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There are things that make you feel old. Not because they remind you of the passage of time, bygone eras, or things like that. They make you feel old because they are things for grouchy and boring old men. And old people often are like this: I notice it as time goes by, and the elderly themselves notice it. I know well that when I retire (around 2052), I'll be grumpy and complain a lot. A bit like my old uncle, but without a photo of the Duce on the bedside table.
You become an old grouch when you start responding to young people like this:
Q: "Hey grandpa, I've never heard of this Rolling Stones album, is it one of the worst?"
A: "What do you mean worst: it's an album of outtakes and demos. And there are bands out there that would pay gold to create such a worthy album of outtakes! Gold!"
I challenge anyone who is not Vittorio Sgarbi to claim that this is not a grumpy response. The point is that often the old people are right, even if they're too grumpy to convince you. And the more time passes, the more you realize you're starting to think like them. Like me, who at twenty-six began to think like my uncle on many things. The point is that he started having these old-man thoughts at fifty-six, before I was born. Let's clarify: I think like him on many things, but not all: he uses a photo of Balbo & De Bono & De Vecchi & Bianchi as a bookmark, I use one of Jagger & Richards & Jones & Watts & Wyman.
Metamorphosis is an album by the Rolling Stones released in 1975. Here there are two considerations to make.
A: The Rolling Stones were already starting to be considered old grouches.
B: Less time passed from the Duce's death to this album than from this album to today.
An LP released between two albums, It's Only Rock 'n Roll and Black and Blue, which convinced many but thrilled few. A compilation containing songs discarded from other albums and alternative versions of well-known songs. So there's great room for the three categories of complainers par excellence:
The old man: "Ah, the devil's music!"
The Serious Journalist: "Probable lack of ideas materializing in a banal commercial move that could represent the omens of..."
The jerk who comments on everything on the internet did not respond because, thank God, he didn't exist yet in 1975.
A person not inclined to complain by default would instead give more space to another reasoning: let's take things for what they are. Which is clearly one of those simple pub philosophy maxims valid for all occasions. But if the pub were a place of error and disturbance, I wouldn't spend my afternoons there squandering my wealth on red wine and gin tonic among the elderly. And by taking things for what they are, we realize that Metamorphosis is such a nice, lovely album. Nice enough not to be out of place among the best second/third-tier Stones albums, so grandpa was really right when he said many bands would give a kidney to create an album of unreleased tracks this good. And never mind if, as is inevitable, the versions contained here of already known songs are often a bit tacky, with their additions of choirs, strings, and female voices. But everyone sometimes needs to hum beach-boyishly I’d Much Rather Be with the Boys, to listen to an Out of Time with the same base as Chris Farlowe's original, to hear a Heart of Stone with Jimmy Page on guitar (so they say, and I trust them), or to recover discarded tracks from LP masterpieces I won't even name.
It's things like this that convince me that even when I'm eighty, white and wrinkled like Keith Richards, I'll still love the Rolling Stones. And I will continue not to want photos of fascist quadriumvirates in my house. Even if I'll reach Keith Richards' age with twice the ailments and one-fifth of the drugs. But you can't have everything in life, yet there are albums of outtakes like Metamorphosis and I'm not complaining.
Tracklist Lyrics and Samples
02 Don't Lie to Me (02:07)
(Jagger/Richards)
Well let's talk it over baby before we start
I heard about the way you do your part
Don't lie to me don't you lie to me
Don't you make me mad I'll get evil as a
man can be
Well all kinds of people that I just can't
stand
That's a lying woman and a cheating man
Don't lie to me don't you lie to me
Don't you make me mad I'll get evil as a
man can be
Yeah
Well I will love you baby and it ain't no lie
For every winter till the well runs dry
Don't lie to me don't you lie to me
Don't you make me mad I'm as shook up
as a man can be
Well let's talk it over baby before we start
I heard about the way you used to do your
part
Don't lie to me don't you lie to me
Don't you make me mad I'm as shook up
as a man
Well well
Well let's talk it over babe before we start
I heard about the way you used to do your
part
Don't lie to me don't you lie to me
Cuz it make me mad I'll get evil as a man
can be
05 Heart of Stone (04:12)
(M. Jagger/K. Richards)
There've been so many girls that I've known
I've made so many cry and still I wonder why
Here comes the little girl
I see her walking down the street
She's all by herself
I try and knock her off her feet
But, she'll never break, never break, never break, never break
This heart of stone
Oh, no, no, this heart of stone
What's different about her? I don't really know
No matter how I try I just can't make her cry
'Cause she'll never break, never break, never break, never break
This heart of stone
Oh, no, no, no, this heart of stone
Don't keep on looking that some old way
If you try acting sad, you'll only make me glad
Better listen little girl
You go on walking down the street
I ain't got no love, I ain't the kind to meet
'Cause you'll never break, never break, never break, never break
This heart of stone
Oh, no, no, you'll never break this heart of stone darlin'
No, no, this heart of stone
You'll never break it darlin'
You won't break this heart of stone
Oh no no no
You better go
You better go home
'Cause you'll, you'll never break this heart of stone
07 (Walkin' Thru the) Sleepy City (03:04)
Walkin'thru' the sleepy city
In the dark it looks so pretty
Till I got to the one cafe
That stays open night and day
Just a lookin' at the sleepy city
In the night it looks so pretty
No one sees the city lights
they just care about the warmth inside
No one listens to what people say
I just sit and hear the radio play
Just then this girl walked in my way
And she was as pretty as my sleepy city
Will you walk through the sleepy city
In the night it looks so pretty
Tired of walkin on my own
It looks better when you're not alone
Will you walk through the sleepy city
In the night it looks so pretty
I'm tired of walkin on my own
It looks better when you're not alone
Mm mm mm mm mm mm
La la la la la la
La la la la la la la la
Will you walk through the sleepy city
In the night, well it looks so pretty
I'm tired of walkin on my own
It looks better when you're not alone
C'mon walk through that sleepy city
I said in the night it looks so pretty
I'm tired of walkin that park on my own
It looks better when you're not alone
13 Downtown Suzie (03:35)
(B. Wyman)
Got the Monday mornin' blues (Yeah, yeah, yeah)
Monday wasn't really real (Yeah, yeah)
Oh, lying on a naked bed (Yeah, yeah, yeah)
With an Alka Seltzer head (Yeah, yeah)
Oh, Lucy looked sweet just a-strollin' down Newport Street
Talkin' 'bout Lu, what ya gon' do?
And I feel so bad
Have you ever been had?
I'll dry out sweet Lucy
Took an early morning shower (Yeah, yeah, yeah)
Well, I wasted 'bout half an hour (Yeah, yeah)
I heard the ringing of the bell (Yeah, yeah, yeah)
It's Lucy with the cleaning towel (Yeah, yeah)
Oh, I'm feelin' like the Sunday Times (Yeah, yeah, yeah)
A Southern Californian wine (Yeah, yeah)
Oh Lucy kicked me in the hole (Yeah, yeah, yeah)
A Tennis worth of achin' bones (Ooh-ooh)
Oh Lucy looked sweet just a-strollin' down Newport Street
Lord, Lu, what ya gonna do?
I feel so bad
Have you ever been had?
Got a dose from sweet lucy
Oh Lucy looked sweet just a-strollin' down Newport Street
Talkin bout Lu (who?) what ya gonna do?
Oh and I feeling so bad
Have you ever been had?
Oh by sweet Lucy
15 Memo From Turner (02:47)
(Jagger/Richards)
Didn't I see you down in San Antone on a hot and dusty night?
We were eating eggs in Sammy's when the black man there drew his knife.
Aw, you drowned that Jew in Rampton as he washed his sleeveless shirt,
You know, that Spanish-speaking gentlemen, the one we all called "Kurt."
Come now, gentleman, I know there's some mistake.
How forgetful I'm becoming, now you fixed your bus'ness straight.
I remember you in Hemlock Road in nineteen fifty-six.
You're a faggy little leather boy with a smaller piece of stick.
You're a lashing, smashing hunk of man;
Your sweat shines sweet and strong.
Your organs working perfectly, but there's a part that's not screwed on.
Weren't you at the Coke convention back on nineteen sixty-five
You're the misbred, grey executive I've seen heavily advertised.
You're the great, gray man whose daughter licks policemen's buttons clean.
You're the man who squats behind the man who works the soft machine.
Come now, gentleman, your love is all I crave.
You'll still be in the circus when I'm laughing, laughing on my grave.
When the old men do the fighting and the young men all look on.
And the young girls eat their mothers meat from tubes of plasticon.
Be wary of these my gentle friends of all the skins you breed.
They have a tasty habit - they eat the hands that bleed.
So remember who you say you are and keep your noses clean.
Boys will be boys and play with toys so be strong with your beast.
Oh Rosie dear, doncha think it's queer, so stop me if you please.
The baby is dead, my lady said, "You gentlemen, why you all work for me?"
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