Why? Why wasn't I, the good Mormon boy, as freaked out by music from the Rolling Stones as I was by Van Halen or Rush (don't worry; we'll be getting to them later)? I suppose it was pretty simple: I was just too young to appreciate how creepy the Stones's lyrics were, while their melodies, their riffs, their energy (even when it was coiled and louche like it is here) was able to capture my still-forming pop music sensibilities. These guys have something going on, is what I suppose I thought about at the time. I knew little about the history of rock and roll, and I probably didn't start to piece together the story of the Rolling Stones and the Beatles and all the rest for quite some time. Still, there I was, listening to KJRB 790 and getting my kicks from these songs that had such--though I wouldn't have used these terms back then even if I'd known them--bluesy, sexual, and ass-kicking power to them. And that power endures. I like the early Stones, sure, and I actually have a lot of fondness for some of their early 90s work, like Voodoo Lounge, which was the point, 20 years ago, when I suppose you could say that Jagger and Richards came to an agreement that they were just going to consistently play the best damn Rolling Stones Touring Show imaginable for the rest of their lives, and its worked really well for them so far. But 40 years ago, the power of the Stones was still fresh enough, challenging enough, to set a kid's mind on fire with their tunes. They did me, that's for certain.
Why? Why wasn't I, the good Mormon boy, as freaked out by music from the Rolling Stones as I was by Van Halen or Rush (don't worry; we'll be getting to them later)? I suppose it was pretty simple: I was just too young to appreciate how creepy the Stones's lyrics were, while their melodies, their riffs, their energy (even when it was coiled and louche like it is here) was able to capture my still-forming pop music sensibilities. These guys have something going on, is what I suppose I thought about at the time. I knew little about the history of rock and roll, and I probably didn't start to piece together the story of the Rolling Stones and the Beatles and all the rest for quite some time. Still, there I was, listening to KJRB 790 and getting my kicks from these songs that had such--though I wouldn't have used these terms back then even if I'd known them--bluesy, sexual, and ass-kicking power to them. And that power endures. I like the early Stones, sure, and I actually have a lot of fondness for some of their early 90s work, like Voodoo Lounge, which was the point, 20 years ago, when I suppose you could say that Jagger and Richards came to an agreement that they were just going to consistently play the best damn Rolling Stones Touring Show imaginable for the rest of their lives, and its worked really well for them so far. But 40 years ago, the power of the Stones was still fresh enough, challenging enough, to set a kid's mind on fire with their tunes. They did me, that's for certain.