Rolling Stones: One last blast

Review: The bands’ U.S. tour comes to an end with a wild pre-holiday party.

By BEN WENER
The Orange County Register

When the Rolling Stones last embarked on a two-year worldwide jaunt, in 2002-03 behind the retrospective “Forty Licks,” they made a point of playing what, to them, were virgin venues in Southern California – Staples Center for a Halloween bash, the Wiltern for a lucky few thousand fans.

Since launching their current outing behind the strong comeback album “A Bigger Bang” last year, however, the legends have stuck to well-trod stomping grounds: Angel Stadium, where they first played in ’78; the Hollywood Bowl, where they last performed in ’66; the Forum, site of several hazily remembered shows in the ’70s.

Wednesday night’s stop at Dodger Stadium – the 71st and presumably final U.S. date on this lengthy trek, with only a visit to Vancouver to follow – doesn’t come with the same sense of history. Mick, Keith, Ron and Charlie have only played here twice before, when they lit the place up on back-to-back nights a little more than nine years ago.

Yet there is a distinct difference between seeing the Stones in a sterile modern arena and catching them at an old Los Angeles haunt: The latter tends to elicit extra energy out of these 60-something bad boys while lending a wilder atmosphere that a place like Staples just can’t capture.

Having caught nearly 10 performances from the band in the past decade – none of which has repeated but half of a typically 20-song set – believe me when I say this one was unique. No matter how many seemingly stuffy wealthy types were amassed on the Dodgers’ field the other night – and you had to be filthy rich to afford the $450 seats that few actually sat in – the “floor” was a full-blown, beer-guzzling, joint-passing party like no other you’d find at a boomer-heavy concert.

It was pure rock ’n’ roll bacchanalia, minus any orgiastic element. And the Stones responded in kind, providing a set severely short on revelations (what could they really surprise us with by now?) but overflowing with deafeningly loud feel-good classics.
“Jumping Jack Flash,” “It’s Only Rock ’n’ Roll,” “Start Me Up,” “Honky Tonk Women,” “Satisfaction” – we’ve heard ’em all quite often lately, and undoubtedly will hear them again when these craggy-faced geezers push closer to 70. By that point, adjusting for inflation, nosebleed seats will reach $450 and a spot within spitting distance will cost more than a compact car.

But the Stones, now loosened up so much their instinctively concocted grooves sometimes threaten to veer off course, still roared as mightily as they did last year. Perpetually prancing Jagger in particular showed few signs of the throat ailment that forced several postponements (including a four-day delay for this stop) and a cancellation in Honolulu.

The singer did get huffy toward the end of “Tumbling Dice” midway into the show, just before Keith Richards took the spotlight to warble two unexpected selections – “You Got the Silver,” with Ron Wood adding delicious slide work, and “Connection,” storming along as if it were an “Exile on Main St.” outtake.

But I’d put his running out of gas down to so often sprinting from one wing of this flame-spewing, hotel-sized stage to the other, flapping his muscular grandpa arms all the while. Given the high notes he reached on “Streets of Love,” to say nothing of the fervency he brought to a robust “Let’s Spend the Night Together,” a positively smokin’ “All Down the Line” (again highlighted by Wood’s work) and yet another tremendous version of the violent blues “Midnight Rambler,” it’s hard to imagine his illness was very debilitating.

He remains incomparable, even on a throwaway like “She Was Hot,” even on a slightly botched duet with Bonnie Raitt on “Dead Flowers,” even on the most upbeat, menace-free rendition of “Sympathy for the Devil” I’ve heard. (All the darkness the band could summon was saved for a galloping “Paint It, Black.”) The dread pirate Richards continues to sting with singular Chuck Berry variations and Charlie Watts is one of the greatest drummers in rock by any era’s standard. But Jagger is a sight like no other – a lithe but torrential whirlwind of unstoppable sexual swagger and vocal ferocity.

He’s “never as comfortable inside his own skin as when he’s performing, which, in part, is why he’s a great performer,” critic Amy Taubin once wrote. “The release he experiences onstage is palpable to the audience.” It’s what we respond to, and primary to what keeps us coming back.

There was only one problem about coming back to an old L.A. venue like this stadium, though: It’s a nightmare to get to. And this night, every freeway swamped with holiday traffic, it was a hundred times harder to reach than that other impossible location, the Hollywood Bowl.

Took a friend of an acquaintance I know 2½ hours to get there just from Beverly Hills. Took me four hours on the nose to make it from the Register to my seat – so don’t ask about Raitt’s opening set, I didn’t see it.

It was an infuriating drive, and I can only imagine how much harder it was to get out of there. (I split during “Brown Sugar,” the encore choice.) But all it took was one splash of Charlie’s crash cymbal, one strangely perfect overlapping of grimy solos from Keith and Ron, one swish of the hips from Mick – and suddenly I forgot just how long the 101 felt like a parking lot.

Go Ben, you nailed it even 'tho I wasn't there!