Friday, December 7, 2007

No. 269: Some Girls


Band: The Rolling Stones
Album: Some Girls
Why Rolling Stone gets it right: One of the iconic band's iconic albums, "Some Girls" fuses several different distinct genres during said genres' peak of popularity. As is the Stones' way, the classic outlaw spirit peppers the album nicely and evenly.
Why Rolling Stone gets it wrong: There's a lot of filler on here, which isn't a big surprise. Some of the songs are entirely forgettable.
Best song: "Beast of Burden" will always have a place in my heart if only because I had heard the lyrics wrong as "I'll never be your pizza burning." That still makes me laugh.
Worst song: I don't care for "Far Away Eyes."
Is it awesome?: Not really.

I can't really write anything about this album that hasn't already been written a million times, so let me just say the incredibly not controversial thing in saying that I wish they stopped making music a long time ago.

That bands like the Stones, Who and Led Zeppelin can continue to tour despite not making any new music of consequence is sad. The Stones continue to tour, despite all of them looking like the dead pirates.

I would be lying if I didn't say that I enjoy "Beast of Burden," "Shattered" and "Miss You." The Stones are so heavily playlisted -- I imagine, partially due to the fact that they still tour -- on classic rock radio that we all know each one by heart. Because I was a suburban teenager, I listened to (and, on some level, still listen to) classic rock radio. Therefore, I don't even really like the Stones, but I've heard each of their hits so many times that they're part of my subconscious. If a radio station (or, god forbid, MTV) gets a hold of something, it becomespart of the culture.

This, on some level, makes me respect Springsteen a little more. Of his 23-song set at the Verizon Center, he played eight songs from his latest album (hat tip to Ellen for the stats). Springsteen, while playing a lot of favorites, did want to play his new stuff.

(And was rewarded. According to Ellen, who was there, the crowd did go nuts for the new stuff.)

Page and Plant haven't recorded new music together, I think, since the late '70s. The Who recently released an album of new stuff, but before that, the band had done several reunion tours to simply play "My Generation," do some windmills and print money.

That's what the Stones do. They open with "Satisfaction" and they close with "Sympathy For The Devil." I can't really begrudge them for making money or playing songs that are, for all intents and purposes, classics.

But, move to the side, gents. There are bands out there who get no play and deserve to be playing those stages and getting some radio play.

2 comments:

kellydwyer said...

Beast of Burden is shyte, can't stand that song. The rest of the album, pretty much the same song over and over, but it's probably my favorite Stones album on certain days. They were cobbling quite a bit from Rockpile back then, Richards even showed up on stage with them right before they started recording the disc.

Anonymous said...

This album's at 269? For my money it should be much higher on the list. Shattered is a classic. Miss You made a lot of jaded rockers forget how much they hated disco. When the Whip Comes Down, Respectable, Before They Make Me Run all great tunes!