The Stones At The Fonda

START ME UP

You make a grown man cry

Like the one out front, who offered four grand cash, so he could take his ten year old son to see the Stones. I saw the green. But today it’s all about experiences, not possessions, and there’s no amount of money that will prevent you from having a peak that may never come again, like the Stones in a small venue.

It was Jan & Dean who sang “They’re coming from all over the world!” but Jan is gone yet his fellow stars from the “T.A.M.I Show” are still doing it so it was amazing who came from far and wide for this event. I haven’t done this much business in one night since MusiCares. But this time there was no riff-raff. Ha!

And the band started on time and they were not over-loud and by beginning with the obvious opener…THEY BLEW MY MIND!

And that’s what it was, a band. A relic from the sixties and seventies. When there were no hard drives and ELO was put out of business for performing with tapes. There was no fakery, no smoke and mirrors, just a few lights and a bunch of fellows with instruments and amps.

This is the way it used to be. When the British invaded and changed our world forever.

WHEN THE WHIP COMES DOWN

My second favorite track from “Some Girls,” the first LP that fully integrated Ronnie Wood, who, like Charlie, was really good tonight.

Up close and personal he’s a mere wisp of a person, but on stage Ronnie is a giant, a full-fledged Stone, he’s never been better. You could see all the way back to those Rod Stewart records, where he switched from bass to lead.

I think it was on this song that Mick first played guitar.

ALL DOWN THE LINE

This was the first stratospheric moment, when Keith opened with the signature riff.

Despite the recent accolades, “Exile On Main Street” was an overlooked album. Number one while the band was on tour soon after its release in ’72, it fell off the chart almost instantly thereafter.

But if you put in the time, “Exile” reveals its magic.

And I always thought “All Down The Line” was a throwaway romp, especially compared to “Let It Loose,” “Ventilator Blues” and “Casino Boogie.” But tonight I got it, because of Keith and that guitar.

We know those legendary sounds, they came out of the car speaker, through the KLHs and JBLs, into our headphones. And it used to be that you went to see the Stones and the sound was not exactly the same. But tonight it was, as if Keith channeled ’72.

Made me grin from ear to ear.

SWAY

So that’s the gimmick of this tour, the playing of the ’71 classic, “Sticky Fingers,” from start to finish.

But they still might not. Because there are so many slow cuts. Will the people tolerate them? After all, the Who performed “Tommy” and always left a couple of numbers out.

This was not the first time the band did “Sway” live. It was good to hear, but not transcendent.

DEAD FLOWERS

They locked into the groove.

That was what was surprising about this entire gig. How good the boys were. They’re famous for being ragged, not quite as bad as the Grateful Dead, but there are always moments when it’s not quite jelling. But not tonight!

I like “Dead Flowers” on record, I LOVED IT TONIGHT!

WILD HORSES

The same, yet different from the record.

You see Mick was selling it more.

It’s hard to play live gigs. No matter how famous you are, you only get the benefit of the doubt for the first thirty seconds. After that, you’ve got to prove yourself night after night.

Ever since he did that solo turn on the Grammys a couple of years back, Mick has upped his game, he’s as good as ever, if not better. He’s comfortable with himself, his patter is cutting and insightful.

For example, you can’t perform “Sticky Fingers” from start to finish, because then you’d have to begin with “Brown Sugar” and you’d end up squandering your momentum. So Mick said they were going to play it in the order from the 8-TRACK! You remember 8-tracks, don’t you? Unwieldy cartridges where the songs were rearranged to fit the four sections of tape? Needless to say, Mick was lying/making a joke, but even better was his tossed off aside that next time they’re going to do “Satanic Majesties” from start to finish!

But my point is it’s Mick who’s keeping it under control, everybody else is just playing, he’s moving, prancing, not as much as in the seventies and eighties, but in more of a refined fashion these days, and this toned-down version works.

And during the breaks between numbers, the audience talked, but Mick soldiered on.

It’s all about being a professional.

SISTER MORPHINE

And here’s where it starts to get really good. When you start to hear songs you’d never think you’d ever hear live.

They were albums, and you played them from start to finish. And in the middle of “Sticky Fingers”‘s second side was this magical track with that acoustic guitar and then wailing electric and the despair of a late night druggie. I always loved it then, and it was sensational hearing it tonight.

YOU GOTTA MOVE

The PIECE-DE-RESISTANCE! The highlight of the show, the moment I could not get out of my head.

So Mick says they’re gonna sing a song they didn’t write. Unlike so many of his brethren, he credits Mississippi Fred McDowell and then says Keith is gonna play the 12 string.

And from the wings a roadie comes out with an acoustic, Keith sits down and starts fiddling, smiling those pearly whites all the while. AND THEN HE STARTS TO PLAY!

Forget the record.

On “Sticky Fingers” “You Gotta Move” is a throwaway. Tonight, it was a thread from what was to what is and will always be. The essence of rock and roll, the blues!

Having not performed these album tracks on a regular basis, the Stones rehearsed the hell out of them. These deep cuts were better than the rest. And, “You Gotta Move” evidenced a groove not even touched on the record.

If you were a fan, if you know the Stones catalog, THIS IS AS GOOD AS IT GETS!

BITCH

Listening to them play “Sticky Fingers” you realize how few hits it had. This was the album’s second most famous cut, and how famous is this?

It was a different era. Where it was about the LP, listening to our favorites over and over again, the radio was secondary to our collection.

“Bitch” was good.

And is this the moment to say how Keith seems to have recovered from his fall, from his mental hejira? Not only was his guitar-playing on point, so were his background vocals!

CAN’T YOU HEAR ME KNOCKING

Mick Taylor’s tour-de-force.

Alas, Mick is not on this tour.

But what put this over the top was the instrumental section, featuring Karl Denson in the place of Bobby Keys. They changed it up just a bit, improvised just a bit, and that made all the difference.

For those who weren’t born back then, “Can’t You Hear Me Knocking” is seven plus minutes long, it was a journey to the center of your mind and back. And when you hear it today you’re connected with back then and your whole life makes sense. It’s not about money, but art.

The Stones are the last of a dying breed. Sure, they’re making beaucoup bucks, but there are scores of wet behind the ears techie-punks who make much more. Instead of chasing what cannot be caught, the Stones are laying back into who they are, merging with their legacy, being first and foremost musicians, not stars. Tonight was all about the playing. You could tell they were having fun. And that’s the reason we do it, right?

I GOT THE BLUES

Almost as good as “You Gotta Move.” A track that never resonated with me on wax, “I Got The Blues” was exquisite perfection tonight. The groove and Mick’s delivery. This was when he had the audience in the palm of his hand. He even had the assembled multitude singing along with and without him at the end.

You go for the hits, but it’s the hidden gems that get you, that keep you coming back.

MOONLIGHT MILE

Just a bit faster, not quite as ethereal as the album-closing track, tonight’s “Moonlight Mile” worked on its own terms. It dragged not at all, yet still had you pondering those nights lying in the grass looking up at the stars as your mind was blown.

BROWN SUGAR

So let me paint the picture.

The Beatles had broken up. Despite the career peak double-whammy of “Beggars Banquet” and “Let It Bleed” there were no hit singles, the Stones were an album band, a big one, but their days on the hit parade were behind them.

That’s right, “Sympathy For The Devil” was too dark for AM radio.

And as haunting as “Gimmie Shelter” was, you’d never hear Cousin Brucie introduce it.

And then this.

Gold coast slave ship bound for cotton fields

Not that we could make that out. The lyrics were buried in the mix, it was all a sound, one that dominated the airwaves for most of the seventies. The party did not begin, the weekend did not start, until someone dropped the needle on “Brown Sugar” and we threw our hands in the air and sang “Yeah, yeah, yeah, WOO!”

And we did tonight!

ROCK ME BABY

B.B. King’s first hit.

And the first encore.

The Stones were devotees, historians, they had roots, which they extended deep into history. They were not just stars, but blues acolytes who filtered what once was to create something new that infected the entire hearing world.

“Rock Me Baby” is a song everybody knows, even if they think they don’t. A great way to put a capper on the evening.

JUMPIN’ JACK FLASH

A 1968 summer smash with an indelible riff that burned itself into our collective brains.

And I’d like to tell you it was as good as the “Sticky Fingers” stuff, but it wasn’t. Because they play “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” every night, they didn’t have to rehearse it, they didn’t have to make sure they got it right.

But it was great to hear it!

I CAN’T TURN YOU LOOSE

The finale.

Mick says they’re gonna do this one really fast. Reminding you that they’re a band, not locked into hard drives or click tracks. It was just ragged enough to evidence humanity. It was done for them, they seemed not to care what we thought, which made us care that much more.

And then they were gone.


- Bob Lefsetz
http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/

Bluzdude wrote on May 21^st, 2015 at 10:17am:

So would I. But of they did do that. They'd probably play a safe stale setlist. Figuring for that amount of money.People just want hits.

“We’re going to do something we’ve never done before,” Mick Jagger said early in the Rolling Stones’ not-so-“secret” show Wednesday night at the 1,200-capacity Fonda Theatre in Hollywood to launch the group’s 2015 Zip Code tour.



You wouldn’t think the “world’s greatest rock ‘n’ roll band,” 50-plus years down the line, would have much left to accomplish (or at least attempt to accomplish), but this was the Stones' first time playing one of their albums in its entirety. Crossing that off the bucket list, the band ripped through all 10 songs from their watershed 1971 album “Sticky Fingers” live. A rep confirmed to the Times that Wednesday night will be the only night the Stones will play the album in its entirety.

Unsurprisingly, nobody groused that the Stones were simply engaging in a savvy marketing move to sell more copies of the recently remastered edition of “Sticky Fingers,” the album that gave the world “Brown Sugar,” “Dead Flowers,” “Can’t You Hear Me Knocking,” “Wild Horses” and a half-dozen others.

The album, and the live presentation of the songs — albeit not in their original order — harkened back to a time when the Stones were indeed still dangerous, still menacing, still dancing with the devil, in dark set pieces such as “Moonlight Mile” and, especially, “Sister Morphine.”


“You might hear some ‘60s drug references,” Jagger said before he and his longtime band mates delved into the darkness of that life-denying workout.

“That’s a bit of a downer song,” he added at the end of "Morphine," “and there are more to come. It must have been a down period.”

Yet, if the early ‘70s did constitute some rough going for the Stones — emotionally, physically, financially -- Wednesday’s show was characterized more by the broad smiles Jagger and guitarist Keith Richards flashed often, along with some faux-menacing mugging from guitarist Ron Wood, while cool-as-ever drummer Charlie Watts nonchalantly powered the whole rock juggernaut for a muscular 90 minutes.


Jagger himself was impressively animated, prancing and preening in his signature style, twisting, contorting and shimmying his still-lithe body in ways that seemed to belie his 71 years. All quips aside about septuagenarian rockers being better suited to walkers, the Rolling Stones, as ever, once again gave vibrant testament to the fountain-of-youth magic of rock ‘n’ roll.

The lineup: Jagger, Richards, Wood and Watts, bassist Darryl Jones and touring keyboardist Chuck Leavell, supplemented at the Fonda by a pair of sax/woodwind players, two singers and an additional keyboardist. Orange County-born saxophonist Karl Denson has stepped in for Texas tenor player Bobby Keys, who died in December. Keys was a vital cog on the Stones machine when they made "Sticky Fingers," and Denson largely stuck to Keys' signature solos that contributed so colorfully to "Can't You Hear Me Knockin'" and "Brown Sugar."

All onstage parties seemed to genuinely revel in the relatively cozy environs of the great indoors, which counterbalances the wide-open spaces they’ll be visiting starting Sunday at San Diego’s 42,000-capacity Petco Park baseball stadium.


“It’s great to be back in L.A.—it’s been couple of years,” Jagger said at one point. “A little bit smaller than Staples Center,” referencing the previous tour’s most recent stop in L.A. proper.

The group has periodically launched tours with similarly intimate shows. Two years ago it was the 700-capacity Echoplex in Echo Park. A decade earlier, for their Licks tour, they built a 117-date world tour around a mélange of appearances at clubs, small theaters, amphitheaters, arenas and stadiums, with L.A. stops at the Wiltern Theater on one end of the excursion and Dodger Stadium at the other.

At the Fonda, the Stones attempted to avoid the commonplace sea of cellphones, requiring fans to leave cameras and smartphones at home or check them at the door.


"It feels so good not to have my phone," one compliant fan was overheard telling a friend.

Still, a smattering of concert-goers managed to sneak their devices in, snapping photos or trying to take video footage surreptitiously.

“Wouldn’t it be so much better to remember this show in your heads and in your hearts than on your iPhones?” one of the band’s crew announced just before the show kicked off with “Start Me Up,” which segued into “When the Whip Comes Down,” then “Exile on Main Street’s” “All Down the Line” and then the “Sticky Fingers” songs.

Jagger-Richards & Co. also once more indulged their youthful passion for American blues and R&B at the show’s end. Following a tribute performance of "Rock Me, Baby" in honor of the late B.B. King, who died at 89 last week at his home in Vegas, they closed out with Otis Redding’s “Can’t Turn You Loose,” which has one of the most infectious guitar-bass-drums-saxophone vamps ever committed to vinyl.

The Times will have an in-depth review of the Stones’ full-fledged production next week following the Petco Park show.

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/music/local/la-et-ms-rolling-stones-secret-...

Just another mad mad day

Well ... for the record ,,, a very positive sign for things to come this tour .. Bjornulf (AKA bv) who runs iorr.org , who has been to countless Rolling Stones shows including seeing them in a theater .. all over the world many times in many different venues. Stadiums ...Roseland ... openers ... you name it ...hes been there....  since the seventies. He flies (taking planes) to see them in various places for a long while now.

Well he stated that all RS shows are unique and until last night he could never say which his favorite show was when he was asked. He said very clearly ... in big letters a few times that in fact... lasts nights club gig was hands down the very best Stones show he's ever saw or been to.

Just saying .. As a special side note he wouldn't just make that call out of emotion. He never rates shows as the best .. Well this time he said it was "all too clear" ... the show at the Fonda was the best Stones show hes ever seen. In fact he stated that in a brief post before he could give a longer review that he would just give a quick review in three words "BEST SHOW EVER"  ... and he retyped it to let everyone know he was being dead serious. He also said they were "on" in every way .... and playing as good as or better than hes ever heard or saw them. He was up close and it was not the crowd or anything other that swayed his opinon. He said they were simply in fantastic form and put on the best show hes ever saw them perform.


Ian

A great read imo. The author is clearly one of us!!!

Scenes from the Rolling Stones' Secret Show: 5 Things Every Act Can Learn From Mick and Keith

Melinda Newman
forbes.com

As you may have heard, The Rolling Stones played a show at The Fonda Theater, a small Los Angeles club, Wednesday night. For the first time in their 50-year career, they performed an album in its entirety: The 1971 classic, Sticky Fingers,  which is being reissued June 9.

I was at the show. In fact, I was about 10 rows back on the floor. I’ve seen the Stones  many times before, but never in so tiny  a venue and never so close that I could see every nuance. For all the naysayers who spout that the Rolling Stones were never good again after Mick Taylor left in 1974 or that they are too past their prime to still be touring, all I can say is watching the band up close was exhilarating and illuminating.

There’s a reason they’re called The World’s Greatest Rock and Roll Band. At 71, Mick Jagger is some freak of nature. He never slowed down. In the 85-minute show, he was off stage for less than two minutes during a saxophone solo in “Can’t You Hear Me Knocking.”


Keith Richards, also 71,  is clearly going to outlive us all, despite the odds. He slide guitar work on “You Gotta Move” as nothing sort of inspiring in its bluesy soulfulness. Ronnie Wood, 67, may do most of the heavy lifting when it comes to guitar work, but Richards will forever and always be the Stones’ living, breathing heart and to see him burst into a grin at Jagger on the second song, “When The Whip Comes Down,” was to witness pure joy. And has there ever been a drummer with a more efficient sense of economy than Charlie Watts, 73?  There is not a wasted note.

Before delving into Sticky Fingers, which the band played out of order, in part, no doubt, to build up to “Brown Sugar,” which opens the album, the Stones threw in “Start Me Up,” “Whip,” and “All Down The Line.” The encore consisted of “Rock Me Baby,” a tribute to B.B King; “Jumpin’ Jack Flash,” and a cover of Otis Redding’s “I Can’t Turn You Loose.”

The Rolling Stones’ 15-city North American tour starts Sunday in San Diego.

Here are six things any performer could learn from last night’s show:

Be Proud Of Your Work: Sure, James Brown, may he rest in peace, will forever have the moniker of The Hardest Working Man in Show Business, but Jagger certainly deserves it as well. Whippet thin, he is flailing his arms, punching like a pugilist over the crowd, doing his best bantam rooster impersonation, snapping his hips every moment on stage. He’s a kinetic back of energy, never resting, never not entertaining. A very obvious sense of pride in doing his absolute best radiates off Jagger and it’s infectious.

Stay True To Yourself: Watts is as laid back as Jagger is flamboyant and they both stay true to their nature. Watts is a human metronome. There’s no flash, just impeccable, solid drumming that he, somehow, makes look effortless. He’s not there to do fancy drum solos or draw any attention to himself at all: He’s there to keep the beat. And no one does it better.
There were several moments last night when Jagger would go back to the drum kit to grab a water and, every time, Watts greeted him with a big smile—that’s about as much emotion as I’ve ever seen him show on stage.  At one point they even carried on a brief conversation, but Watts never broke from his unflappable, steady style


Look Involved:  Everyone on stage knows eyes are on them. As much as Jagger is the focal point, at any time, you could look at the other musicians and see how animated they were (Watts aside).

Never, even when they weren’t playing, were they checked out. During “Wild Horses,” when they weren’t singing, the co-ed back up singers were locked in a seductive, slinky dance that never pulled focus from Jagger, but was a little sideshow unto itself, there to enjoy for anyone who looked over.

Be Engaged: At this stage in his career, you might think Jagger would have adopted a bit of aloofness. That couldn’t be further from the truth. Throughout the night he was making eye contact with people in front rows, smiling at them, engaging them, exhorting them to clap their hands. He was fully present.




Be Happy: There were moments that joy absolutely radiated from the stage. There is no reason for the Stones to be playing gigs any more other than that they want to. The demand is there—they’re still filling stadiums—but it’s clear what drives them is their desire. To the man last night, Jagger, Richards, Wood, and Watts looked delighted to be on stage. Richards often smiled so broadly he looked like the cat who swallowed the canary.

Challenge Yourself: In doing Sticky Fingers from start to finish, the Rolling Stones challenged themselves to play songs, like “Sister Morphine” and “Sway,” that they most likely hadn’t played in decades live, if ever. Yet the renditions were perfect. I kept looking to see if Jagger was using a teleprompter or lyric sheets for some of the deep album cuts and he wasn’t. He knew all the words. And, more impressively, vocally  he hit every single note, including the high notes on “I Got The Blues.” There was never a moment when the band coasted.

Ian Billen wrote on May 22^nd, 2015 at 12:18am:



In fairness, he's never been known to say any show was less than brilliant and life-affirming.

Saying that, you'd need to be dead from the neck up not to enjoy a Stones gig played in front of a few hundred people.

Gazza wrote on May 22^nd, 2015 at 5:11pm:



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Yeah ...maybe you are right (you kno ...hes an alright bloke still the same). I know he rates all shows pretty darn well .. but he did make it a point to say all these years hes never once said which show was the best and he had no favorite... because he had none.. they were all unique and great in their own way ..but this one was indeed the best show hes ever seen them do.

Again .. jus sayin