Bang, Bang, You're Dead

In my younger days, I was a massively geeked out fan of the Rolling Stones. In a time (mid to late 90's) when really good, simple rock was hard to come by (at least to me), they seemed a good way to check out the music's past: rougher than the Beatles, less pretentious than the Doors or the Who, and a good link to the blues that was Rock's father. I bought a bunch of their albums, including the newer ones. I'll never forget CD-shopping with friends back in 1998, buying "Bridges to Babylon" while everyone else was grabbing stuff buy bands their own age. And as much as I new it wasn't any good, I couldn't say so. I *wanted* it to rock, and said it did.

That was seven years ago. I've vastly expanded the palette since then. I've even made peace with the New Wave wankers from the 80's that I hated so much (but not Hair Metal. NEVER Hair Metal. Hair Metal makes God cry), thanks to 24 Hour Party People and a coupla Joy Division albums.

So obviously I'm only minorly interested in the new Rolling Stones album. On the one hand, it's kinda cool that these guys are actually taking the effort to make new music, when they could coast forever on their back catalogue, occasionally releasing newer and newer compllations of the same songs, like the aforementioned Beatles and Who. I remember an old interview from say, '69, in which Jagger said that he hoped he was still doing this when he was an old man, just like Muddy Waters and Big Bill Broonzy and Mississippi John Hurt and all the guys that were his heros when he was coming up. No rock star could say that nowadays; it seems to be required to embrace ephemerality, to be way too cool to even consider making a living off of your music. So I have to think that these guys are still doing this because they like it, they enjoy the music they make, and they enjoy making more of it. There's something almost innocent about that, and a lot more honest than the hordes of indie bands who suffer guilt seizure as soon as they get mentioned in Rolling Stone.

That said, I have a suspicion that this won't be anything to get excited about. And from the fact that they can't get played on the radio, I'm not surprised. Rock radio has taken such a beating the the last couple of years that I don't know who would play it. The Classic Rock stations would rather play a medley of '68-'72 songs when the band comes to town. The Modern Rock stations won't play anything before 1985, or something that sounds like 1985. Nothing else will play a Rock song. Despite what I've just said, the public at large has long held the Stones to be simply a recurring revival act, a traveling circus to catch if you can snag the tickets but otherwise nothing more than an excuse for Leno to trot out new variations of Viagra, old-age, and Keith-is-dead jokes.

Yet the album is #1 on Amazon. Interesting that a band that saw, even helped to bring about, the rise of rock radio will not only be around to see it fall, but will be able to sidestep the consequences thereof.