The Rolling Stones.- Blue & Lonesome (2016) Review

The Rolling Stones.- Blue & Lonesome (2016)

By: Ghost Writer

My favorite Rolling Stones recording is 1972's Exile On Main St, although not an immediate classic, is a record not overloaded with "hits" but fully stacked with great blues based raunchy rock n roll and a killer vibe, is a down and dirty album with the Stones surviving psychedelia, surviving in France, and most of all surviving themselves, is a great sonic slap on the face to the long forgotten "summer of love", with the Stones as true rock n roll outlaws, a recording that undoubtedly set a deep footprint on future American hard rock bands like Aerosmith, Kiss and early proto punk bands like the New York Dolls and the Stooges with the blasphemous marriage of British rock musicians playing music deeply influenced by blues. 

I have criticized the Stones recently for a long time, I´m a fan, perhaps that’s why I crave for some great new music form them, despite loving their classic records for so long and considering their recent incapability of creating some great new music and becoming a touring rock n roll museum, along a bunch of rancid, quick cash in "greatest hits" compilations, with the lone exception of Keith Richards recent outstanding solo album, I've got the feeling that the Stones have been living out of their rock reputation for so long, not hungry for rock anymore and not issuing a single memorable song since the days of 1989's remarkable Steel Wheels. 

A Bigger Bang was the Stones last album, recorded in 2005, marks an absence of more than 10 years from the recording studios, and although Blue & Lonesome can hardly be called an original songs album, it is a welcomed surprise to the discography of this legendary band, a collection of amazing songs written by blues legends like Howlin' Wolf, Willie Dixon, Memphis Slim and Jimmy Reed, lovely covered by the British longstanding rockers and with an outstanding production work from Don Was and Jagger and Richards themselves. 

Opener Just Your Fool is an smashing, buoyant tune, with Jagger playing some truly mean harmonica and Charlie Watts hitting really hard his drums, the powerful blues motion is quickly displayed by the band, they will undoubtedly take more than a few listeners by surprise, while the next one Commit a Crime, a Howlin's Wolf classic, lets Richards and Ronnie Wood trade guitar licks in a wonderful way, capturing in a perfect way the maniac black magic intensity of the great Wolf, and if guitars are what we are talking about here, just check out the intro to the title track, with Richards and Wood wailing all over the Memphis Slim powerful recoding, with Jagger at the top of his game as front man transcending his charismatic persona and becoming again a great, great rock n roll performer. 

This blues onslaught continues with the great I Gotta Go that easily take us to the early formative years of this original bad boys’ quintet from England, embracing American blues with fierce passion, while on Everybody Knows About My Good Thing, the circus is joined by old “slowhand” Mr. Eric Clapton, who lays some really mean blues guitar on a really lustful tune, the enormous talent of the two musical mighty legends coming together in a musical celebration that long time Stones fans truly deserved. 

Hate To See You Go, despite being a Little Walter, reminds me a lot of Bo Diddley music, heavily supported by Jagger's prominent harmonica playing and Richards playful licks, leaving us right in the last part of this truly enjoyable recording featuring not one, but two Willie Dixon songs as proper closer to this wild adventure like none seen recently on the Stones discography, as Just Like I Treat You and I Can't Quit You Baby, this last one, again with prodigious input from Clapton putting to work his great guitar playing along Jagger, who puts aside his impressive persona in only to shine as a great singer, sending forward a show stealing performance like we haven't seen from him in a long time, Blue & Lonesome is a definitely unexpected delivery from the Stones, showing them jubilant and really hungry to find their true muse and love once again, a powerful raw experience captured red hot by Don Was, it is really a joy to find the Stones playing this way once again, hope this is an inspirational phase that can lead them to create some awesome original music in the future.