Often times, the trait of a great band is that they can be remembered for a single masterful album. For Led Zeppelin, this album was their fourth album. For Dire Straits, it was Brothers in Arms. Although some fans would argue that Aftermath and Beggars Banquet show Mick Jagger and Keith Richards at the peak of their songwriting skills, popular opinion shows that Exile On Main Street is the emerald gem (or maybe their Ruby Tuesday).
Listening to this great album, I can fully understand why. What makes Exile truly unique is that the band produced their best work at a time when many of their bandmates from the sixties had vanished. Recall that in 1972, the world had seen the death of sixties icons Jimi Hendrix and Jim Morrison as they suffered the traumatic breakups of Cream, Simon and Garfunkel and, most heartbreaking of all, The Beatles. Those few who had made it from the mid-sixties into the new decade (for example, The Kinks and The Bee Gees) had started to fade at this point. Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple had become the new faces of rock. One could easily imagine that the Stones are past their expiration date. This album must have proved the skeptics wrong.
As with many seminal albums, the story behind the songs would turn out to be almost as great as the wealth of the material. To record Exile, the band moved to Nellcôte in the south of France, where they recorded most of the backing tracks in the basement of Keith Richards’ rented house. Although the recording sessions began in earnest, the five Stones (along with producer Jimmy Miller and saxophonist Bobby Keys) were soon plagued with commitment issues. Frontman Mick Jagger was frequently absent from the initial recording sessions to spend time with his new girlfriend Bianca. Guitarist Keith Richards also missed several sessions due to his growing addiction to heroin. For weeks, Richards’ village had become a haven for junkies, irritating bassist Bill Wyman to the point that he also skipped several sessions (Wyman allegedly only played eight of the album’s eighteen tracks, with the parts bass guitars recorded by Richards and lead guitarist Mick Taylor). The end result, however, was magnificent.
Although there are no instantly recognizable tracks like “Gimme Shelter” or “Satisfaction”, the album includes a host of brilliant songs. From the acoustic ballad “Sweet Black Angel” to the gospel influence “Shine a Light”, the album experiments in many genres and at the same time succeeds in the genres for which they are best known: rock and roll and blues. As with most of the Stones’ breakout albums (like Sticky Fingers, Let It Bleed, and the aforementioned Beggars Banquet), Keith Richards is the strongest on the record. Although he was never a guitar god in the same way that Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page were, his talent for playing is everywhere on the album. Richards’ choppy staccatos on the upbeat “Happy” were almost certainly an influence on Johnny Marr, while the Eagles’ Joe Walsh would praise Richards’ wonderful guitar playing on “Tumbling Dice.” Mick Taylor’s guitar playing is just as impressive, be it his effective riffs on songs like “Ventilator Blues” or his Latin American soloist on “I Just Want To See His Face.” So it’s no wonder that guitar virtuoso Slash later proclaimed Taylor one of his biggest influences. If there is one song that stands out the most, at least for me, it is “Shine a Light”.
Not only would Noel Gallagher take away the melody from his song “Live Forever”, but it would also become the title of his 2008 concert documentary. It is believed to be written about the death of former member Brian Jones (although the lyrics could just as easily interpreted in terms of Richards’ growing dependence on drugs), features Mick Jagger at his peak singing about a lost friend. The track features Billy Preston (who had the rare privilege of playing with both the Beatles and the Stones) playing a beautiful organ line. A heartwarming and soulful ballad, this song displays a sentimentality not normally attributed to the band. Exile is excellent work. Many of the tracks on this album are performed by the band to this day and still sound as powerful as forty years ago. Unlike many double albums, this beauty holds the listener’s interest from opening the track to closing. More experimental than Physical Graffiti, more energetic than Blonde on Blonde, and more cohesive than The White Album, Exile On Main Street is a strong contender for the greatest double album of all time.
