The Rolling Stones took eight years between Bridges to Babylon and 2005’s A Bigger Bang, and it’s been seven years since that studio recording. Perhaps the long wait is over.
Ronnie Wood, speaking at a news conference for a new exhibit of his paintings called “Faces, Time and Places,” confirms that the Stones are set for a recording session before embarking on a long-discussed 50th anniversary tour. Wood will also be inducted this weekend as member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s 2012 class. He’s entering time as a member of the Faces, having previously been inducted with the Rolling Stones in 1989.
Wood tells The Mirror that the recording sessions are expected to loose-knit affairs — designed for the group “to just throw some ideas around,” and “to get the feel again.”
After his Hall of Fame induction, Wood is set for a rare solo show at the Golden Nugget in Atlantic City, New Jersey, on April 21, 2012. Woods said fans can expect “lots of surprises — because I’m going to surprise myself. I don’t know what the hell is coming next. The whole set list is going to be made up. I’m making it up every day now.”
The Stones are expected to go on the road for the first time the tour in support of A Bigger Bang in 2013, though Wood says there is still much to be done before then. “It’s like working out for the Olympics or something,” Wood said. “You’ve got to go into training. So we’re going to go into training.”
Here are some of our previous thoughts on Ronnie Wood and the Rolling Stones. Click through the links for complete reviews …
ROLLING STONES – SOME GIRLS: LIVE IN TEXAS ’78 (2011): The full-on, balls-out Some Girls was perfectly uncluttered — no horn section, no guest stars like Billy Preston. That gives this subsequent live set from the summer of 1978 a chance to build off the record’s latent energy, rather than fruitlessly try to match it. Instead, this is a stripped-down wonder: no digital movie screens, no huge scaffolding for Mick Jagger to prance on, no big light show. Just a band playing.
RON WOOD AND THE FIRST BARBARIANS – LIVE FROM KILBURN (2007): Ron Wood was still a member of The Faces when he put out I’ve Got My Own Album To Do. This live recording (and DVD) is from that tour, featuring Wood on guitar, Faces buddy Ian McLagan, and even an appearance by Rod Stewart. Future Rolling Stones cohort Keith Richards is there, too. I’ve always been more of a fan of Wood’s Gimme Some Neck, but that doesn’t stop me from turning this record up way too loud.
ROLLING STONES – A BIGGER BANG (2005): I listened to ‘A Bigger Bang’ expecting a lot of the generic glossy pop of their more recent output. Instead, the classic mid-period Stones sound is back. That sound is updated, for sure, and Mick’s voice is deeper. But Jagger’s swagger is back. Keith Richards (who actually sings with some effort on a few tracks) and Ronnie Wood are playing together as well as ever. And Charlie Watts can still lay down some mean rhythms. The results sound like the same band who put out Let It Bleed and Sticky Fingers, even if it’s not up to par with those classics. And at this point, that’s plenty good enough for me.
GIMME FIVE: ROLLING STONES IN THE 1990s: There was no reason to believe that the Rolling Stones, 30 years into their dangerously debauched rock career, would make anything worth a damn out of the 1990s. A band that made its name on skirt chasing and drug taking was softening into middle age. No one would have been surprised if the Stones simply ground to a halt. Only, they reformed in the wake of Richards’ successes with Talk Is Cheap, and by the middle part of the next decade, the Rolling Stones were in the midst of a small very-late career resurgence. Here are five arguments for continuing your Rolling Stones collection into the 1990s.
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