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Rating: Now considered among the best albums of the (second) greatest rock'n'roll band of all time, "Exile On Main Street" was greeted upon its release with mixed and not too enthusiastic reviews.
Its dense atmosphere, in a gelatinous and dark double album, at first listen seemed and seems to be defined as a challenging work, almost too uniform to capture us with its webs without leaving us momentarily bewildered. Bewildered because we can hardly understand the power of this music on first listen. How it manages to devour us.
Yes, it's the "usual" r'n'r-blues-country-soul that our band brought to the surface with the masterful “Beggars Banquet” (1968) and then developed in the previous works of the Mick Taylor era. But it's the substance and the way of presenting it that changes wonderfully here. The Stones have definitively completed their apprenticeship as new prophets of hard-blues, they no longer have to fear being listened to by skeptics as a surrogate of something they are not, but are striving to be. The band has truly changed, the beat and roll of their beginnings, the hallucinatory experimentations and the dreamy flower power lyrics of Brian Jones are gone forever. Here, in an exile that feels more like a landing, on the "main road", stand four giants playing in the freest and most natural way possible.
What seem to us superficially like eighteen obscure question mark songs are a serenity written in disappearing ink for the Jagger-Richards partnership. The boys are now men, splendid thirty-year-olds who seem to have learned every lesson. Now they stay in the evening to jam with friends, beers, lovers, and the scent of a distant America, that of Robert Johnson or Muddy Waters, the one that sells its soul to the devil for a bit of great music.
The Stones reduce the instrumentation to a minimum, calling only a few friends like the ubiquitous Billy Preston (who with his organ confers a credible gospel spirituality to an incredible ballad like "Shine a Light"), Bobby Keys and Jim Price on the usual horns, and Nicky Hopkins on piano. Even more venomous and sincere than the previous "Sticky Fingers," Exile after repeated listens finally begins to reveal itself in its greatness, which seems all improvised, playful, unconscious.
The tracks follow one another without wasting time, every second is important, and in just over an hour we're presented with a steaming country-blues soup from which we only need to fish. Devastating pieces like "Rip This Joint", evocative harmonicas that translate fantastic tales on the Mississippi mythology ("Ventilator Blues", "Shake Your Hips"), relaxed acoustic anti-racist anthems ("Sweet Black Angel"), hit singles with pure Richards riffs like the unforgettable "All Down The Line" and "Tumbling Dice".
In small doses, we can find everything to love about this group, from Keith's lazy yet successful singalongs (see "Happy") to dreamy psychedelic references ("Let It Loose") amplified by Taylor's impeccable solos, essential yet indispensable in every register. Jagger, for his part, seems buried by this lo-fi explosion of life, but that's not the case: he's the red thread of this complex sonic and human puzzle (also made explicit in the cover), he's the storyteller who stands in the shadows only to reveal to us more deeply, with his typically aggressively delicate gaze, his world, what was and what it has become.
Under this tangle of hearts, melodies that already stink of timeless, our idols and the granite immortality of their music, of our music, still shine.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
02 Rip This Joint (02:23)
(M. Jagger/K. Richards)
Mama says yes, Papa says no,
Make up you mind 'cause I gotta go.
I'm gonna raise hell at the Union Hall,
Drive myself right over the wall.
Rip this joint, gonna save your soul,
Round and round and round we go.
Roll this joint, gonna get down low,
Start my starter, gonna stop the show.
Oh, yeah!
Mister President, Mister Immigration Man,
Let me in, sweetie, to your fair land.
I'm Tampa bound and Memphis too,
Short Fat Fanny is on the loose.
Dig that sound on the radio,
Then slip it right across into Buffalo.
Dick and Pat in ole D.C.,
Well they're gonna hold some shit for me.
Ying yang, you're my thing,
Oh, now, baby, won't you hear me sing.
Flip Flop, fit to drop,
Come on baby, won't you let it rock?
Oh, yeah! Oh, yeah!
From San Jose down to Santa Fe,
Kiss me quick, baby, won'tcha make my day.
Down to New Orleans with the Dixie Dean,
'Cross to Dallas, Texas with the Butter Queen.
Rip this joint, gonna rip yours too,
Some brand new steps and some weight to lose.
Gonna roll this joint, gonna get down low,
Round and round and round we'll go.
Wham, Bham, Birmingham, Alabam' don't give a damn.
Little Rock fit to drop.
Ah, let it rock.
03 Shake Your Hips (02:59)
(James Moore)
I wanna tell you 'bout a dance
that's goin' around
everybody's doin' it
from the grownups down
Don't move your head
don't move your hands
don't move your lips
just shake your hips
Do the hip shake, babe
do the hip shake, babe
shake your hip, babe
shake your hip, babe
What you don't know
don't be afraid
just listen to me
and do what I say
Don't move your head
don't move your hands
don't move your lips
just shake your hips
Do the hip shake, babe
do the hip shake, babe
shake your hip, babe
shake your hip, babe
well ain't that easy
Well, I met a little girl
in a country town
she said, "What do you know
there's Slim Harpo!"
Didn't move her head
didn't move her hands
didn't move her lips
just shook her hips
Do the hip shake, babe
do the hip shake, babe
shake your hip, babe
shake your hip, babe
well ain't that easy
04 Casino Boogie (03:33)
(M. Jagger/K. Richards)
No good, can't speak, wound up, no sleep.
Sky diver insider her, skip rope, stunt flyer.
Wounded lover, got no time on hand.
One last cycle, thrill freak Uncle Sam.
Pause for bus'ness, hope you'll understand.
Judge and jury walk out hand in hand.
Dietrich movies, close up boogies,
Kissing cunt in Cannes.
Grotesque music, million dollar sad.
Got no tactics, got no time on hand.
Left shoe shuffle, right shoe muffle,
Sinking in the sand.
Fade out freedom, steaming heat on,
Watch that hat in black.
Finger twitching, got no time on hand.
05 Tumbling Dice (03:45)
Women think I'm tasty, but they're always tryin' to waste me
And make me burn the candle right down
But baby, baby, don't need no jewels in my crown
'Cause all you women is low down gamblers
Cheatin' like I don't know how
But baby, I go crazy, there's fever in the funk house now
This low down bitchin' got my poor feet a-itchin'
You know you know the deuce is still wild
Baby, can't stay
You got to roll me and call me the tumblin' dice
Always in a hurry, I never stop to worry
Don't you see the time flashin' by
Honey, got no money, I'm all sixes and sevens and nines
Say now, baby, I'm the rank outsider
You can be my partner in crime
Baby, can't stay
You got to roll me and call me the tumblin'
Roll me and call me the tumblin' dice
Oh my my my, I'm the lone crap shooter
Playin' the field every night
Baby, can't stay
You got to roll me and call me the tumblin'
Roll me and call me the tumblin' dice
Got to roll me
Got to roll me
Got to roll me
Got to roll me
Got to roll me
Got to roll me
Got to roll me
Keep on rolling
Got to roll me
Keep on rolling
Got to roll me
Keep on rolling
Got to roll me
Got to roll me
Got to roll me
Got to roll me
Got to roll me
Got to roll me
Got to roll me
Got to roll me
Got to roll me
06 Sweet Virginia (04:25)
(M. Jagger/K. Richards)
Wadin' through the waste stormy winter,
And there's not a friend to help you through.
Tryin' to stop the waves behind your eyeballs,
Drop your reds, drop your greens and blues.
Thank you for your wine, California,
Thank you for your sweet and bitter fruits.
Yes I got the desert in my toenail
And I hid the speed inside my shoe.
But come on, come on down Sweet Virginia,
Come on, honey child, I beg of you.
Come on, come on down, you got it in ya.
Got to scrape the shit right off you shoes.
I want you to come on, come on down Sweet Virginia,
I want you come on, honey child, I beg of you. .
I want you come on, honey child you got it in you.
Got to scrape that shit right off you shoes.
But come on, come on down Sweet Virginia,
Come on, come on down, I beg of you.
Come on, come on down, you got it in you.
Got to scrape that shit right off you shoes.
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Other reviews
By jackpizzello
Exile On Main Street stands as a milestone in the now forty-year-long career of the Stones.
Simply a masterpiece, one of the most significant albums in Rock history.
By j&r
The greatness of this album lies precisely in its total formal imperfection, in the frantic, disorderly, and chaotic way it came to light.
Exile on Main Street is the strongest example of total symbiotic fusion between life and music.
By currahee72
A warm, dense, raw, anarchic, and uncontrolled album.
An album seductive, nonchalant, and seminal that shows the wild and proletarian side of rock.
By woodstock
Because inside here there's rock, all of it, and I don’t care if anyone says otherwise.
Probably, even in moments like these, a record can save your life.
