This is danceable though!

Steel Wheels wrote on Oct 11^th, 2012 at 6:56am:



Maybe Paul Cashmere was right and Charlie left four years ago. 

What is the other itunes version?

I like it.
Lyrically its …meh.
But the guitars and drums are great, Mick sounds great.

I wasn’t expecting anything that great. So for the first time in ages it’s good that they exceeded my expectations

I only found the version on iTunes (deluxe version?)
Where are the others?
One reviewer on the web said his version had a harmonica solo? Mine didn’t

3 out 5 Star Review:

By Neil McCormick
9:28AM BST 11 Oct 2012
21 Comments
It’s been six years since the last one, and over 20 years since the last hit, but the new Rolling Stones single sounds very, well, Stones-y. For which, I suppose, we must be grateful. At least they haven’t gone dubstep.

In defiance of advancing years and creaking bones, Doom & Gloom is an energised, uptempto blues attack built around a raw Keith Richards and Ron Wood slashing rhythm guitar riff, meshing thrillingly with a Muddy Waters style blues harp and underpinned by Charlie Watts tight and minimal backbeat. This gritty, dirty groove is topped off with one of Jagger’s shouty, one-note blues holler vocals that gets in your ear and yacks away like a headache. The frontman makes each line last several seconds beyond its natural end point, turning “road” into “ro-o-o-o-o-oa-d” and (rather impressively) “explode” into “explo-o-oa-o-o-oa-aa-deh”, overstretching syllables with a relish that would make Liam Gallagher weak at the knees.

With long verses sustained on one chord, and Jagger yelling over a familiar blues progression on the chorus, the immediate impression is not a million miles from Exile On Main Street’s basement rock. The texture of the interplay on the backing track has hints of Gimme Shelter, and the defiant aggression of the vocal touches on Street Fighting Man but the song itself never quite takes off, hammering away with the kind of heavy handed of gusto of veterans chasing the inspiration of their youth. It lacks the real juice and wayward spirit of those bygone days.

A big part of the problem is Jagger’s voice, which is (as it has been on recordings since the late Seventies) just a bit too high in the mix, too assertively dominant. Jagger has suggested this is a political song but it is the glib politics of laissez faire, a non-voter’s protest anthem. Smartly turned couplets evoke crashing aeroplanes, zombies in Louisiana, overseas war, tightening screws, mounting garbage and endless news of “doom and gloom” but the singer’s complaint is not really about the state of a deteriorating world. He’s just a bit grumpy about being subjected to all this bad news when all he really wants to do is dance. This kind of stuff might sound nihilistically charged from a street fighting 17-year-old but just sounds little bit glib from a 70-year-old.

The best bit is when he stops singing and starts blowing. There is a fantastic, swampy guitar and harmonica interlude in the middle, in which Charlie shifts to the offbeat and the band lock into a down and dirty groove. It’s a reminder of everything the Stones do so well, indeed, better than anyone else. Doom & Gloom may not be a classic single but it at least sounds like they are trying to recapture the spirit that made them the world’s greatest rock and roll band, and having fun doing so.

another review from NME

Currently you can go to the Channel Four website and book your seat on the plane crash to see if you’d survive. If the new single from The Rolling Stones – ‘Doom And Gloom’, released as a download this morning - is right, though, surviving would be the worst possible option. Not only would you find yourself stranded in zombie-infested wasteland and having to shoot your way out, you’d be in the company of “(i)drunk and insane(i)” fellow survivors with no idea how lucky they’ve been: “(i)sitting in the dirt, feeling kinda hurt/And all I hear is doom and gloom(i)”.

That, fifty years into their career, they can come up with a song that opens like a mission from Dead Island (“(i)Crash landed in the Louisiana swamp/Shot up a horde of zombies, but I come out on top(i)”) and also unwittingly mimics Baldrick’s poetry (“(i)when those drums go boom boom boom(i)”) speaks volumes for their continued playfulness – they’re a pension-worthy band with the hearts and souls of petulant teenage freaks. That they go on to drop sly references to the Iraq invasion – “(i)lost all that treasure in an overseas war(i)” – and social inequality is testament to their sophistication, and that the whole thing is wrapped up in a tune reminiscent of their peak period makes for a rare combination of wisdom and enthusiasm. It sounds like a ‘Gimme Shelter’ for Generation Wii.

Keef’s riffs are fresh as ever, Jagger yelps, claps and croons about getting hammered like he’s still living it up down the LSE bar and there’s a Zep-tastic breakdown that thankfully stops the whole thing sounding too much like Primal Scream’s ‘Rocks’ – a concept that would launch music into an inescapable loop of influence as confusing as a bad time travel plot. No, the first new Stones song in seven years is a revitalising reminder of what made them great in the first place, a tune that will sit seamlessly amongst their classics. Are you listening, Macca?







Rate this track

Average rating









Be the first to rate this track




To read all our reviews first - days before they appear online - check out NME magazine, on sale every Wednesday

I hope to hear this blues version ASAP.

There is no blues version, the iTunes version is a "clean mix", the radio/video version is a "jungle mix"

The harmonica is heard in the bridge, it's that wailing sound, pretty well done, similar but dirtier than in "Break the Spell".

The other version has more fucking guitars! I hear my motherfucker Keith Richards!  Ahhh!  Sliding around with some nice riffs. I will be playing this the rest of the day.

I love it. I'm stiff as a board.

iT'S SO LOUD MY EARS ARE RINGING.

breakfeast of champions!!

puttin the grrrr in my granola

Woke up to this in my in box from the Stones themselves. How thoughtful. Not sure what version I listened to. But I liked it. Nice riff. You have to get used to the Jagger growling constipated style of singing. But it's still better than Start Me Up. Of course a cat in a blender would be better than start me up. But I'm full of doom and gloom.