On July 26, 1943, Mick was born. Eight decades later, he is still singing and writing songs for the greatest and oldest rock
and roll band in the world. If you don't know which band I'm talking about, please close this window and leave your house for the first time in your life.
With or without the Stones, there's a fact: whenever I see Jagger's face on a magazine or TV, I think of Wandering Spirit; his most personal record to date, beautifully recorded by Rick Rubin celebrating Jagger's first half century. If you remove the name Mick Jagger out of the equation, It was also a cathartic and
sensitive album about the blues of a lonely man. Nevertheless, what kind of
blues a man like Mick Jagger could possibly have; a blues strong enough to
record an album like this?
Mick Jagger is an icon by himself and with
the Rolling Stones. He has the kind of life 99% of the occidental
heterosexual male population want to have: wake up, exercise, travel, eat the
finest food at the finest restaurants, sing your own songs and have the audience
singing them with you, get paid for this job, meet presidents,
kings, queens, artists and beautiful women -so many women you forget their names and don't care a bit about child support when a hot supermodel comes
to you pregnant and says "it's your child I'm carrying".
OK, it's not 99% of
heterosexual males; it's 99.99%.
Wandering Spirit tells us that, even when he's a super-cool guy,
sometimes a man gets the feeling that he's alone and bored. But
here's the thing, and the problem other Rolling Stones songs have: we don't care about Jagger's blues, we just want to live his
life! Again, let's remove the money and fame Jagger has and we will find a great rock and roll record
and, comparing it with the Stones records released since 1989,
way superior to them.
For instance, there's "Put Me in The
Trash," a rock and roll number about a former millionaire who's calling
her ex-girlfriend for a loan. He bought her shoes, a Ferrari and tickets to the
Opera. Now he's asking for some dough. What could have happened? He wasted his
money on parties, alcohol, drugs and women. He realized he should have saved
some money in the bank for leaner times.
The greatest moment comes when Lenny Kravitz
and Red Hot Chili Pepper's Flea join Mick to pay tribute to Bill Withers with his "Use Me".
Jagger also sings Lowman Pauling's "Think" as a tribute to James
Brown, I suppose.
So the dues are paid here. The album closes
with an Irish violin and Mick singing "Handsome Molly," leaving the
listener with the feeling that the singer was alone from the very beginning and
it will be the same at the end.
Jagger did something he never did before even
with the Stones, releasing his album the same day as a Beatle released his
(Paul McCartney's Off The Ground hit the streets on February 9th, 1993),
breaking the old rule that kept Beatles and Stones separated with their
respective parts of the music market. McCartney did not care, for sure. In 1993
CD sales were at the top of their game (remember, this was the year of
Nirvana's In Utero and Pearl Jam's Vs.) and there were CD
buyers with money in their pockets for all of them. Anyways, Paul and Mick are
millionaires so even if their records did not sell more than 10 copies,
they would not starve.
You can get this forgotten treasure used for
less than 4 bucks on Amazon.com Z-shops; so for a small price you can prove
that I am being honest. This was an outstanding record, comparable with Stones
productions like Some Girls, Tattoo You and Emotional Rescue.
More Mick:
Goddess at The Doorway (Virgin, 2001): Rolling Stone Magazine rated this album as classical (5 stars). It's OK, but Wandering is better, way better.Primitive Cool (Atlantic, 1987): Do people actually remember "Let's Work"? It was a great radio tune!
She's The Boss (Atlantic, 1985): A hard woman to please, Mick's debut was pretty decent.
