AR: Exile on Main Street

The Rolling Stones - Exile on Main Street (1972)

In the continued interest of reviewing all the Phish-covered Halloween albums, here's the 2009 entry, The Rolling Stones dirty basement blues 1972 classic Exile on Main Street. Mick and Les Boys triumphantly managed to break exactly no new ground here, but somehow threw together a soulful batch of Brit-rock Americana that captures something way bigger than the sum of its tracks. It's gritty, dark and lived-in, and one of (if not the) best examples of the intimacy of a recording popping right through the music. Whether it was the drug-addled craziness that bore the album or who-knows-what, Exile saw a bunch of style-chasing bad boys - this is the same group that aped Sgt. Pepper's with Their Satanic Majesties Request - put down something undeniably real. It's a classic and proof positive that the Stones weren't always sucking in the Seventies.

Exile begins in typical RS fashion, with a classic bombastic Keith Richards riff followed by a rollicking, piano-backed verse of Jagger's barely pronounced drawl. "Rocks Off" has ample energy even before the horns kick in after the second verse, and the trumpet screams add to the flashing lights rock concert-style feel. Full band assault here - by the final choruses, things are in absolute full swing. Killer opener - even has a wacky psychedelic bridge that manages to disrupt but not feel out of place. The energy does not dip for track two, as "Rip this Joint" is (appropriately enough) a short roadhouse blues number featuring more full-speed ahead piano-trilling and a pair of crowd--slaying sax solos. Jagger spits his vocals out the side of his mouth - the music mercifully, for the sake of your record player, fades out before things start spinning off axes. Two more powerful and driving, yet murky and mysterious, opening tracks are hard to come by.

"Shake Your Hips" is an old-style blues riffer which basically sounds like the opening to some ZZ Top song on repeat. It's not 12 bar at all - just the same pattern over and over, with Jagger's eerie vocals and the brass section wildly shifting over the course of three minutes to keep things intriguing. The table is set nice and spooky-like - I'll try to avoid reiterating this throughout this review, but the image of half-drunk dudes rocking out while strewn about couches in some warehouse at 4 in the morning is pervasive. This mood sets the stage excellently for "Casino Boogie," another slow to mid tempo blues shuffle that starts off sparse and crescendoes to a brief jam out with some nifty full band, horns and all, interplay. You can easily see members finishing their individual runs, setting down their instruments and reaching for green-bottled brews.

As great as all of the songs, the closing track of side one of the original double LP, "Tumbling Dice [Gambling?]" is a step above and the obvious first single off the album. "There's fever in the funkouse now," indeed. It's a general tale of rock-starrin' and womanizing (gambling? :)), and the backup singers, another signature Richards riff, and the slowed down groove / drop-out choruses are flat out glorious. It's simultaneous raunch and summertime breezy groove - impressive stuff.

"Sweet Virginia" follows with some acoustic and harmonica stompin' country honk. More visions of basement sing-alongs as everyone in the studio seems to chant along with Jagger over the choruses. There's even a saxophone wail throughout, too - despite lines that you "got wipe that shit right off your shoes," this is a fun times, endearing tune - I, too, thank you for your wine, California. "Torn and Frayed" maintains the laid-back vibe with a banjo / piano / slide guitar combo - the Stones pulled off a lot more of an alt-country vibe than people often remember. That tendency is continued in the protest country blues number, "Sweet Black Angel," a lovely stripped down number challenging the murder charges brought against Angela Davis.

After that relative slow down and trek into political sincerity, the groups brings down the house with the side two, LP one closer, "Loving Cup." Full disclosure - I definitely heard the Phish versions of this first, and those particular cover versions led me to purchase Exile in the first place. As grandiose as those anthemic cover encores are, the original horn-backed and Jagger-sneer-led version is a flat-out lymbic accomplishment. Hard to say why this song, among all the piano and guitar led rockers on the disc, is so great - it really sits in the same genre as the bulk of the album - but that je ne sais quoi makes me reach for the non-existent lighter in my back pocket every time. It also accentuates how well organized Exile is - the sides feature big openers and closers throughout, so it's one of the more actualized double albums in that there are actually seemingly two albums within.

Case in point - side three opens with another riff-number (sorry for the lack of a better description, but there is something very particular about these mid neck Richards riffs that give The Rolling Stones that signature vibe) in "Happy." High energy, very similar in sound to "Rocks Off," replete with "Pround Mary" allusions, and a good move to kick off the latter half. "Happy" was the album's second single, too. It's followed by the straight ahead, non-standout "Turd on the Run," a quick, spastic number with nearly indecipherable lyrics. Nervous energy is going for it, so it still sinks in despite being a relative low point.

Things settle back in with a nasty slide riff blues romp in "Ventilator Blues," perhaps the edgiest song on the disc with snarling "When your spine is cracking" spat lyrics. A real thick, plodding groove gets set for this one, and even in the short 3:24 they manage to get quite a jam going. It fades nicely into the uberspooky "I Just Want to See His Face," a sort of meditative trance number with the ever-quotable "Let this music ... relax your mind" and "Don't wanna walk and talk about Jesus, just want to see His face." The backup singers and lyrical content give this a little bit of the gospel feel that has bubbling beneath throughout the album, a vibe that becomes more overt for the remainder of the album, starting in the next track, "Let it Loose." It's a bit melodramatic, a big anthem song in the tradition of "Wild Horses" or "Can't Always Get What You Want." This reflective tune closes side three.

Almost like clockwork, side four opens with another Richards' riff number in "All Down the Line"- pretty typical Stones fare again, with a catchy melody and a little bit of that edge. The horns really step it up here to make the tune stand out more than it otherwise would. "Stop Breaking Down" has the Stones covering something that sure sounds like Robert Johnson-era blues territory* - they rock its face off in a demonstration of what one can *actually* do with the 12 bar blues format. :)

* Ed. - I'm an idiot. That would be because it is a Robert Johnson song. :)

The gospel inflected "Shine a Light" is exactly the sort of dawn-breaking song one needs at the end of a long rock/blues/country/etc. excursion. It's a sort of confessional from Jagger, complete with organs, piano pounding, and a no doubt gospel choir. It keeps things on the right side of overdone - there's always a danger of self-parody with a big choir-backed number like this, but so much of the album has been steeped in down home, late night lick-laying that it comes off as sincere. Amazingly enough, they don't end with this number - it really sounds like the sort of benediction perfect for such a big album, but the Stones come back with an encore song of sorts in "Soul Survivor." Good call? I'm not sure, particularly since it's a choice to go from a positive, comforting message to the repeated taunt that "you're gonna be the death of me." It's also one of the two or three tracks on here that I don't just love, so I'm probably the wrong person to consult. Regardless, the Stones stay true to form and end their rough-around-the-edges epic with a sneer and in doing so cap off one of the classic authentic blues-rock works in popular music.

As you probably noticed, there's nothing weak on this album and really only one or two songs that don't make the good-to-great-to-transcendent categories. I guess Jagger's vocals could have been better articulated - his slurred drawl is all over the place throughout, though it's pretty perfect for this style - and some of the tunes are better mixed than others. But really, this is a boulder-sized gem of a double album, one that will definitely make the island suitcase. I think a lot of people who may have been into the Stones in the '60s but lost track of them at the start of the '70s are seriously missing out here - while this disc lacks the chart-topping singles of albums past, it's easily my favorite in the Stones catalog, and should be a required addition to all sensible collections. Exile lives up to the hype and maybe forces us to embrace the embarrassing notion that the Brits do Americana right - the master becomes the student becomes the master again. A hearty hat tip to that, and if this disc was indeed the love-child of many a heroin-fueled songwriting session, then I'm all in favor of legalization. For Jagger/Richards.

Status: Desert Island Recommended
Nyet's Faves: "Loving Cup" and "Tumbling Dice [Gambling?]"

p.s. Just a brief note that Phish TORE UP their live cover of this with the backing of Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings. Tons of highlights, but "Loving Cup" was far away the best version I've heard, and the "Ventilator Blues > Just Want to See His Face" segment was outstanding. Everything was fairly extended from the album version - the RS comes in at 1:07, and the Phish set tipped those same scales at 1:42 (though admittedly with some crowd noise and band intros and such). One of the best things - you can understand what Trey says! Yeah! Anyhoo, it was a fantastic choice / execution for Halloween, and some of the songs are still popping up in fall tour setlists. I heartily approve.