The Rolling Stones
Grrr! (Universal)
It’s time to pension off your Forty Licks compilation as the re-booted Stones deliver a new retrospective. Various editions are currently on the shelves. We’ve got the economy class twin CD set that, despite the 50-year anniversary, includes forty songs. Opening with 1963’s ‘Come On’, a Chuck Berry tune, the collection then rallies through a swag of Jagger/Richards originals and a few choice covers. It’s here you can revel in the majesty of their sixties’ heyday: ‘Get Off My Cloud’, ‘19th Nervous Breakdown’, ‘[I Can’t Get No] Satisfaction’, ‘Paint It, Black’ etc. Then it’s on to the glorious late-sixties/early seventies with ‘Jumping Jack Flash’, ‘You Can’t Always Get What You Want’ and highlights from Sticky Fingers and their magnus opus, Exile On Main Street. The mid-seventies yield was still pretty high and it’s here you’ll find ‘Emotional Rescue’, ‘Miss You’ and ‘Start Me Up’ which carried the hits into the next decade. ‘Happy’ turns up weirdly out of synch, but the lads are still punching their weight with ‘Undercover Of The Night’, ‘Harlem Shuffle’ and ‘Mixed Emotions’. Two new tracks are added for good measure, ‘One More Shot’ and ‘Doom And Gloom’. Why ‘Rough Justice’ isn’t here will remain a mystery. Thin on annotations, period pictures and without much of a booklet, the band let the music speak for itself.
Mitchell Peters
[rating: 4/5]
