“No Spare Parts,” a Rolling Stones song that’s been bouncing around on bootlegs for years, will finally find official release on Nov. 21 as part of a new boxed-set treatment for the band’s 1978 album Some Girls.
Unlike its earlier pirated editions, this new version of “No Spare Parts” appears to have updated vocals from Mick Jagger, as well as some additional licks from Keith Richards and Ron Wood — who originally made his debut as second guitarist with the band on this album. The Stones took a similar approach when polishing up previously unreleased material for the recent reissue of Exile on Main Street, for instance.
A country-tinged number in the style of 1971’s “Wild Horses,” “No Spare Parts” couldn’t be further away from this album’s most famous tracks — the prowling disco vamp of “Miss You” or the grimy come-on of “Beast of Burden.” In that way, it’s easy to see why this new track initially didn’t make the cut on an project that had more to do with the streets of New York City — we’re talking the pre-Giuliani version, when it was all fun-seeking desperation and broken out-of-town dreams — than it did with Bakersfield. Still, “No Spare Parts” might have provided an important counterbalance on the brash, shit-talkingly frenetic Some Girls. The record’s one true weakness, back then, was that it lacked a certain musical vulnerability that’s always made the Rolling Stones’ outsized bravado ring true.
This track, a jangly opportunity for Jagger to resume the role of stubburnly self-centered horndog, would have sounded just right …
Even without “No Spare Parts,” the chart-topping Some Girls was a vast improvement over sloppy, uneven efforts like 1973’s Goat’s Head Soup and ’74’s It’s Only Rock ‘n’ Roll. It would go to become the Rolling Stones’ best-selling album in the U.S., eventually moving more than 6 million copies. Rolling Stone magazine later placed Some Girls at No. 269 on its list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.
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