Experiencing the Rolling Stones

First let me say being a Stones fan for decades I found this book to be very insightful. When my friends were buying the Beatles records I was buying the Stones. I still look for the new stuff when it comes out. This book takes you back from their first record up to 2012 and goes through each album and for the most part the hit song from those albums. He also explains how the first three or four were different from one being an U.S. release and the other being a U.K. release. The author also explains how the different styles of music has shaped their own style, blues, R&B, some jazz, African and Cuban beats, even Jamaica with Reggae music. He also explains how even Stax a 1960-1970 record label out of Memphis inspired certain songs on some albums. The author will explain cords and riffs and how they got the sound and how later some of the earlier sound was changed by changing cords and moving down a few frets on the guitar to change the sound but only silently. He thought that this was brilliant because it is there blues, rock, R&B style that has kept them going. The author lets you know who also played on the albums like Billy Preston plating piano for example and Sonny Rollins a jazz great playing on “Waiting on a Friend” from the Tattoo you record. He also goes into sound engineers like in the 70’s Chris Kimsey, who took over for them with “Some Girls” and had also worked on Peter Frampton’s “Come Alive”, Bad Company’s “Burnin’ Sky”, just to name two. He has worked with many artists over the years. The author also explains how after Ian Stewart passed away they needed a new keyboardist for studio and touring, so they hired Chuck Leavell who at one time was a member of The Allman Brothers Band, and played on Duane’s Allman solo album, he also had his own band plus played with other bands like Govt Mule. This is a good book on their work and for the most part sticks with the music. If you want personal life stuff of the band then this book is not for you. For me this was a fabulous book because I still listen to their music. Overall a good book.