With an indolent air and an insolent stare

Continuing my trip back through the 1994 album charts.

07/08/94 : Voodoo Lounge - The Rolling Stones


Our sixteenth visit with the Stones moving them clear of Dylan into second place on their own and only one behind Elvis - I suspect they're going to end up winners through sheer longevity alone. I have heard of this one but don't think I ever listened to it - I was not interested in this period Stones.

Nope - not for me. In some ways I think I was unlucky to meet the Stones when I did (which was admittedly a bit before this time) because all their stuff sounds like this (or worse) - it's just generic US-ish rock, Yes, with hindsight there's an argument that early Stones helped to shape this sound and hence they can use it as much as they like - but at the time for me I was just "why are these guys so highly regarded?". Listening to it now, I think none of this album is dreadful but very little of it stands out from the pack. I did quite like "New Faces" though because it's a bit different, as is "The Worst" but I can definitely do without that because they've decided they want to be Bob Dylan - I also didn't need the six minutes of "Thru And Thru". If you like this period Stones then I guess you'll like this and, whilst it's perfectly bearable (although 52 minutes of it was too much), you're welcome to it.

We're at #4 in the charts this week on their fourth week of a fourteen week run with it having peaked at #1 in its debut week - it managed two subsequent runs of five and eleven weeks, but hasn't been seen since '95. The rest of the top five this week were Wet Wet Wet, Larry Adler, The Prodigy and Gun (a new entry who I don't remember at all) and the next highest new entry is Michael Ball (#7) who unfortunately I haven't been allowed to forget. 

Wikipedia tells us this is their twentieth album and their first without Bill Wyman, who was experiencing some "difficulties" around this time. It was produced by Don Was, who apparently steered them towards a more conventional sound which lead to a bit of a spat later with Jagger saying "Don steered us away from: groove songs, African influences and things like that...and I think it was a mistake" to which Don replied he was not "anti-groove, just anti-groove without substance" - meow! Critically, the reviews were pretty decent but I feel Q got it right with "no classic, but nor is it the resounding hound it could have been". Commercially, it seems like it made no difference what anyone said because it got to #1 in Australia, Canada, The Netherlands, Germany, New Zealand and Switzerland and #2 in the US, selling six million copies globally (and there's no way it deserved that). Apparently there was also an interactive CD-ROM, which I'm intrigued by, but all I can find out about it is that it got "mixed reviews".

discogs.com tells us you can pick up a decent CD version for £1.50 but if you want the reissued limited edition red and yellow vinyl version it's going to set you back £150. I can understand why people like this, but I can take it or leave it (which means I'll be leaving it).

31/07/94 - A phenomenally successful debut
14/08/94 - Just why?

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