This is more like it. A complete return to form. How do I know? I wanted to hear it again. That’s the litmus test. I could barely get through “Angry,” it was a chore, it was a Stones cover band imitating the sound that made the act famous. You know, an opening cut that’s supposed to wow listeners and become a radio hit. But the radio doesn’t play the Stones anymore, at least not on Top Forty. As for rock… They want something new, just look at the Active Rock chart. Well, by their standards even Metallica is new, but that is about as far back as it goes. In fact, if you recognize most of the acts on the Active Rock chart you must work in the format, or be heavily dedicated to the sound. As for the rest of us…
What about the rest of us? What are we supposed to do? With no trustworthy filters. No one to point us to the good stuff. Sure, there’s tons of information, but you listen to the music and you wonder what the fuss is about, you can’t get through it. So you go back to the old records. You feel bad about it, but you just can’t find an entry point to the present. You’re told you’re old, you don’t get it, but you got it more than anybody else back in the day, how can this be?
The Stones have misfired with opening cuts for years now. That formula is long in the tooth and far from blue chip. But what’s between the buttons…that’s the nougat, that’s what we’re looking for, what we’re listening to. The stuff they may never play on the radio, but stuff we want to play again and again at home. That puts us in a mood. We don’t need a crowd to enjoy it, it’s just us, and that’s enough.
But now not only are today’s vaunted singles trash, the albums are endless, over an hour, it’s too much to digest, it’s too much to even start.
Now if you follow the history of rock and roll, it’s all based in the blues, the Delta. These acts might have been ignored in the States but they were godhead in the U.K. The nascent musicians across the pond digested this stuff and then fed it back to us in a slightly altered form that we loved. But in modern music we got so far from the garden. You know what the TV competition shows are missing? Soul. It’s not about how good somebody’s voice is, it’s something indescribable, that you can feel, that hits you directly in the heart, that moves you as a person, that is not teflon, that does not slide right off of you.
I think rock music could come back if it went back to its roots, back to the blues. Stripped it all down, slowed it all down, and just delivered the essence. The seventies were about the flourishes, expanding upon the form, demonstrating playing skills. The eighties were about how you looked, the rockers dressed up in spandex and sang ballads for commercial appeal and then Kurt Cobain came and put a fork in the whole damn thing. Don’t confuse Nirvana with Pearl Jam. Cobain was a great songwriter, he owed more to the Beatles than he owed to punk. His punk element was in the outlook, the feel, but the songs…they had melodies and changes like back in the sixties. And then Cobain killed himself and hip-hop took over. Hip-hop was the sound of the streets, Ice-T knew more about Compton than anybody in the government, but then hip-hop became a caricature of itself, a cartoon just like the spandexed rockers of the eighties. Also, since samples were expensive to clear, it became about beats and too true hooks and melody were absent.
As for pop… It might put you on the front page of the paper, but it doesn’t hit you in the gut, doesn’t stick with you, it’s evanescent, whereas the blues are forever, they’re still singing Robert Johnson songs.
So the Stones have actually improved on stage. They’re tighter. And they’ve got balls, they don’t employ hard drives, there are no fillers, just a band on stage, and it takes them a while to lock on, but when they do… It’s still the same thing, that’s the thrill. No one else does this. The Eagles present perfection. No one is on the high wire except for the Stones. The Dead used to inhabit this territory, talk about rough, but John Mayer elevated the professionalism of the act, Dead and Company were made for modern consumption, they were good from the first note, delivered what was needed, which was more than could be expected.
They sing to tape at the Super Bowl. It’s too risky to go live. Forget performance mistakes, the audio could fail, there are too many potential potholes. You record in advance and sing to tape and the engineer mixes a final product. But the Stones play to audiences this large without it. They might be rich, but they’re broke on stage, just depending on their skills, their wits, and nobody else does this to stadium crowds, nobody. Which is why when they hit the groove, when they lock on, it’s such a transcendent experience, the essence of live, because it is live, it’s human, and that’s something everybody can resonate with.
So “Sweet Sounds of Heaven” should have been the initial single. Screw the charts, the only people interested in Stones tracks are the faithful, they want to be satiated, and that’s what “Sweet Sounds of Heaven” does.
In other words, there are no rules, other than to throw the old rule book out. And if you’re coming from the wilderness with a big PR campaign don’t give people what you think they want, but what they need. I’ll tell you, I was surprised when I pushed play on “Sweet Sounds of Heaven,” a slow, dirgey number? These are so hard to get right, but in this case the Stones triumphed.
Think of “Sweet Sounds of Heaven” as an album track on “Exile on Main Street.” You know, “Ventilator Blues,” “Casino Boogie” and “Loving Cup.” But mostly “Let It Loose,” the stealth number closing the third side, you know, with that woman wailing with her high voice at the end… There was once a letter in “Rolling Stone” saying the writer wanted to meet a woman like that, who could make that sound, who was that person. Back before money was everything, when it was about the sound, the record.
That’s Lady Gaga in “Sweet Sounds of Heaven.” And what’s great is it doesn’t sound like Lady Gaga, as in it doesn’t come across as a stunt, she fits the track, she doesn’t overpower the track, it’s about her voice rather than her fame. I was skeptical when I heard she was on the record, but ultimately not only does she sound like the woman on “Let It Loose,” but Maggie Bell in “Every Picture Tells a Story” and Sandy Denny in “The Battle of Evermore.” She lifts the track to a whole new level, she’s a spice, not the main ingredient, and that’s appropriate.
And the other thing is what happens when the edited version is over at 5:06, you need to listen to the original, the real thing, the whole enchilada, which runs 7:22. Because it’s at this point, when the single is over, that the whole track quiets down, that you’re transported to Muscle Shoals, back to Mississippi, the roots of this music…when this song is struck down to its absolute essence, its roots, no tricks, that’s when it shines. And you may not want to hear this part on the radio, but at home it’s what makes you happy to feel alive.
The lyrics suck, are substandard, someone needed the balls to confront Mick. Forget trying to be modern, Mick isn’t even in the league of what he’s done before. Even “Let It Loose” had more, never mind “Brown Sugar” and “Sister Morphine,” and “Midnight Rambler” and “You Can’t Always Get What You Want.” And a lot of blues songs are repetitive, but really Mick, we needed more than this. But really, the lyrics are secondary to the sound, the feel, the soul on records like this. “Sweet Sounds of Heaven” is more, is great, but it could have been truly iconic with some better words.
But not only do I think of “Let It Loose,” I think of “Time Waits for No One,” the last cut on the first side of “It’s Only Rock ‘n Roll,” a transcendent number that seems to have been lost to the sands of time, but if you were a dedicated Stones fan back in 1974 you’ve never forgotten it, never will forget it.
Because of Mick Taylor. The Stones have never been as good since. They’ve been good, but not that good. Taylor was a superior musician, a better player than anybody else in the group, Keith may specialize in feel, in sound, even riff, but Taylor could dance atop the whole thing, take it into the stratosphere.
With melody. Unfortunately Ronnie Wood’s guitar playing is too similar to Keith’s. Taylor’s was different. A special sauce that Brian Jones added too. The indefinable element that separates the wheat from the chaff, that makes the Stones the Stones. When Mick Taylor dances on the frets, over the track in “Time Waits For No One,” you’re both energized and transfixed, as he goes up the scale, this takes the number to a whole ‘nother level. Which is what the break down section, what happens past 5:07, does in “Sweet Sounds of Heaven.”
Instead of trying to hit us in the face, the Stones backed away, left just the juices, not the whole meal. They’ve been covering up for too long. But not in “Sweet Sounds of Heaven.” Gaga is wailing without showing off, she feels the music, the piano is playing, you can hear the notes, and Mick is toasting.
That’s rock and roll.
And that’s why “Sweet Sounds of Heaven” is great. Once is not enough, nor is twice, I’ve been listening to it for over an hour, will listen more on my hike tonight, I just don’t want to let go of the mood, one that I can’t get in any TV show, even the best, only music delivers this.
You know it when you hear it. And I heard it almost immediately. And I don’t want to let go.
Do I expect everybody to feel the same way? Absolutely not. Today you don’t make music for everybody, you don’t play to the bleachers, but to those up close, the fans, who need this manna. And if it’s good enough, they’ll spread the word, turn more people on. The old days of top-down marketing/manipulation are history. It’s all about the track. And “Sweet Sounds of Heaven” is that track, that transcends the image of the band, that stands on its own. It’s nearly remarkable. I was expecting the tracks released in the wake of “Angry” to be worse.
Life’ll surprise you.
And it’s life and life only.
It’s not money, it’s not possessions, it’s all about feel.
And there’s a great feel in “Sweet Sounds of Heaven.”
Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/mrynf85a
YouTube: https://tinyurl.com/ypm9x3ua
