The Rolling Stones: the veterans’ return to norm - somewhat

They are the self-styled ‘The Greatest Rock'n'Roll band’ and as far as live work goes, there is very little to challenge them. But, The Rolling Stones have been going for so long there is huge doubt any new album can still match their enormous legacy. And, the answer has usually been the - lesser one.

And yet, this time - ‘A Bigger Bang’ - is not as under-whelming as the case may have been in the past few decades. It also doesn’t mean it is a great album - just that it shows few glimmers of the former glories. ‘The Glimmer Twins’ have been at it for a very long time and it shows in certain songs.

26 studio albums and 43-year-career have certainly worked out certain settings, formulae and sounds one can instantly recognize as the band’s trademark sonics. Keith Richards is still churning out riffs that are reminiscent of the blues legends and Mick Jagger’s lyrics often sound like they were written when he was 40 years younger.

By the same token one suspects it is to do with the genre and their fans - philosophy ain’t the language of ‘youth’ nor rebellion. Thus, ‘Rain Fall Down’ is funky, the cocksure swagger of ‘Rough Justice’, the Rock‘n’Blues of ‘Back Of My Hand’ and the emotionally tender ballad ‘Streets of Love’ are aces; ‘She Saw Me Coming’ delivers quality as well. The supposed anti-Bush ditty ‘Sweet Neo Con’ fails to blast with the rest of the material being of uneven standard.

‘A Bigger Bang’ heralds their first new studio material for eight years, since the release of ‘Bridges To Babylon’. The Stones are playing five songs from this album on the current American leg of their tour which means five less classics that, somehow, doesn’t feel like a fair trade… Still, by the time they reach Europe next spring, we’ll love them all well -
probably.

The fact is that this album will sadly not win any new fans for the band but - it actually is a an collection of songs that sounds good, like old friends and much better than the majority of critics would like you to believe.

7½/10