THE ROLLING STONES: GET YER YA-YA'S OUT! (1970)
1) Jumpin'
Jack Flash; 2) Carol; 3) Stray Cat Blues;
4) Love In Vain; 5) Midnight
Rambler; 6) Sympathy For The Devil; 7)
Live With Me; 8) Little Queenie; 9) Honky Tonk Women; 10) Street
Fighting Man.
The Rolling Stones' second live album is not
simply their best live album ever — much like its only serious competition from
the same year, the Who's Live At Leeds,
it is a unique sonic and, dare I say it, spiritual experience that either
defines «Rolling-Stonism» or transcends it, depending on your default feelings
for this confusing term. As far as live performances go in general, the Stones
have had their ups and downs, depending on a mix of factors such as drugs,
musical fads, and age, yet on the whole, one way or another, a Stones show has
always been a terrific experience, especially if you were there in person.
However, there was a brief period — a very
brief period, largely limited to the Stones' American tour of 1969 — when a
Stones show was something bigger, deeper, and perhaps even scarier than just a
Stones show.
Two documents capture this brief glimpse best,
and can hardly be discussed separately from each other: Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out!, the live album culled from the band's
performances at Madison Square Garden on November 27-28, and Gimme Shelter, the Maysles brothers'
documentary of the North American tour in general, culminating with footage
from the Altamont disaster and the ensuing reactions. Gimme Shelter is the more complete of the two, of course — Ya-Ya's only offers you the first
chapter of the story, whereas Gimme
Shelter focuses just as heavily on the inevitable denouement. The reason
why Gimme Shelter remains such a
fascinating experience after all these years, proudly retaining its status of
one of the best musical documentaries ever made, is because it was brilliantly
molded by its creators in the shape of a Faustian story — here is this supremely
powerful, transcendent, God-like musical force that holds an entire young
nation in its magical grip... and here comes the payoff, when the Devil, to
whom they have allegedly sold their souls, finally arrives to collect. Of
course, it is all largely a matter of clever editing — from Jagger's opening triumphant
"Welcome to the breakfast show!" to the final expression on his face
as he gets up and walks away, stunned, from watching the murder footage — but
no artistic hyperbole could have such a psychologically devastating effect if
it hadn't been at least partially
rooted in some deep truth.
There is actually a very deep, though not
immediately obvious, rift between the Stones' functioning as a live touring
band at the end of 1969 and everything they did later — starting off with the
infamous touring debaucheries of 1971-72 and beyond. Already in 1972, as can be
easily seen in the Ladies And Gentlemen
movie, or heard on the classic Brussels
Affair release from the next year, the Stones' live show was precisely that
— a live show. The glam era had settled in, and the emphasis was placed on
extravagance, «going crazy», glitzy costumes, running around, simulating
totally drunk behavior, and doing much of this at the expense of musicality
(although as long as anchorman Mick Taylor was still in the band and Keith was
still too constrained by drug intake to do as much jumping and flailing around
as he'd begin doing post-clean-up, the musical side still remained impressive).
Yet, in a certain way, that, too, could look like a subconscious result of
Altamont: one might go as far as to say that Jagger's firm switching to the
"It's only rock'n'roll, but I like it" mentality was caused by a deep
wish to prevent any further
Altamonts. After 1970, The Rolling Stones went on stage to give you a good
time. That was all. Could they be blamed for that after what happened on
December 6, 1969?
But these here tracks — they were recorded one
week earlier than December 6, and at that time The Rolling Stones were a
different band. They had only just overcome a huge crisis, and come out
completely on top — having established the Jagger/Richards songwriting
partnership as the No. 1 partnership in the world (now that the
Lennon/McCartney one was over), having acquired a fresh new second guitarist
whose well-honed blues-rock chops gave them added confidence in an era of rock guitar
gods, and, most importantly, having understood that the world as everybody knew
it was really changing, and that
they, the brand-new reformed, arrogant, talented, self-confident Rolling
Stones, could be spearheading that change the way they liked it.
This is, in fact, the first thing I hear in Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out! — the gleeful
pride, the self-confidence, the ecstatic feel of a freshly trained magician
who realizes that the whole world now lies at his feet. And to do that, they
did not even have to begin the album with a set of overdubbed introductions
from their road manager, Sam Cutler, announcing "the greatest rock'n'roll
band in the world, The Rolling Stones!", a somewhat self-obvious fact at
the time — the opening chords to ʽJumpin' Jack Flashʼ would have sufficed
alone.
Amusingly, some people have complained over the
years about the slowness of the
performances as a detrimental factor in their enjoyment of the record —
comparing it unfavorably with bootlegs and semi-bootlegs from the subsequent Taylor-era
tours of 1971-73, where the average tempo of the songs would be sped up and
they would allegedly acquire more «kick-ass power». I have always found this
argument to be completely laughable, because it is precisely the slowness, the
willingness to take the extra time to unfurl the demonic potential of this
material, the chance to properly savor every distorted lick from Keith's guitar
and every grinning snarl from Mick's mouth, that gives Ya-Ya's its unique power. It is, of course, very important that all
the classics played there were still so fresh at the time — when you have five
thousand performances of ʽJumpin' Jack Flashʼ and ʽSympathy For The Devilʼ
behind the belt, it must be damn hard to find yet another chunk of your soul
that you could invest in the five thousand and first one — but it is not even
the freshness, per se, that matters so much, as an instinctively felt belief
that what they did actually mattered,
that these performances could double as entertainment and a certain wake-up call-to-action addressed to the audience at
the same time. The Stones were not alone in this, of course: The Who, Hendrix,
The Doors, and a host of lesser performers all shared the same drive, but The
Stones had a certain advantage over all of them.
Two players were absolutely essential for «the
breakfast show» — Mick and Keith. These days, whenever you watch a 1969 clip on
YouTube, the average comment usually goes «thank God for Mick Taylor», but, at
the risk of causing the ire of all the guitar god aficionados out there, I
would say the greatest thing that Taylor brought to the band was a sharpening
of the senses and instincts of Keith, who'd felt himself threatened — there was
no way he could easily pick up on all the subtleties and complexities of Mick
Taylor's fretwork, so, unless he wanted to become reduced to a mere helping hand
on the stage, he had to somewhat compensate for this in other ways; and the
sound that he came up with, based on open tunings, distorted tones, and a
serious modernisation of Chuck Berry's signature licks, became the epitome of
classic hard rock, combining the atmosphere of The Barroom, The Battlefield,
and The Seventh Circle of Hell. "Watch it!" goes Mick at the opening
notes of ʽJumpin' Jack Flashʼ, and regardless of what he really meant, I've
always interpreted it as "Stand back! One step closer to those amps and
you go down in flames, mortal!" And the speed — yes, they play it
significantly slower than they would do in 1972, but that is just so that you
can taste the complete, unabridged power of each single chord in Keith's riff.
The mid-section and the outro, too, consist of little other than Keith driving
home, one after another, bar after bar of the same repetitive bridge riff (if
Taylor is playing lead over it, it is intentionally left inaudible by the
engineer), but it has all the brutality of a Tony Iommi, extended with an
extra feel of recklessness and rustic hooliganry.
It is for this exact reason that they slow down
two Chuck Berry covers — again, both in the past and in the future they would
play Chuck as fast as Chuck would play himself, but on this occasion, ʽCarolʼ
and ʽLittle Queenieʼ are placed in «draggy» mode, for two reasons only: (a) so
that Keith can flash his new-found jagged, angular, dirty-offensive post-Berry
sound in your face — each of his lead guitar responses to each of Mick's lines
on the verses is a priceless slice of nasty arrogance; (b) so that Mick can
flash his drawn out, insulting, insinuating, swaggery tone in your face — give
him one more year and his on-stage singing would largely shift to faux-drunk
barking and brawling, but here he is still capable of gleefully extending and
swirling his creaky vowels ("it's not too far back on the highway, not so
long a ri-i-i-i-i-de..."). Next to this sound, both of Chuck's originals
fall on the innocence level of Chubby Checker: where, in the past, "go,
go, go, little queenie!" could really
sound like it actually had something to do with a girl dancing, here the
implied activity is clearly a much less sublimated one than a rock'n'roll
dance. And it sure has everything to do with the fact of Mick changing the
infamous ʽStray Cat Bluesʼ line from "I can see that you're 15 years
old" to "I can see that you're 13 years old", too.
While I am certainly not implying that the
songs here are all superior to their studio versions (like all great
studio/live bands at the time, the Stones knew very well how to bring out some
aspects of their tunes in the studio and others on stage), they are all clearly
far more ferocious than the studio equivalents. Cue ʽMidnight Ramblerʼ, which inevitably
loses its subtle, suspenseful, quiet-creepy nocturnal atmosphere, but gets an
entirely new and equally exciting coat of tough, gritty, sinister rumble, with
a lower, growlier, thicker tone from Keith and a sharp blues-rock lead reply
from Taylor — additionally, it also becomes a highlight in illustrating the
band's newly found jam power, with Keith and Charlie hacking it out with
machine-like precision on the long race after the first two verses; and the
"well, did you hear about the Boston... WHAM!" mid-section, so quiet
and understated on the studio version, is here turned into a macabre, bloody
execution, as Jagger (probably) whips the stage with his long red scarf. Again,
by the way, they take the song at a slower tempo than they would on the ensuing
tours — a tempo that is perfectly suited to bringing out its chilling
potential, instead of just making it look like yet another basic rock'n'roll
number, for some reason, extended way out of proportion.
In a context like this, even a supposedly
innocent tune of barroom happiness like their latest single, ʽHonky Tonk Womenʼ
— which, in its original studio recording, with the cowbell and the brass backing
and the somewhat subdued guitar tones, did really sound like a bunch of drunken
sailors having harmless sailor fun in the local tavern — acquires an unusually
sinister sheen: here, Keith's opening riff plainly states, "don't fuck
with me, or I swear to God I'll kill ya", and Mick's sexual boasting, with
each syllable perfectly enunciated from the back of his throat, gets all Mephistophelian,
as if, you know, he were pledging to have sex with each member of the audience right then and there, male, female, or
otherwise, because he's got enough of that demon seed to satisfy everybody. Ask
Keith's guitar for confirmation of said fact.
But just so as not to go completely overboard
and make it seem like darkness, sexuality, and hidden menace are all that
matters, there are also some performances that invest very heavily in sheer musicality — one of these, paradoxically as
it sounds, being ʽSympathy For The Devilʼ, here reinterpreted as more of a funk
than a samba number and, consequently, featuring some of Charlie's funkiest
drumming ever (he does a very steady and convincing, if not particularly inventive
job), and a Richards/Taylor sparring lead guitar duel that has long since
passed into legend, with people debating even today over which of the two solos
is superior — Keith's or Mick's. At least this is unquestionably Keith's finest
lead break on the stage, ever:
instead of the broken, «sputtering», high-pitched banshee shrieks on the studio
version, here he delivers a more tightly integrated melodic passage that
follows an impeccable, mistake-free musical logic, goes through a couple of
ecstatic climaxes, and finally goes down in a perfect resolving flourish, like
an immaculately rehearsed public speech, oriented at maximum effect. Taylor then
picks it up from the exact same notes, demonstrates his technical superiority,
and makes the song climax a few more times before it ends — but for Taylor this
is more or less a routine job, whereas Keith would never ever deliver another solo like that, period. (By the way, it is
very easy to think of Keith as a horrible lead guitar player based on the past
thirty years or so — you should always go back to 1969 to remember that there
was a time when the man could churn out fluent, coherent lead melodies with
almost the same ease with which he churned out those riffs).
Taylor's properly stellar moment arrives with
ʽLove In Vainʼ, where the slow blues nature of the song gives him his real
chance to shine — again, what they have here is neither better nor worse than
the studio recording, with its mix of psychedelic slide licks and archaic
mandolin trills, but simply different, focusing on Taylor's gift to convert
12-bar blues into uplifting lyricism (unsurprisingly, perhaps, ʽLove In Vainʼ
is the only song from Ya-Ya's that would sound every bit as
good on the subsequent Taylor tours, mostly because Mick was the only member of
the band to have not undergone any
serious stylistic changes post-1970).
And so we arrive at the most interesting, and
disturbing, question of all: so was it really this music, with all of its
demonic power, that was responsible for the Altamont debacle? The easiest
answer is to simply brush it off — after all, Altamont trouble started out even
before the Rolling Stones arrived at the concert, not to mention that answering
«yes» without any scientific proof would only play into the hands of idiots
blaming rock music for the end of the world. But behind that easiness, there
still lurks some un-easiness as well
— and at the very least, I can vouch for myself, namely, that I have always
felt some sort of presence behind the
music on Ya-Ya's. Of course, I am
not talking about anything supernatural (though it would be fun, wouldn't it?):
I am saying that the element of provocation,
as delivered over the course of a Rolling Stones show in November 1969, even if
it may superficially look weaker than
their completely over-the-top behavior of the following decade, is actually
much stronger in terms of sheer sonic substance. (And visual, too: just compare
this shamanistic clip of ʽJumpin' Jack Flashʼ from
Gimme Shelter with this speedier, rowdier, bawdier version from Ladies And Gentlemen two years later and
then tell me which one's got more mesmerizing power).
No, it is not really about provoking you into
sleeping with 13-year olds, shoving knives right down somebody's throat, fighting
in the streets, or even (horrors!) beginning to take tea at three — but it is about provoking you to «think dangerous»,
whatever that might mean for anybody in particular. For some girls (and boys),
it might mean wanting to have sex with Mick Jagger; for some, it might mean
wanting to go out there and fight the system; for some, it might mean wanting
to pull a knife or a gun — you never really know. Whatever be the case, Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out! is a far more
disturbing record than all those comparatively mild albums by Prince, AC/DC,
and Twisted Sister that would fuel the ridiculous discussion over ratings and
parental control in the Eighties — precisely because it transcends the
vaudeville limits of «shock rock» and taps into certain Freudian zones where
people should not always be admitted without a legal guardian of sorts. I do
know that for me, this is the perfect record to play when I get the serious
urge to kill somebody — there's nothing as spiritually refreshing and morally
relieving as a good old murder in open-G tuning, you know. A juicy, dirty,
bloody thumbs up
for an experience that could never again be properly replicated — although,
after Altamont, I couldn't really blame the Stones for switching the genre tag
from «dark ritual» to «glitzy vaudeville».
PS. Technical detail: if you are seriously
interested in the deluxe CD reissue of the album, it is not worthy of much
attention unless you are a fanatical completist. All you get is an extra set of
five live songs from the same shows (including acoustic performances of
ʽProdigal Sonʼ and ʽYou Gotta Moveʼ) that, with the exception of a completely
re-tuned ʽSatisfactionʼ, do not have the intensity of the originally released
material; and mini-sets from the Stones' supporting acts — B. B. King and Ike
and Tina Turner — that should probably be enjoyed within the context of those
artists' own careers (though, I must say, Tina's quasi-pornographic performance
of ʽI've Been Loving You Too Longʼ as captured in Gimme Shelter totally fits in with the atmosphere). Perhaps with
time, we might be lucky enough to get cleaned-up and remastered versions of
additional performances from the same tour, but there's no telling how long we
have to wait for that.
"The glam era had settled in, and the emphasis was placed on extravagance"
ReplyDeleteExtra kudos to Ritchie Blackmore and Rory Gallagher - they never joined this trend. It's also an important reason why I think Black Sabbath' Live in Paris their best live record.
Agree about Gallagher, but Blackmore? One of the original kings of guitar extravagance (certainly far more extravagant than Iommi ever was).
DeleteIf you're talking guitar technique, yes, but that also includes Gallagher, whose technique wasn't any worse. Though both, unlike eg Alvin Lee (who was actually faster than Blackmore), always tried to put their technique in service of the notes instead of the other way round.
DeleteI thought you were talking off-stage shenanigans with the purpose of image building. Blackmore of course quite often was a pos towards many bandmates and members of the music industry, but you will find precious few destroyed hotel rooms and ill-treated fans in his trail. You might also be surprised how many interviewers reported their surprise about how cooperative he was - when he was willing to give an interview in the first place. Almost all problems with Blackmore involved saw people trying to force him to do something he explicitely didn't want to. That's egocentric, but not exactly glam extravagance.
Now I think about it, Alvin Lee never cared about image building and glam rock extravagance either.
It's fun to blame or credit the power of the Stones' approach to their own music in 1969 for the fatal idiocy of Altamont, but it's only fun for effect. The music had nothing to do with it. Throw the Beatles on a low, impromptu stage at the bottom of open hillsides, surrounded by 300,000 seriously altered fans, with nothing but drunken bikers to protect them, and you'd probably witness a veritable massacre to the musical accompaniment of Hey Jude.
ReplyDeleteThe musical & visual video comparison is definitely interesting though. The new science of rock & roll crowd control definitely made a difference on their performance.
I listened to this record almost exclusively for a period of a few weeks as I was seriously suffering from depression, but the intensity of the performances allowed to me to respond very strongly to the music. It was at that point that I knew the worst of my depression was over, because as long as you can feel and be in the moment of experiencing music, you are on the path to sanity. I always think of Jumping Jack Flash as the greatest rock song of all time for that reason.
ReplyDeleteStanley Booth's True Adventures of the Rolling Stones is, in my view, another essential document of this period. I highly recommend it to serious Stones fans, as well as those who'd like to read arguably the best book on rock and roll. (Booth's other main book, Rythm Oil, is also a worthwhile read.)
ReplyDeleteReally enjoyed your piece here and agree with much of what you say; Mick Taylor arrived as part of the Clapton/Green continuum of English blues virtuosi, so certainly forced Keith to up his game. Additionally, you could almost argue that 1969 was the year that the Stones finally left their 'beat group' roots behind and became the rockers we knew for most of the 1970's. Another aspect of 'Ya-ya's' worth mentioning is that after the whole Woodstock extravaganza, live albums became 'de rigeur' for a lot of bands, partly to combat the newly-emergent bootleggers (Even the Stones must have been impressed with 'Liver than you'll ever be') and partly because the likes of Cream had shown how much a live album could boost sales with 'Wheels of Fire'. Other notable contributors to this 1969 trend were the Bay Area trio of Jefferson Airplane ('Bless its pointed little head') Quicksilver Messenger Service ('Happy Trails') and the Grateful Dead ('Live/Dead'). As for Altamont, it's become a gift to writers who want to draw comparisons with the myopic hippy rhetoric of Woodstock Nation but having been to a few of these early festivals, I would venture to say that there were others that were equally poorly organised, so it's a wonder it didn't happen more often. The naivete of promoters prepared to entrust 'security' to a horde of self-aggrandising, drunken bikers beggars belief and Altamont wasn't the only festival where that happened. I think the real issue about Altamont and the Stones was that this was a pivotal moment. Jagger, as the frontman, had been flirting with Satanic and biker imagery since 'Sympathy for the Devil' or maybe even earlier and this was the point at which his bluff was called. During the show, he just came over as a petulant little brat and his 'power' to manipulate audiences was exposed as empty braggadocio; just smoke & mirrors, really. As you say, the scene where he views the murder footage after the event is hugely telling - he just looks crushed, broken, impotent. And, as you rightly point out, after that, it was just showtime; keep your distance, give 'em 90 minutes of the Stones Experience, then off into the limos and on to the next one...
ReplyDeleteAnother great'un.
ReplyDeleteGood review - but wrong about the Deluxe set. You absolutely SHOULD get that, if you can find it for a non bank-breaking price.
ReplyDelete