Give Satanic Majesties A Chance


Hope all are doing well. My 92 year old mother beat the virus. So can you. But I digress.
I never liked SMR when it came out and neither did anyone else including the Stones, who described it as "rubbish".
But times change and I decided, for some reason, to pop my 2002 Inaugural Edition Hybrid Disc 2002 in the CD player.
It was a remaster and came with a Certificate of Authenticity. Authentic rubbish I guess. But anyway - there is quite a bit of aimless meandering in some of the songs, but the album was better than I remembered. "In Another Land", "She’s a Rainbow", "Citadel" are not bad songs and they’ve managed to capture some very nice piano, drums and bell sounds.
All in all, better than I remember. Maybe give it another listen if you’re so inclined, misuse of the plural possessive notwithstanding.   Be well.
chayro
I was finally able to solve the maze puzzle on the inside of the gatefold cover. Even the Beatles didn’t have a maze puzzle.
The 3D cover was particularly cool back in my psychedelic ingesting days as a much younger man!
I liked "TSMR", but it’s true that not every album is a winner. I’d like to hear Mick and Keith's opinions of Mick's solo effort, "Primitive Cool." Ouch!
I agree.  I haven't listened to it in a while, but I love psychedelic music.  I just put up Keith's quote because I thought it was relevant.
I kinda like "Their Satanic Majesties Request". It fit the times. I mean, it was 1967 and everybody was doing it....
Can I offer some explanation?

Recording[edit]

Begun just after Between the Buttons had been released on 20 January 1967, the recording of Their Satanic Majesties Request was long and sporadic, broken up by court appearances[6] and jail terms. For the same reasons, the entire band was seldom present in the studio at one time. Further slowing productivity was the presence of the multiple guests that the band members had brought along. One of the more level-headed members of the band during this time, Bill Wyman, wary of psychedelic drugs, wrote the song "In Another Land" to parody the Stones' current goings-on.[5] In his 2002 book Rolling with the Stones, Wyman describes the situations in the studio:

Every day at the studio it was a lottery as to who would turn up and what – if any – positive contribution they would make when they did. Keith would arrive with anywhere up to ten people, Brian with another half-a-dozen and it was the same for Mick. They were assorted girlfriends and friends. I hated it! Then again, so did Andrew (Oldham) and just gave up on it. There were times when I wish I could have done, too.

I've always been willing to let musical artists experiment, even when the experiment might occasionally blow up in their faces.  I mean, hey, my favorite musical artists include Bartok, Beethoven and Bowie.  And, oh yeah, Coltrane.
It was garbage then and garbage now. I remember a lot of us  kept “ trying” to like it, but no drug at the time could help it. Thankfully the next three albums were the best of their career IMO.
If you were a Stones fan looking for their next great r&r, r&b LP you were probably disappointed and hated SM but if you were a music fan into the psychedelic scene you definitely could get into it. If you go with an open mind and just judge it as an LP of the time and not the Stones I think you'll come away with a different prospective.

I became of fan of "2000 light years from home" after hearing it live on their 89 Steel Wheels tour. 

I agree with Geoff - ER has some good guitar play between the boys.  I just listened that the other night....
On Emotional Rescue, OK, pretty shitty title I admit, there are a few gems. Where the Boys All Go, Send it to Me, Let Me Go, She’s so Cold
I tend to favor Voodoo Lounge.  I know, maybe the only one.  But I do have my original LP of Satanic, and have the SACD box set that has this recording too.  I like it.  
Not the only Stones album to plumb the depths with Emotional Rescue beginning a slide arrested temporarily by Tattoo You.
I suspect Keith was a little jealous because most of the album was Mick and Brian’s idea. Keith probably wanted more Chuck Berry riffs. 😩 2000 Man, In Another Land, Two Thousand Light Years from Home, The Citadel are super duper, the whole thing really. All tubes obviously. The Stones always seemed to be one step ahead of the competition drug wise, probably due to Keith’s really excellent connections. 😬

While Sgt. Pepper and TSMR were getting all the attention at the time of their release, there was an alternative underground (and not-so-underground) scene developing, one offering a very different music.

It is not for no reason that those two albums sound 180 degrees out-of-phase from the albums that were leading the way to the future, though the music contained on the two following albums already at the time of their releases sounded as if from a bygone era: Bob Dylan’s John Wesley Harding and The Band’s Music From Big Pink, both from the first half of 1968, just as the bitter aftertaste of SPLHCB and TSMR was becoming apparent.

I blame the musical missteps on LSD. While the Dylan and Band albums sound grounded, organic, and honest, The Beatles and Stones (and many of their contemporaries) sound just the opposite: lost in space, contrived, phony. That damn drug led to some really bad music (Psychedlia), not to mention the ruin of some musical talents (Skip Spence, Peter Green, Brian Wilson, Brian Jones, Eric Burton).

Eric Clapton says Atlantic Records President Ahmet Ertegun’s reaction to hearing the acetate of Cream’s Disraeli Gears album was "What a load of psychedelic horsesh*t". The Dylan and The Band albums were cleansing the palate, so to speak, wiping the slate clean, forging a new beginning by returning to the roots of the music that was the inspiration for an entire generation of writers, musicians, and singers, including those who, like The Beatles and Stones, had lost their way. Clapton felt exactly that way upon hearing MFBP, and promptly dissolved Cream, going to West Saugerties, NY (location of the Big Pink house in which the Basement Tapes were recorded), waiting for The Band to ask him to join. Naw, Eric, we got it covered. ;-)


Big Stones fan, especially Keith Richards, have to agree with Keith though. So good to hear your mom is well, just keep her away from that album and play her some "Get your Yah Yahs out. Enjoy the music
Here’s what Keith Richards thinks of Satanic Majesties and Sgt. Pepper:

"No, I understand—the Beatles sounded great when they were the Beatles. But there’s not a lot of roots in that music. I think they got carried away. Why not? If you’re the Beatles in the ’60s, you just get carried away—you forget what it is you wanted to do. You’re starting to do Sgt. Pepper. Some people think it’s a genius album, but I think it’s a mishmash of rubbish, kind of like Satanic Majesties—"Oh, if you can make a load of ****, so can we."

https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/music/interviews/a36899/keith-richards-interview-0915/

Keith is more of a roots music guy, I guess. He also likes to rip people and music in interviews.  He does it so often I wonder if he really means it or if it's some kind of inside joke.
Sorry to disagree, but I like "Their Satanic Majesties Request." It may not be in my top five Stones album favorites, but I still like it. I don’t care if Mick did call it rubbish. I did some research and found that he did cash the check. I liked it so much I bought the special edition Vinyl/CD that came out a few years ago. Yes, that’s right, I’m the one!
I'm playing "Satanic Majesties" on Spotify as I type this just to check it out. My conclusion? I'm calling the audio police to raid your houses and confiscate your audio systems. 

Frank
You got me to hunt down my Satanic Majesties' Request.  It turned out to be a British Decca pressing with a 2D record jacket.  I evidently sold off my bought-the-first-day-it-came-out 3D American pressing decades ago to try and get some coin.

The recording is so painfully bright, I quickly reverted to random needle drops.  Pressing and recorded clarity is outstanding but, for better or worse, the record is pan-potted to the point of pain.  Genuine soundstaging does happen, but rarely, and only in individual pan pots.  The music is self-indulgent but I have to admit that the guys sound like they were having a helluva good time.  Bottom line, a curiosity at best.

P.S., the lead-out groove is as quiet as any I've ever encountered.  It's been playing the entire time I've been grinding out this post.
Bless her heart and yours, that’s awesome. Lost mine last April (89 1/2).
Thanks to the universe, your mother is doing well.

Yes, my 67 mono press does sound fantastic. I don’t think the entire album is  strong as their run from LIB to Exile though.

Thanks for the suggestion to pull it out of mothballs for a spin.

I even gave Some Girls a run. After that album........dicey.

The Beatles had the spotlight last week. I went through the entire catalog, including some post break up albums.

Since I don’t stream, it’s been "desert island" collection listening other than that,it’s the trusty 65 Mac FM tubed tuner.
AFAIK Stones started as Rhythm & Blues band, while Brian Jones started to steer toward psychodelic, very popular at the time as well. Mick and Keith were interested only in R&B (sole reason of forming the band).  There were many bands playing good psychodelic music, Vanilla Fudge being one of the best.  I had their record and been at their concert in Chicago.  In comparison SMR was a flop.
Did I like it? I liked 3D picture on the sleeve.
I felt like both of you - I knew I hated it, so I didn't bother listening.  Until today.  Things change.  Now - I KNOW I hate Dark Side of the Moon.  
Maybe I'll try that tomorrow.  
@chayro congrats on your mom.  Great news!  
I too am a die hard stones fan and that’s the only album I don’t own.  I agree it has some decent material but overall not sure I could sit through it.