The Rolling Stones – Exile On Main St.

This is the best sounding version of this classic album, as far as I'm concerned. And I have zero complaints about the mixes being "muddy" -- because the album that came after this one was indeed rather muddy, until it got remixed recently.

In no way reprising the forthrightness of its iconic predecessor, 1972's “Exile On Main St.” is a marked regression in of immediacy and fidelity, favouring impermeable opaqueness over instant gratification. Somehow though, The Rolling Stones, by now so accomplished in their collective ability, commercially successful and legendary enough to dispense with ambition, saw them seek to do the exact opposite. Exploring a multitude of styles within their usual rough-and-tough, sex and hedonism framework, albeit with a tighter focus on the roots of rock and roll, the band were on a mission to experiment. As a result of this fierce developmental attitude, “Exile On Main St.” is by no means accessible or easily processed; with its dense, murky sound, buried vocals, and guitar playing that fails to sear as it did on their classic singles, the album was deservedly met with mixed reviews on its initial release. However, that being said, it isn’t a bad album, it just sounds lousy and isn’t as great as you expect it to be the first time you hear it. “Exile” is so difficult to penetrate that it requires repeat listens until you can truly appreciate its sleazy, visceral disposition as much as its sprawling length and grimy dankness. It is perhaps the only Stones album whereby not even the standouts are able to eclipse the deep cuts; with its unconventional auditive gloom and overarching grottiness, the album is to be experienced in its unconfined, extended state rather than individuated or streamlined as one would with a double album such as this.

As a musical unit, the Stones are less controlled herein, taking an infinitely looser, off-the-cuff approach than ever before; the fuzzy idiosyncrasy of the lyrics, barely perceptible in their delivery by an atypically unobtrusive Mick Jagger, whose voice disorients, barely audible above the dirty, indecipherable convergence of horns, organs and guitars. It is this brooding Deep South-styled instrumentation that dominates the proceedings, with numerous extensions of coarse blues rock, gospel and soul emerging through the darkness. Far too rich and expansive a record to analyse or fully digest whilst listening to it, the instrumentation and lyrical content must be over the course of many years, returned to and intuited without expecting it to suddenly resemble their previous work. I would not recommend listening to it as an introduction to the classic period of the Stones, only if you enjoyed “Sticky Fingers” can you familiarise yourself with its muddy, gauzy atmospherics and bleary brilliance. It may not be as cohesive or sonorous as the aforementioned classic, but its lived-in feel and diverse arrangements are equally impressive and well-executed.

Rating: 4/5