An emblematic pocket in Braguette, a succession of unstoppable titles. Making of a masterpiece, Sticky Fingers
Recorded at the Olympic studios in London, Muscle Shoals in Alabama and Stargroves, Mick Jagger's Manor in Bekshire, Sticky Fingers There remains the most thought and most worked album of Stones. All the titles were all quite successful before entering the studio, which was no longer the case thereafter. The group had even already recorded “Sister Morphine”, with Ry Cooder, before Mick Taylor joined the group. And Sticky Fingers There remains a wonderful disc, without a single title lower than the others.
Mick Taylor enters the scene
The replacement for Brian Jones, a young Mick Taylor of barely twenty years old, embodied a new type of WECB: a mouth of angel steeped in shyness. But his guitar game, focused on the baptismal font with “Country Honk” and “Live With Me” in the Let it bleed From December 1969, had given a serious facelift to the group. In March 1970, Taylor joined the rest of the group, plus producer Jimmy Miller, from Brooklyn, at the Muscle Shoals Sound Studio in Alabama, to put it in box Sticky Fingers.
In the wake of Let it bleedthe first album of the decade for the Stones – published in April 1971 – brewed Blues, Soul and Country influences, with a very English rogue charm. On the “Wild Horses” stroll, Jagger seemed to put his heart naked. Elsewhere, the group allowed stupid and lust to be supplied, on very virile titles like “Bitch” or “Brown Sugar”, or the camée “Sister Morphine”.
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While most of their colleagues were burning from Moog and Mellotron, the Stones remained near the bone. The saxophonist Bobby Keys and the trumpeter Jim Price brought a new dimension to sound; Taylor's exquisite counterchants were not to be outdone. They were new Rolling Stones, clearing the future vigorously.
The race in mind
“Brown Sugar” is now a classic, just like “Honky Tonk Women” and other emblematic titles of the group. The resumption of “You Gotta Move”, by Mississippi Fred McDowell was part of this selection of titles regularly played by Stones in the studio. “Bitch” and “Dead Flowers” were recorded in Olympic, as well as “Can't You Hear Me Knocking”. This title at the Groove and the unstoppable RIFF allowed Taylor to install a historic solo. Central protagonist of this album, his way of playing brought an original touch and even a certain finesse to Sticky Fingers.
In Stargroves, the mobile studio sixteen tracks was placed outside and the group played in the building, in a huge excellent acoustics gallery. This is where “Moonlight Mile” was born. Mick Jagger had hummed the start to the group on the train leading them from London to Bristol. Then he had the idea of ​​decorating him with strings. The riff on which the arranger Paul Buckmaster modeled his orchestral arrangement, with this ethereal end, ambiguous harmonically is the work of Taylor too.
Homecoming
More prosaically, by exploring new more or less exotic musical territories, the Stones had lost their “mojo” a little, which made the very essence of their music: blues and rock'n'roll. They had no choice but to reinvent themselves and will do it brilliantly … by reconnecting with their roots. In this flamboyant rebirth, producer Jimmy Miller, with the maneuver on the fantastic trilogy that will constitute albums Beggar's Banquet,, Let it bleed And Sticky Fingerswill play a crucial role. Behind his console, he redefined their sound in the studio … A roots sound and refined to the extreme … Using guitars with evil precision, whether they spring up like solo lightning or draw rhythmic interlacing … capturing the energy of the quintet in the most natural and direct way possible …
With Jimmy Miller, the Gimmer Twins Jagger/Richards will not only access the quintessence of their art of Songwriters but (re) define the grammar of rock for the decades to come … An electric tornado born in the bouges of Chicago, giving birth to songs with powerful melodies, not moving away from the former Record.
