{"id":133318,"date":"2025-11-13T17:57:10","date_gmt":"2025-11-13T17:57:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/133318\/"},"modified":"2025-11-13T17:57:10","modified_gmt":"2025-11-13T17:57:10","slug":"rolling-stones-black-and-blue-super-deluxe-box-set-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/133318\/","title":{"rendered":"Rolling Stones’ ‘Black and Blue’ Super Deluxe Box Set: Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tThere\u2019s a moment deep in the 1975 \u201cBlues Jam\u201d the Rolling Stones<\/a> recorded with Jeff Beck<\/a>, a bonus track to the new super deluxe Black and Blue box set, where the six-string genius stops playing Howlin\u2019 Wolf, B.B. King, and Keith Richards<\/a>\u2013style blues and starts fiddling with his instrument\u2019s volume knobs to resemble a crying cat. It sounds transcendent and unlike anything else the Stones recorded, and that is likely why they didn\u2019t hire the virtuoso to replace Mick Taylor, who\u2019d quit a few months earlier over a lack of satisfaction with songwriting credits, among other gripes. Beck was just too good, too inventive for Stonehood, and, as history proved for both Beck and the Stones, he was never cut out to be a Stone anyway, since he largely refused to join any band that would have him as a member.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe three jam sessions Beck recorded with the group \u2014 including an impressive interpretation of his then-unreleased, jazzy Blow by Blow gem \u201cFreeway Jam,\u201d on which Richards sounds reserved, and drummer Charlie Watts<\/a> sounds at home \u2014 are highlights of this compendium of the Stones\u2019 most unusual era. Black and Blue\u2019s legacy has always been billed as something like the Stones\u2019 Star Search: 40 minutes of rockers, ballads, and reggae numbers to serve as auditions for Canned Heat guitarist Harvey Mandel, session man Wayne Perkins, and Faces face Ron Wood<\/a>. It\u2019s nobody\u2019s favorite Stones record, but, in hindsight, it\u2019s also underrated since the whole Who Wants to Be a Rolling Stone? narrative has always overshadowed the songs.<\/p>\n

\n\tIt\u2019s notable, too, that it was the Stones themselves largely who short-shrifted the record, rarely playing the tunes live compared to those off the records that bookended it, It\u2019s Only Rock and Roll (1974) and Some Girls (1978). When Black and Blue came out, the music press accused the Stones of being too professional, middle-aged 30-somethings who offered more \u201conly\u201d than likable rock & roll on the LP. It\u2019s true that the record is more manicured than previous Stones offerings (other than the cringy ad campaign<\/a> that they canceled almost immediately), but it also came out at a time when rock bands were still expected to die before they get old. On a purely musical level, the tracks are nuanced and well crafted, mature rock & roll songs (whether the Stones themselves cared to admit it.)<\/p>\n

\t\tEditor\u2019s picks<\/p>\n

\n\tBlack & Blue\u2019s cover is also relatively subdued-looking, a portrait photo (their first since Between the Buttons), and its two singles \u2014 the plaintive, brilliant Smokey Robinson\u2013falsetto-sung ballad \u201cFool to Cry\u201d and disco rocker \u201cHot Stuff\u201d \u2014 lacked the bite and parentheticals of recent hits \u201cIt\u2019s Only Rock and Roll (But I Like It)\u201d and \u201cDoo Doo Doo Doo Doo (Heartbreaker).\u201d But the album tracks \u201cHand of Fate\u201d and \u201cCrazy Mama\u201d rocked nearly as hard as any other post-Exile joint ripper; they just weren\u2019t as bloodthirsty as \u201cStar Star.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe ballads \u201cMemory Motel\u201d (a sentimental ode to remembering Long Island\u2019s apparently unmemorable groupies) and \u201cMelody\u201d (hey, they at least remembered her second name!) swooned in a soulful, age-appropriate way, thanks in large part to Billy Preston<\/a>\u2018s pianisms and backing vocals. Their heavy-skanking rendition of Eric Dolandson\u2019s \u201cCherry Oh Baby\u201d is as convincing a white reggae rocker as anything else English rockers produced in the Seventies and it certainly holds up better than Eric Clapton\u2019s \u201cI Shot the Sheriff.\u201d But all these songs largely fizzled out of Stones concerts after the tour for Some Girls, the album that showed why Wood became victor of the Great Guitar Wars.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\n\tIn the context of the box set, the album still sounds sharp and lively. Porcupine Tree frontman and remixer to the stars Steven Wilson zhuzhed up the master tapes just enough to let the instrumentation breathe a little more without altering the songs themselves. He recently told Rolling Stone<\/a>, \u201cSome people say they think [Black and Blue is] sonically the best-sounding Stones record of the Seventies, and I might go along with that,\u201d which explains why he took a light touch to the mix. The songs fade out in the same places they did in 1976 and there are no noticeable unearthed alternate guitar solos or Jaggerisms.<\/p>\n

\t\tRelated Content<\/p>\n

\n\tWhere Wilson\u2019s mix excels is how he made the ballads sparkle in new ways, with more obvious pretty piano playing on \u201cFool to Cry\u201d and Richards\u2019 soulful \u201cshe\u2019s got a mind of her own\u201d bridge on \u201cMemory Motel\u201d sounding more pronounced. The one place where the new mixes suffer is in the disco and reggae songs, genres that sounded purposefully claustrophobic in the Seventies, either as a side effect of musical taste, cocaine, or both. Wilson widened the audio spectrum on \u201cHot Stuff\u201d and \u201cCherry Oh Baby\u201d a little too much, but the soul\u2019s still there and Bill Wyman<\/a>\u2018s bass sounds better than ever. And overall, it\u2019s a good thing the mix isn\u2019t too dramatic since it never becomes distracting.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe bonus tracks, \u201cI Love Ladies\u201d and a cover of Shirley & Company\u2019s disco song \u201cShame, Shame, Shame,\u201d both foreshadow Emotional Rescue with Jagger\u2019s Mickey Mouse via Studio 54 vocal exuberance. They\u2019re fun but wouldn\u2019t have fit with the rest of Black and Blue the way that \u201cSlave\u201d or the reggae version of \u201cStart Me Up,\u201d both recorded in the same sessions and later released on Tattoo You, might have.<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd as good as the two previously unreleased songs are, you still have to wonder what else is in the vault, and if ever anyone will officially release \u201cCarnival to Rio,\u201d<\/a> the funky song the Stones and Preston recorded with Eric Clapton around the time. Also, while the box set\u2019s \u201cChuck Berry-Style Jam\u201d with Harvey Mandel is great, and Robert A. Johnson trades licks well with Beck and Richards on the \u201cRotterdam Jam,\u201d you have to wonder where are all the other jams, such as any featuring fleet-fingered Irishman Rory Gallagher, who allegedly had too much star quality for the Stones?<\/p>\n

\n\tUltimately, though, the included recordings from the band\u2019s 1976 residency at London\u2019s Earls Court (excerpts of which came out on Love You Live) show why Wood was the perfect choice for the band. Not only was he English (as opposed to Perkins, who almost got the job) but he weaves his parts perfectly with Richards, and his playing on \u201cHey Negrita,\u201d a Jagger-Richards song he got an \u201cinspiration by\u201d credit on Black and Blue (even though Wood claims in the liner notes he wrote everything except the lyrics), is crisp and direct. He even plays Perkins\u2019 parts on \u201cHand of Fate\u201d and \u201cFool to Cry\u201d as if he wrote them himself. With help from Preston, \u201cAin\u2019t Too Proud to Beg\u201d sounds funkier than usual, and \u201cGet Off of My Cloud\u201d has a honky-tonk vibe. Jagger also comes off particularly wild, changing lyrics to \u201cIt\u2019s Only Rock and Roll,\u201d \u201cBrown Sugar,\u201d and \u201cStreet Fighting Man\u201d into edgelord sentiments that match the abandoned ad campaign. He wasn\u2019t going to let the critics call him tame.<\/p>\n

\t\tTrending Stories<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Blu-ray\u2019s concert film, shot in Paris at Abattoirs (recordings form which also featured on Love You Live), however, comes off a bit more subdued, possibly because the inflatable penis Jagger rides during \u201cStar Star\u201d maybe needed some Viagra that night. But he makes up for it by throwing water and confetti on everyone and swinging from a rope like Tarzan over the audience, which was still a novel idea in 1976. Also, Wood\u2019s charisma is obvious. Perkins was a studio guy, while Woody had logged miles on the road with the Faces; he was the perfect pick.<\/p>\n

\n\tAlthough the Stones always shrugged off Black and Blue as the bridge between Mick Taylor and Woody, the box set shows how they struggled to keep going at a crucial time, but were also open to new sounds and new musicians, all while never losing their mission. The reissue also makes the case that the album\u2019s songs should get a second life. If a \u201cblack and blue\u201d is a bruise, then the Stones healed quite nicely at the time. It\u2019s just a shame, shame, shame that there\u2019s not more recordings with Beck and others that could\u2019ve shown what an alternative-universe Stones would\u2019ve sounded like.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There\u2019s a moment deep in the 1975 \u201cBlues Jam\u201d the Rolling Stones recorded with Jeff Beck, a bonus…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":133319,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[91426,91427,48225,156,91428,22323,22324,157,111,139,69,22616,91429,12802],"class_list":{"0":"post-133318","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-bill-wyman","9":"tag-billy-preston","10":"tag-charlie-watts","11":"tag-entertainment","12":"tag-jeff-beck","13":"tag-keith-richards","14":"tag-mick-jagger","15":"tag-music","16":"tag-new-zealand","17":"tag-newzealand","18":"tag-nz","19":"tag-rolling-stones","20":"tag-ron-wood","21":"tag-the-rolling-stones"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133318","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133318"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133318\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/133319"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133318"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133318"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133318"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}