"…Pleased To Meet You…"
As
the truly fantastic "Sympathy For The Devil" sails into your living
room on a patter of Tabla shuffles and Salsa shakers – all slithery, slinky and
sidewinding like a snake – you wonder how many times this incredibly durable
song has been used in movies? How many instances has a smug vampire or demon or
Old Nick himself (in human form of course) played this tune in his car
CD-player as he heads off for another rendezvous with a succulent throat in the
big dark city?
Bloodletting
and a propensity to name-check Hades and its unsavoury occupants aside - The
Rolling Stones started a peerless run of albums with 1968's "Beggars
Banquet" that ran through 1969's "Let It Bleed", 1971's
"Sticky Fingers" (the first on their own Rolling Stones Records) –
culminating in the magnum opus double-album "Exile On Main St." - a
deserved No. 1 in 1972. Yet in its plain white British laminated gatefold or
naughty US toilet graffiti sleeve - somehow good old 'BB' seems to get ignored
over the illustrious trio that followed it. And its history on CD has been
murky and problematic too...
When
the Decca label side of the Stones catalogue first came out on CD in 1986 on
London - it was not the greatest moment for the new format. This 2002 'Hybrid
SACD/DSD CD' reissue and remaster acknowledges this and advises that after
'long and painful' searches through tape vaults on both sides of the Atlantic -
both time and technology had caught up enough to warrant a proper stab at it
again. And like the other titles in this wicked series of card digipaks - man
what a result. Here are the street fighting men...
UK
and Europe released August 2002 – "Beggars Banquet" by THE ROLLING
STONES on Abkco 8823012 (Barcode 042288230120) is a Limited Edition Hybrid
SACD/DSD CD Remaster – a straightforward transfer of the 10-track Stereo album
that plays out as follows (39:47 minutes):
1.
Sympathy For The Devil
2.
No Expectations
3.
Dear Doctor
4.
Parachute Woman
5.
Jigsaw Puzzle
6.
Street Fighting Man [Side 2]
7.
Prodigal Son
8.
Stray Cat Blues
9.
Factory Girl
10.
Salt Of The Earth
Tracks
1 to 10 are the album "Beggars Banquet" - released 6 December 1968 in
the UK on Decca LK 4955 (Mono) and SKL 4955 (Stereo) and 7 December 1968 in the
USA on London LL 3539 (Mono) and London PS 539 (Stereo). Only the STEREO MIX IS
USED.
Made
by Sony and Phillips - the SACD/DSD Hybrid Disc actually has two layers - the
first contains the normal CD playback - but the other layer has a SACD remaster
which will automatically come on if your machine has SACD playback facilities
(it doesn't require a special machine to play this disc). The three-way foldout
card digipak unfortunately doesn't reproduce the British front cover artwork
(white with script titles) but does have the inner sleeve 'banquet' photo of
the boys pigging out spread across the inner digipak and further onto the CD
label. As with all of these three-way card digipaks - there is also a small
square paper 'Certificate Of Authenticity' for the 'Inaugural Edition Hybrid
Disc 2002' that quotes some lyrics to a song from the album and (in this case)
pictures a black and white snippet of the 'toilet sleeve' on the rear. Not sat
in any kind of pouch within the glossy card digipak - these little certificates
are easy to lose - and the glossy sleeve easy to mark or smudge - so perhaps
use a protective plastic to hold the lot in place/keep it new.
But
the real layers of soft ply are the new Audio. STEVE ROSENTHAL did the Sound
Restoration and Archive Coordination - TERI LANDI the Analogue to Digital
Transfers & Tape Archive Research with final Mastering carried out by the
legendary Audio Engineer BOB LUDWIG at Gateway Mastering. The sonic
transformation of Jimmy Miller's original production is awesome. This CD sounds
fantastic in either DSD CD mode or SACD – a great Stones album made better at
last.
After
the bombastic backwards-tapes bilge of December 1967's psych-out "Their
Satanic Majesties Request" – the stripped down almost country R&B
instrumentation of "Beggars Banquet" came as a welcome relief. And
excepting a cover version of "Prodigal Son" by Reverend Robert
Wilkins (covered by Hank Williams in 1952 – probably the version Keith Richards
heard and admired) – the other nine are Jagger-Richards originals. It opens on
a balls-to-the-wall Stones classic – "Sympathy For The Devil". As
well as the famous 'ooh ooh' chorus throughout that features Mick Jagger, Keith
Richards, Brian Jones, Bill Wyman, Nicky Hopkins, Marianne Faithfull, Jimmy
Miller and actress/Stones girlfriend Anita Pallenberg - one of the unsung
heroes of this 6:02 minutes is Nicky Hopkins whose brilliantly complimentary
piano playing underpins the rhythm. Up next is one of my all-time Stones craves
– the gorgeous "No Expectations". Sailing in on a bed of Bluesy acoustic
strums – Brian Jones plays slide while Nicky Hopkins once again does a sweet
piano refrain throughout (you can hear Wyman’s bass in the remaster now too –
so sweet). American fans will know that the song was used as B-side to
"Street Fighting Man" on London 909 (shame they didn't feature its
rare picture sleeve somewhere in the digipak - under the see-through tray for
instance). We go all hick-Country with "Dear Doctor" where Keith and
Mick complain "...there's a pain where there once was a heart..." -
Brian Jones plays Harmonica while Dave Mason of Traffic guest on guitar. Keith
Richards famously took over the 'slide guitar' reins from Brian Jones on the
wickedly good "Parachute Woman" while Mick gives it some Harmonica
and Nicky Hopkins plays piano (lost somewhere back in the mix). They were never
so ramshackle and louche as on "Jigsaw Puzzle" where the bishop's
daughter has been an outcast all her life while poor Mick pours over his jigsaw
puzzle (undoubtedly in a very cool Chelsea flat).
Side
2 opens with the mighty "Street Fighting Man" - banned by the knobs
at the BBC for its 'incendiary' sentiments (guaranteed million seller then). A
harsh-reality statement – the song asked "...what can I poor boy do...”
The direct opposite to the message of hippies and peaceniks – the authorities
clearly thought its seeming praise of 'fighting' was going to cause riots in
the – well – streets. It didn't. More likely the real violence came from
American cops trying to control thousands of peaceful protestors riling against
the sickening Vietnam War and its waste of life. I still don't know how
Richards got that slightly off guitar sound and once again – Nicky Hopkins
contributes Piano while Dave Mason offers Percussion. Acoustic Blues comes at
us with "Prodigal Son" - Richards on Acoustic - Jones giving it some
cotton-field Harmonica while Jagger sings about restlessness - going down the
road - a poor boy crying for mercy. Truthful but "Some Girls" angry
in ways - naughty rock-band antics fill the saucy lyrics of "Stray Cat Blues"
where a 15-year old needn't show her ID (grow up boys). Far better is
"Factory Girl" - a pretty song that has Dave Mason on Mandolin and
Family's Rick Grech on Violin - both lifting the song into something special.
It ends on more acoustic introspection - "Salt Of The Earth" - a song
about the working everyman - the 'common foot soldier'. Keith croaks out the
first verse - Jagger takes over from there in with Keith doubling. Nicky
Hopkins plays melodious piano licks until The Watts Street Gospel Choir come
sailing in towards the big finish.
"Beggars
Banquet" isn't as immediately 'rocky' as say 1969's "Let It
Bleed" or the crowd-pleasing riffage of "Sticky Fingers" from
1971 - but it's a Stones album I keep returning to - wanting to play it side to
side. Whether you go for the 2002 Abkco SACD/CD Hybrid issue or Japan's SHM-CD
from 2010 with all the repro artwork (and the 2002 remaster) you're in good
hands - the best Rock 'n' Roll band in the world on fighting form...
