Beautifully packaged, Eagle Rock Entertainment’s new live series of Rolling Stones concerts, From The Vault, starts with Hampton Coliseum Live In 1981 and L.A. Forum Live In 1975 (both restored and remixed by Bob Clearmountain). Each show is two and a half hours and consumers get their choice of vinyl (three discs) or CD (two discs) along with the concert DVD. (Both releases are also available digitally. The ’81 show can be bought separately as a Standard-Definition Blu-ray.)
In 1975, upon the break-up of The Faces, singer Rod Stewart went solo and guitarist Ron Wood joined the Rolling Stones. (Drummer Kenney Jones would replace Keith Moon in The Who three years later.) For Wood’s first Stones tour, the band made its tour announcement by performing “Brown Sugar” on a flatbed truck in midtown Manhattan. After a couple of fully attended dress rehearsals in Louisiana, the 44-date tour revved up on June 3 and ended on July 13 with five nights at the L.A. Forum, one of which, July 12, was filmed. Keyboardist Billy Preston [1946-2006] is a joy throughout and gets a two-song spot where his infectious brand of gospel-soul even gets Mick back out on stage to boogie down hard in doing a priceless impromptu dance routine with Preston.
In 1981, no one grossed more than the Stones did while touring in support of Tattoo You. The 50 dates took in a record $50 million, from Philadelphia in September to Hampton, Virginia, in December. The next-to-last show, on Keith’s December 18 38th birthday, was filmed. It was also the first rock concert to be broadcast on television as a pay-per-view event.
1975 Setlist
1) Introduction
2) Honky Tonk Women
3) All Down The Line
4) If You Can’t Rock Me/Get Off Of My Cloud
5) Star Star
6) Gimme Shelter
7) Ain’t Too Proud To Beg
8 ) You Gotta Move
9) You Can’t Always Get What You Want
10) Happy
11) Tumbling Dice
12) It’s Only Rock’n’Roll
13) Band Intros
14) Doo Doo Doo Doo Doo (Heartbreaker)
15) Fingerprint File
16) Angie
17) Wild Horses
18) That’s Life (Billy Preston)
19) Outta Space (Billy Preston)
20) Brown Sugar
21) Midnight Rambler
22) Rip This Joint
23) Street Fighting Man
24) Jumpin’ Jack Flash
25) Sympathy For The Devil
1981 Setlist
1) Under My Thumb
2) When The Whip Comes Down
3) Let’s Spend The Night Together
4) Shattered
5) Neighbors
6) Black Limousine
7) Just My Imagination
8 ) Twenty Flight Rock
9) Going To A Go Go
10) Let Me Go
11) Time Is On My Side
12) Beast Of Burden
13) Waiting On A Friend
14) Let It Bleed
15) You Can’t Always Get What You Want
16) Band Introductions
17) Happy Birthday Keith
18) Little T&A
19) Tumbling Dice
20) She’s So Cold
21) Hang Fire
22) Miss You
23) Honky Tonk Women
24) Brown Sugar
25) Start Me Up
26) Jumping Jack Flash
27) (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction
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Hard Luck Child: A Tribute To Skip James (Stony Plain) is Rory Block’s fifth installment of her “Mentor Series,” rural blues played in a time-honored tradition. Previous legends whom she has honored include Mississippi John Hurt [1892-1966], Reverend Gary Davis [1896-1972], Mississippi Fred McDowell [1904-1972] and Son House [1902-1988]. Nine Skip James originals—including “I’m So Glad” that Cream famously popularized on its 1966 debut—are interpreted by this exquisitely talented guitar-slinging, soul-singing 65-year-old blues-woman from Princeton, NJ. The set opens with her own “Nehemiah James” to set the scene on exactly who this dude was. Block ultimately reaches the deep dark underbelly of this mysterious legend, successfully mixing the sacred with the profane to ferret out—and stunningly bring to life—the dichotomy of one of America’s greatest blues legends.
