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| VoodooChileInWOnderl |
Posted on Fri, Oct. 18, 2002
STONE GOLD
What gets creaky rollers up out of their rockers? A lucrative tour of the world
BY EVELYN McDONNELL
[email protected]
Imagine you're a secondary member of one of the most storied bands in contemporary music history, a band with, improbably, the longest shelf life of all the great acts of rock's golden era (a longevity that's perhaps testament to the preservative effects of pickling?). You've made a career of being a secondary player in Great Bands. It's a nice life, an easy life; you paint in your (copious) spare time, invest in clubs and whatnot. You never have to work again.
But nonetheless, for reasons that are inscrutable even to yourself, every few years, you haul yourself out of your English estate and traipse around the world, flogging your craft. Is it for the money? The women? The parties? The prestige? The power? Could it even be for the music? And when that call comes, how exactly does it come?
''You get wind from the main office that the boys are interested in gathering again,'' Ron Wood says mysteriously. ``We have a meeting, see what we could do. And then, it starts to materialize.''
He could be talking about some secret society or clandestine government operation. Instead, of course, the 55-year-old guitarist is talking about the Rolling Stones. Their Forty Licks tour brings the rock 'n' roll institution to the Office Depot Center in Sunrise Tuesday and AmericanAirlines Arena Wednesday.
This year, the Stones have fewer reasons to tour than most. For one, the economy has tanked; it's not a great time to be asking people to pay hundreds of dollars to hear songs that aren't exactly as fresh as a Missy Elliott remix. The Stones don't even have a new album. Instead, they are peddling Forty Licks, a retrospective of their career that includes early material and four new songs.
''Normally we tour to promote an album,'' Wood says, speaking over the phone from New York. ``Instead, we're doing a whole cross section of new and old.''
And then, of course, there's the issue of how do they top their own act. Their past three tours were not mere tours: They were strategic, coordinated international invasions scoring the kind of epic cash haul that could help Bono feed Africa, or at least keep Mick Jagger and Keith Richards off the road for another few years. The Stones' 1989 Steel Wheels tour set a then rock-tour record by raking in $260 million, according to a recent Fortune magazine feature on the Stones. The Voodoo Lounge tour brought almost $370 million, Bridges to Babylon/No Security $390 million.
''We didn't go out for that on this one,'' Wood says. ``We just came out musically, to get it honed down. It's totally different from any Stones tour I've done before. It's much more of a concentrated effort. Musically the band got so much better. All the back line, with the brass sections and the background singers: Everyone is really shining.''
But many music lovers scoff at the aging Brits trotting out their wares one more time. Old-time Stones fans like Noel Gallagher of the band Oasis consider the band's recent doings, including Jagger being knighted by the Queen of England, a complete betrayal.
''Haven't they gotten enough money?'' Gallagher said in a recent interview. ``They were supposed to be the rebels. It's a betrayal of everything they stand for. They should be called the Rolling Thrones.
``They're the greatest rock band there ever was. But at the point they start playing [expletive] whatever, will you be buying a hamburger? Because I know I will. When you go to see the Rolling Stones, you want to hear all the classics. After Steel Wheels, it's all about money. And it's wrong.''
The Stones say this tour is different, that the focus is back on making music. The first decision the Stones made on past tours was whether to play stadiums, arenas, or clubs. For Licks, they opted to play all three. That means that instead of setting up the same stage show every night, every night is different. The idea is to make a Stones show a musical concert, not a theatrical production.
Stripping away the accouterments and making ''the music'' the point of a production is not exactly an original idea. That's why Madonna called her last album Music, after all. In 2001, U2 decided to follow a decade in which their stage shows had gotten bigger, glossier, and clunkier with a lean, music-centric production. The resulting Elevation tour was a huge critical and commercial success. One can imagine former London School of Economics student Jagger poring over U2's tour reports with a gleam in his eye. No one has ever charged the Stones, recyclers of Muddy Waters hooks, with excess originality.
If not inventive, the Stones' ''music'' line may at least be genuine. The group (Jagger, Richards, Wood and drummer Charlie Watts, joined by bassist Darryl Jones) rehearsed a whopping 140 songs to prepare for this tour, preparing a retrospective repertoire that allows them to change up to 10 songs on the set list every show. The night before each gig, the band faxes each other in their hotel rooms, or Wood and Jagger go to Richards' room. They come up with a set list; if someone doesn't want to play a particular song, ``it's back to the drawing board.''
The night of the show, the band rehearses at every sound check -- not something a band that has played together approximately two million times necessarily bothers to do.
''A lot of it is a surprise to us as well as it is to the audience, by the time we get to the final set list we're using that night,'' Wood says. ``That keeps the interest going. The set lists are quite challenging. It keeps you on your toes. You may find an emphasis one night on Exile on Main Street, then another night maybe a Some Girls night, or a Black and Blue night. Then we're mixing in reggae, soul, blues evenings. Different mixtures. The audiences are loving it, like we all are. We've raised the bar with playing, with music.''
The Stones have changed in other ways: Wood, for one, has sworn off drugs and alcohol for the past seven months.
``I have to change my whole angle. Luckily it's not been that hard. I've fallen off the wagon a couple times, that's understandable. I'm back on the program now. It's doing me good. I'm getting a lot of response and support from the band, and from the audience. I'm still a nut case, still as nuts as when I was using. But somehow I get rounded and I don't need to celebrate.''
What Wood calls ''my new viewpoint on life'' has helped his musicianship.
''We're seeing things a bit clearer; I know I am,'' Wood says. ``My playing has come on a lot better for it. I'm playing the best that I've ever played.''
Most reviews back Wood up. The Boston Herald praised the show's ''scruffy charm'' and ''high-octane, full-tilt fervency.'' ''The Stones defy time and derision by pleasing themselves first,'' Jon Pareles wrote in The New York Times.
Still, many observers are skeptical at the prospect of another Stones tour. Neal Pollack, also writing in The New York Times, said ''they are a Vegas headliner show, not a rock outfit.'' Author John Strausbaugh has called them ``the historical reenactment of the once-great Rolling Stones.''
Many people felt the rest of the band should have followed original Rolling Stones bassist Bill Wyman when he called it quits in '92 because he said 30 years was enough. Erstwhile ''street-fighting man'' Jagger was recently made a knight, a capitulation to authority that even Richards has scoffed at. The band has been accused of becoming mercenaries. Tickets for the current tour are as high as $350 (although the $50 tickets for the club gigs are a bargain -- and retailing on the Internet for thousands).
''We just try to make it as fair as possible so we can make a profit and they're not breaking their backs to buy a ticket,'' Wood says.
Wood says the current tour could change skeptics' minds.
``It's surprised me how reviews have been so good. I'm sure they're not just kissing our a--. I think they've really enjoyed what they've heard. Once they've seen the show, they completely change their mind.''
Perhaps the best proof of the Stones' renewed musical intentions is Wood's carefree attitude when it's pointed out that it might be a good thing the Stones are touring to play music, not set sales records, given the fact that neither South Florida appearance has sold out.
``That's cool, Wood laughs. ``That'll teach us a lesson.''
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| Mickjagger1963 |
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