The Rolling Stones: Black And Blue version on vinyl LP in Remastered edition. This particular edition was published in publishing company Rolling Stones Records on 26. June 2020.

1976 stieg "Black And Blue" auf Platz 1 der US Charts ein. Nachdem die Rolling Stones meherere Ersatzgitarristen für Mick Taylor unter die Lupe genommen hatten, unter anderen auch Wayne Perkins und Harvey Mandel, die beide auf dem Album "Black And Blue" zu hören sind, entschieden sie sich letztlich doch für Ronnie Woods, der dann auch neben Charlie Watts auf der Rückseite des Album-Artworks stand. Aufgenommen wurde das Album in Deutschland, Holland, der Schweiz und den USA. "Black And Blue" enthält wundervolle Balladen wie "Fool To Cry" und "Memory Motel" und einige Riff-Perlen wie "Hand Of Fate" oder "Crazy Mama". Der Funkbrecher "Hot Stuff" wurde prompt zu einem Clubhit. Product information The Rolling Stones' thirteenth studio album was released in 1976 after being recorded mostly at Musicland studios in Germany and Rotterdam, the Netherlands. It is not considered a Stones classic; however, that does not mean it is not worth listening to. 1976 is a very long time ago and the world was a very different place then. There were different things going on. For example, the song Black And Blue was originally launched in America with a huge billboard on Sunset Boulevard featuring model Anita Russell bruised and bound by Mick Jagger, accompanied by the line, "I'm Black And Blue by the Rolling Stones - and I love it!". Mick thought it was a "valid piece of commercial art, just a picture", and Keith claimed it was "funny"; however, various feminist groups were not quite so sure and protested until the poster was removed. In 1976, you could also quite legitimately get Billy Preston into the studio to play Eric Donaldson's Cherry Oh Baby and then sing the whole thing with a cod-Jamaican accent. No one would think ill of you, except perhaps rock critic extraordinaire Lester Bangs, who declared Black And Blue to be "a disappointment of hideous proportions" and "the Rolling Stones' first nonsensical album". But that seemed to miss the mark somewhat, because Black And Blue, perhaps more than any other Rolling Stones album to date, was primarily about the medium rather than the message. It's a good example of the old "dance about architecture" problem - the music doesn't say anything that can be usefully put into words. This record is a triumph of feeling over meaning. So tune your ears, but turn your brain off for a while, you won't need it. Take the closing track, Black And Blue, Crazy Mama. There's no point looking for any hidden meaning in it - in fact, the idea is pleasantly amusing. Listen to it and you'll hear why. How can there be anything more to this straightforward rocker than Charlie and Bill's potty groove, a wall of full-blooded backing vocals and Woods and Richards' guitar figures peeling paint? The songs may tell stories, but that's not what makes them work. Case in point: Hand Of Fate revels in the lines, "Yeah and I watched him die, yeah, watch out boy, I watched him die, woah!" before returning to a surprising guitar solo that's far more telling than the lyrics of Pick 'n' Mix Outlaw. Then there's Hey Negrita, a live jam session that transports you to Munich's Musicland Studios and puts you on your back on a long leather sofa. And there's Preston again, letting loose with a series of pearly piano shapes. "I need money," Jagger sings, before contemptuously offering "my sweet ass...". Charles Shaar Murray, in a review of the 1976 album (while showing that the music press of thirty-something years ago did things quite differently too), had this to say: "The song is no Nobel Prize winner, but it's solid enough that the riff gives an excuse to come alive, and the vocals on the chorus (Jagger, Richard, Preston and Wood) have a pleasingly cheeky urgency." Good enough. And why not? The record actually starts with a stiff disco groove. Hot Stuff tries for a simmering dancefloor push, comes up a little short, melts a little, and settles instead for a head-spinning ultra-bump with more of Preston's prickly piano lines. And then, just when you think there's no way it's going to break down into some stumbling jazz-rock, it does. There are two great ballads on the album. Memory Motel ("She has a mind of her own and she uses it well...") features Wayne Perkins and Harvey Mandel on guitars and seems to hark back to the nostalgia of the old Stones. Much of the song is about the various attractive women who flashed through the band's world, but it aptly captures life on the road: 'On the seventh day,' Jagger sings, 'I had my eyes on fire, we'd travelled 10,000 miles, we'd been to fifteen states...'. The second track, of course, is the global mega-hit Fool To Cry, which is heavily corny but also undeniably affected. It's hard to take Jagger seriously when he sings about his wife, "in a poor part of town", even when he's, "make lurve, so fine", but that said, you have to get over trying to attach any literal meaning to things on Black And Blue if you want to enjoy any of them. Interestingly, Foool To Cry is a very 80s sounding track - the kind of spare, spacey, synthesised song that would dominate many of the world's airwaves some five-plus years later. So what does our trip through the time machine that is Black And Blue teach us? Well, popular music has a tremendous capacity to be silly at the best of times - you only have to listen to a really really bad Melody to realise that (sample: "Looking high and low/Like a mustard for a ham"). And Black And Blue doesn't even qualify as prime time. Barbara Charone was clearly on Kool-Aid when she called it a "great record", and Lester Bangs was probably right in saying it's not one of The Rolling Stones' most important records. But he was wrong as to its overall value, and Charone hit it exactly right when she wrote in the same review: "...you're cheating them [The Rolling Stones] and yourself if you don't take the time and care to listen to Black And Blue". Despite some ill-considered musical choices, highly suspect lyrics, and a few song placements that come dangerously close to sounding like filler, the majority of the album is at least pretty good - even by the Rolling Stones' standards, which are higher than most. So rest assured: there are indeed a few standout moments and even songs here - but only for those prepared to take the time to seek them out and then listen without prejudice.

Album can be classified in the genre Rock. 180g Remastered Half Speed Master Gatefold Vinyl.