Cloud,” and then to 1972 for a gritty “Rocks Off,” one of the clear high points of the evening. “This next one is pretty old and ancient,” Jagger said afterwards, “but we’ve never done it in Houston before. In fact, I don’t think we’ve ever done it in the USA before. It’s called ‘Out of Time.'”

He wasn’t kidding. The 1965 Aftermath track wasn’t played live once until their 2022 European tour, and this was the first time it crossed the Atlantic. But it’s not something you hear much on classic rock radio, and the audience reaction was pretty muted at first. “I don’t think you really knew it,” Jagger said at the end. “But you got to know it as it went along.”

The Hackney Diamonds portion of the evening began at this point with leadoff single “Angry,” which popped onstage much like it did during their surprise album release show at the New York club Racket last year. “Beast of Burden” won the fan vote for the night, and it provided veteran backup Stones singer Bernard Fowler with a much-deserved spotlight moment. “You’ve got one more vote in November,” Jagger said. “Don’t forget to vote then too. What to play now? Something old…Something new.”

The “something new” was the live debut of “Mess It Up” from Hackney Diamonds. It’s one of the two songs from the album that feature the late Charlie Watts on drums, though Steve Jordan expertly recreated his parts onstage. He was the new guy when the band last toured America in 2021, and emotions were still raw right after the loss of Watts, but Jordan has proven to fans by now that he was the best man on the planet for this near-impossible job.

“It’s been a great a few days in Houston,” Jagger told the crowd. “We’ve been rehearsing here a bit. I took an amazing trip to the space center. That was great. I was a bit disappointed there were no Beaver Nuggets there.” (This is a continuation of Jagger’s 2021 bit where he called out a local delicacy every night on tour. He went really obscure with this reference to a Texas brand of sugary corn puffs he’d almost certainly never dream of actually eating.)

At the midway point of every Rolling Stones concert in recent memory, Jagger introduces the band one-by-one before heading offstage so Keith Richards can sing a couple of songs. For some reason, perhaps to squeeze more new songs into the set without cutting any of the standards, Richards was limited to just a single tune. He made it count by singing 1981’s “Little T & A” for the first time since 2016, though it was disappointing he didn’t get a chance to break out “Tell Me Straight” from Hackney Diamonds. It feels inevitable that’ll happen before this tour ends.

Jagger returned for “Sympathy for the Devil” and “Gimme Shelter,” which gave new background singer Chanel Haynes a chance to emerge from the wings and show off her stunning pipes. She first entered Stones World in 2022 when Sasha Allen, their previous background singer, couldn’t make a Milan show. Haynes was playing the lead role in the West End musical Tina at the time, and she parachuted in at the last second to save the show. This frustrated the producers of Tina, who fired her for handing the show off to her understudy that night when she wasn’t ill, but it impressed the Stones enough to hire her for this tour.

It was a wise choice. With all due respect to past Stones backup singers Lisa Fischer and Sasha Allen, who are both very gifted vocalists, “Gimme Shelter” hadn’t sounded quite this haunting since Merry Clayton sang on the original recording back in 1969. Haynes’ first howls of “Rape! Murder!” echoed all across the stadium, stunning even the security guards pressed against the stage. She then walked with Jagger down to the edge of the catwalk for the climactic “just a kiss away” segment, beaming with confidence and swagger.

The main set wrapped up with “Honky Tonk Women,” “Miss You,” “Paint it Black,” and “Jumpin’ Jack Flash.” These are songs they’ve done hundreds and hundreds of times for good reason. The hardcores may yearn for deeper cuts like “Memory Motel” or “Moonlight Mile,” but Jagger knows they’d cause many people to sit down and start scrolling through Instagram. And when you have a song like “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” in your repertoire, you simply have to play it every time you do a gig.

“Sweet Sounds of Heaven,” one of the finest songs on Hackney Diamonds, kicked off the brief encore set. If it wasn’t challenging enough to channel Merry Clayton a few songs back, Haynes had to now deliver Lady Gaga’s soaring vocal parts from the original recording. Unsurprisingly, she crushed it. For a moment, it really felt like witnessing a scene from some alternate-universe version of A Star Is Born.

The night closed out with a joyous “Satisfaction,” meaning they played just three songs from Hackney Diamonds. That’s typical for a tour in support of a latter-day Rolling Stones album, but this one really deserved more. They dropped “Midnight Rambler,” one of the Keith songs, and the acoustic set to make room for the three new ones in the show, but it be worth further restructuring to squeeze in “Whole Wide World,” “Bite My Head Off,” and “Tell Me Straight.” These are stellar songs that deserve a spot in the set, even if it means tossing aside “Paint It Black” or “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” sometimes.

Whatever happens in the weeks and months to come, it’s worth taking a few steps back and realizing how miraculous it is the Rolling Stones exist in any form after Ron Wood‘s lung cancer scare in 2017, Mick Jagger’s heart surgery in 2019, Charlie Watts’ death in 2021, and the countless times that Keith Richards has cheated death over the decades. (A character in Wayne’s World 2 joked that Richards “cannot be killed by conventional weapons.” It’s not so clear at this point that even unconventional weapons can do the job.)

The band’s 60th anniversary tour in 2022 seemed like it could be the end of the Rolling Stones saga, but we’re somehow now living through an entirely new era of their history. They even have a bunch of outtakes from Hackney Diamonds that they hope to release on a follow-up album. Whatever happens, they’re now in completely uncharted waters for a rock & roll band. It’s thrilling to witness.

[www.rollingstone.com]

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JN99
It seems to me that everyone is entitled to their opinion, whether that's bitching or not. And when the band is delivering this type of performance, but still charging $500 for tickets, then some level of bitching is to be expected. And, IMO, it is deserved.

They are to be commended for pulling this off at their age, no doubt, but it's no longer worth the price of admission to me. And I still feel like Charlie is sorely missed, by me, and also by his bandmates.

JN99-Thats actually a fair assessment. I would never pay $500 to see anyone or anything. I'm in the $109 seats in Chicago as typical for me. That said, the majority of the fans are in the $500 or more seats, and when considering that, criticism is indeed fair.

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Halup
I don’t know why people keep talking about an 11pm curfew. The show was scheduled to start at 8:00 with Gary, who got a standard 45 minutes, and the Stones were on from 9:15 to 11:15. They clearly weren’t rushing to finish before a non existent 11pm curfew. The show would have been scheduled for a 7:30 start if there was a curfew.

Keith apparently wasn’t feeling up to do 2 songs and seemed to me to spend more time than usual standing right by Steve.

The photo posted by the band clearly shows the run of show memo in the background, and Curfew states "None"...

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More Hot Rocks
Wow just endless bitching. It just never ends

It’s not bitching it’s just stating facts.
I am aware that others will love the set list, especially people who see them all the time and want something g new.

Except for hardcore fans in the pits setlists don't matter anymore. The quality of the shows aren't that important either. People just want to see them. Play anything. Preferably the old ones.
It's 2024, they are plus 80 now. It's a miracle that they are still on tour.

Unbelievable; 6:30/mile pace at least for sure. Last saw him in full sprint run 2015 San Diego. Sinatra at his 80th bday show could barely walk...

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ProfessorWolf
just noticed mick does a full sprint from the b stage to the main stage during satisfaction

Not sure if true, but according to Stonesdoug, Keith missed yesterday's sound check.

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Crackinup

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padre69
I hope they keep Angry and Mess It Up in the set, but yesterday’s low key performance may suggest that the countdown has started for those two. It’s probably very hard to learn new songs when you’re 80. A lot easier to stick with the warhorses. But I hope I’m wrong and the new songs stay.

Low key? Were you at the show? No one in pit A thought they were low key.

I meant Mick's singing pitch was low from the right key. The band sounds great on it. But as others suspected it was probably (hopefully ) due to bad monitoring.

Someone at Shidoobees said they met Bernard who said that Keith is recovering from Covid…

Midnight Rambler was rehearsed at least once in Los Angeles, so it’s not necessarily out for the tour.

After Out Of Time being played every night for Sixty, I don’t see it being an every night song this tour. After it ended, Mick said something to the effect of “I see you don’t know that one”. It didn’t get the crowd participation that it did nightly in Europe.

Full concert

Thank's Nyna Ryan, Jam Magazine,Julian Fava, Christopher Mogenson, Hendrik Mulder.


video: [youtu.be]

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cyclist
Someone at Shidoobees said they met Bernard who said that Keith is recovering from Covid…

Things are adding up..

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padre69
I meant Mick's singing pitch was low from the right key. The band sounds great on it. But as others suspected it was probably (hopefully ) due to bad monitoring.

If you look at the videos from last night it looks like Mick was having issues with his IEM, he was adjusting it quite frequently. Bad monitoring will 100% lead to those kinds of off pitch vocals.

As you get older you lose power in your voice but you don't lose your sense of pitch, you may have trouble reaching higher notes but that's a sperate issue. I'm confident it was the IEM that was giving him trouble.

Mess It Up is a strange selection from Hackney Diamonds. It's one of the weakest tracks on the album. Maybe Keith really is sick, and not up to playing Bite My Head Off, or Live By The Sword (although it won't have the bounce Bill gave it).

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cyclist
Someone at Shidoobees said they met Bernard who said that Keith is recovering from Covid…

Yep the Keith one song drama, i called it, if it's not two songs he's obviously not 100%.

So flu is called Covid now.

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More Hot Rocks
Wow just endless bitching. It just never ends

My thoughts as well. Mostly from people who weren't even there. The complaints about sound from watching a phone stream on a phone just makes me laugh. We should be happy we are getting a tour and they have changed up the setlists a bit. Looking forward to New Orleans, Vegas, Seat, NJ, LA and Santa Clara so I can actually see and hear the band.

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Elmo Lewis

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bye bye johnny

I never noticed the clothes rack by Chuck before...

That's the discount rack.......

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Woz

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Elmo Lewis

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bye bye johnny

I never noticed the clothes rack by Chuck before...

That's the discount rack.......

Speaking of fashion, how about that Texas size belt buckle? Don't think Mick wears that too often!

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keefriffhards

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cyclist
Someone at Shidoobees said they met Bernard who said that Keith is recovering from Covid…

Yep the Keith one song drama, i called it, if it's not two songs he's obviously not 100%.

So flu is called Covid now.

I don't understand your comment, but there are four varieties of influenza and numerous coronaviruses of various degrees of seriousness, the newest and most serious of which is Covid-19, the severity of which has been substantially reduced over the last two-plus years through campaigns of vaccination and other interventions, widespread (and often repeat) infection, and development of treatment regimes, but which remains a pandemic virus that is still sickening and killing more people than others even if it doesn't seriously harm most in the short term.

I don't know what Keith does/did or doesn't/didn't have, and you don't either, but if Bernard Fowler said he had Covid, I'm pretty sure he had Covid, not the flu, which is also serious in the elderly, but generally to an at least slightly lesser degree.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2024-04-29 23:53 by SecondSet.

Lot of experts in music, health, medicine...everything. In every forum. Wellcome to the digital era

It is not about you Second.

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BowieStone
Mick might have dropped MR because people expect him to go nuts on that one…Physically. He might think; I’m not doing that anymore.

Honestly once they invited Mick Taylor Back to play on MR a few years ago it's been somewhat disappointing on the tours that followed - they were hitting new heights with him on stage and Keith and Ron just can't do what he does -

I often wonder if they regret bringing him back for those shows cuz they haven't brought him back or even mentioned him - and these days he would be a shot in the arm for the band live IF he is even up to do it physically (who knows?) - Ronnie spends a lot of time on stage "mugging" these days and acting like a goofball -

like someone else said the "engine" of the band seems to be Chuck, Darryl & Steve - and that obviously changes the "swing" of the Stones -

I kinda wish they would come out on stools and play like they did on the Stripped Unplugged tracks (ie: Spider & The Fly, Love In Vain etc etc ) - I think that would bring back the essence of the band's sound more than these big stadium shows - just my opinion - and I know Mick wouldn't do it - but the grit and balls seem to be gone now - and I do realize they are 80 - but they are also a blues band - maybe the unplugged angle would bring that back -

in any case God Bless Them & Long Live my beloved Rolling Stones

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portlandphil

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Woz

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Elmo Lewis

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bye bye johnny

I never noticed the clothes rack by Chuck before...

That's the discount rack.......

Speaking of fashion, how about that Texas size belt buckle? Don't think Mick wears that too often!

As a Texan, it’s a good starter buckle

the shoot 'em dead, brainbell jangler!

Had a great time, tour kick-offs are great for not knowing the setlist. Although I was expecting two Keith songs, Shattered, Monkey Man and another tune from Hackeny…Dreamy Skies or Bite My Head Off.

The “warhorses” sounded reinvigorated…YCAGWYW, & Miss You especially

The ‘sound’ was phenomenal, crystal clear, not muddy, or too bottom heavy….mix was nicely balanced and spaced.

The band, the entire band, seemed energized. Plenty of smiles between all of them. Everyone had a moment to shine, Chuck, the saxophonists on Miss You, Daryl, Bernard on Beast, Sasha (is that her name?) was a standout on GS & SSOH. Keith put on a few pounds since the last time I saw him in 2021, but he’s entitled.

the shoot 'em dead, brainbell jangler!

How are you they still doing this?! I am in awe.

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SecondSet

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keefriffhards

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cyclist
Someone at Shidoobees said they met Bernard who said that Keith is recovering from Covid…

Yep the Keith one song drama, i called it, if it's not two songs he's obviously not 100%.

So flu is called Covid now.

I don't understand your comment, but there are four varieties of influenza and numerous coronaviruses of various degrees of seriousness, the newest and most serious of which is Covid-19, the severity of which has been substantially reduced over the last two-plus years through campaigns of vaccination and other interventions, widespread (and often repeat) infection, and development of treatment regimes, but which remains a pandemic virus that is still sickening and killing more people than others even if it doesn't seriously harm most in the short term. I don't know what Keith does/did or doesn't/didn't have, and you don't either, but if Bernard Fowler said he had Covid, I'm pretty sure he had Covid, not the flu, which is also serious in the elderly, but generally to an at least slightly lesser degree.

Ahhh i see you know your judo well.

Not sure why Bernard would disclose private health information regarding Keith.

Main thing though, Keith did play the show.

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rattler2004
Had a great time, tour kick-offs are great for not knowing the setlist. Although I was expecting two Keith songs, Shattered, Monkey Man and another tune from Hackeny…Dreamy Skies or Bite My Head Off.

The “warhorses” sounded reinvigorated…YCAGWYW, & Miss You especially

The ‘sound’ was phenomenal, crystal clear, not muddy, or too bottom heavy….mix was nicely balanced and spaced.

The band, the entire band, seemed energized. Plenty of smiles between all of them. Everyone had a moment to shine, Chuck, the saxophonists on Miss You, Daryl, Bernard on Beast, Sasha (is that her name?) was a standout on GS & SSOH. Keith put on a few pounds since the last time I saw him in 2021, but he’s entitled.

While I agree with you that the mix was good as far as instrument separation, from where I was sitting halfway up in section 107, I felt that the sound was too trebly and there was not enough bass. This was especially noticeable in the first half, but not so much in the second. In watching videos filmed from elsewhere, I can hear more bass, so I know it was a case of how it was in just my area.

My random thoughts about the tour opener:

My highlight of the night was the awesome T&A by Keith. Excellent delivery of guitar and vocals. Glorious noise he made hitting those riffs.

Chanel nailed Gimme Shelter and SSOH. Her vocals took soul to new heights in those songs. Love her in the show.

Ronnie everything guitar and good showman. I would like to have heard a little more from Keith, really nice SFTD solo.

Mick: I mention him last as he always is the best front in rock. And that continues today I love that he is still such a strong voice and show man at 80. Singing running jumping bringing life to music…

I liked Out of Time better in Europe-outdoors in daylight though was nice here too. YCAGWYW rearranged NOLA style was fun. Miss You has new life compared to years ago, gets audience dancing.

Great set list though a little short. Missed MR and Keith’s 2nd song. Of course I always want more.

On to NOLA. Getting there from Houston is a pain.