Month: February 2020

Of the Stones’ flawless series of records beginning with 1968’s Beggars Banquet and ending with the ragged excesses of 1972’s Exile on Main Street, there is a case to be made for Sticky Fingers as the Stones’ absolute peak. Cloaked in a druggy haze, Sticky Fingers saunters through a smorgasbord of the Stones’ hottest cuts, from the hot-footed Brown Sugar through soaring country opus Wild Horses, the Santana-inspired long form jam on Can’t You Hear Me Knocking, good natured country vamp Dead Flowers and the haunting album closer Moonlight Mile. Jimmy Miller’s production is both canny and spare and new guitarist Mick Taylor’s interplay with Keith Richards’ swashbuckling rhythm guitar allows the Stones’ songs to be ornate and dynamic in ways they never have before. Jagger, as always, plays the pouting ringmaster with his vocal approach shapeshifting from song to song, giving each a distinct feel. Sticky Fingers is a snapshot of the Stones at their most vital – a wildly creative pop culture phenomenon more than deserving of the mantel of the greatest rock and roll band in the world.

The history of rock music can quite comfortably be divided into two categories – before Zeppelin I and after Zeppelin I! Although the undulating, sinuous heavy metal of this record is not without precedent, Hendrix and Cream in particular, Led Zep spawned a hard rock subculture that was quite seperate from the pop music of the time. It was subversive, sexual and anti establishment – listen to Robert Plant’s doom struck howl on Dazed and Confused or Jimmy Page’s savage riffing on Communication Breakdown – this record spoke to people on a primal level. That’s not to say that it’s without craftsmanship or nuance – the musicianship of each member speaks for itself. This record, and many of their later efforts, were critically panned by Rolling Stone, dismissing the songs as “weak and unimaginative” (look up the review, it is scathing!). Fifty years later and a million Rolling Stone covers later, I’m sure that writer never imagined the impact Zeppelin would have. This record was the beginning of a cultural phenomenon that is as potent today as it ever was.