LET IT BLEED
Let it Bleed is the eighth British and tenth American album by the English rock band the Rolling Stones. Released shortly after the band’s 1969 American Tour, it is the follow-up to 1968’s Beggars Banquet and the last album by the band to feature Brian Jones as well as the first to feature Mick Taylor. In a five-star review for Rolling Stone in 2004, Gavin Edwards praised Keith Richards’ guitar playing throughout the album and stated: “Whether it was spiritual, menstrual or visceral, the Stones made sure you went home covered in blood.” Jason McNeil of PopMatters wrote that Beggars Banquet and Let it Bleed are “the two greatest albums the band’s (or anyone’s) ever made”. (More from Wikipedia)
Another artist that I loved a lot is the Rolling Stones, and getting all of their albums was a little tougher than those of Bob Dylan, since I didn’t really start buying them in earnest until around the time of Let it Bleed. The early albums in particular were not that easy to find. I did locate an original copy of their first album, The Rolling Stones and another that was almost as old for $2 each as I recall. Like those that I ordered through Columbia Record Club, they were mono copies (that was a simple decision for my junior-high self: stereo albums cost a dollar more, though with some records I definitely wish I’d have bitten the bullet).
(April 2012)
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The concert was made not long after the release of one of my favorite Rolling Stones albums, Beggars Banquet, and includes two songs from that album, “Sympathy for the Devil” and “Street Fighting Man”, plus several more from their most recent album at that time, Let it Bleed: “Gimme Shelter”, “Love in Vain”, “Midnight Rambler”, “Live with Me”, and “Honky Tonk Women” – a country version of this song was included on Let it Bleed under the name of “Country Honk”, while “Honky Tonk Women” itself was released five months earlier as a single only. The Greatest Group on Earth was the only concert album that I had of the Stones for several years (in fact, I did not own very many albums back then, period) – just one live album by the Rolling Stones had been officially released previously, Got Live If You Want It! (1966) – so I played this record a lot.
(September 2017)
