Rolling Stones - Their Satanic Majesties Request

I'm on a mission. That mission is to learn to like Their Satanic Majesties Request by The Rolling Stones. I think i can do it.

One, this album is a self made monstrosity because they were completely drugged up to the point of getting arrested, their manager actually quit and Bill Wyman was close to that point, they had absolutely no one to tell them anything was too much or too dumb, and it was anybody's guess who would show up every day and how many superfluous hangers on they might bring with them. So the way it sounds is off the table.

Two, it's a complete rip off of Sgt. Pepper and the band unanimously agreed it was a disaster, then abandoned psychedelic experimentation all together afterward. About a month before the intended release they freaked out and just bashed everything together as best as possible. I can totally respect that.

The songs aren't about anything, so there's no need to actually analyze the lyrics. This is just pure studio improvisation.

Actually that helps a lot. It's really not much different than Pharoah Sanders, or any random Experimental Rock album on bandcamp. If this was the first Rolling Stones album, you could be really interested in hearing them develop and improve. It's their 8th album, so i can understand everyone's agitation at the final result, but it's really not as bad as everyone says it is. Granted, the harder they copy the Beatles the less enjoyable the result, but it's not like they're pretending it's innovative; it's obvious they're copying Sgt. Pepper and that's not necessarily bad.

I think you have to approach this album like you might approach Berio or Rochberg: this is collage music, and it's meaning is fully dependent on your own interpretants.

Crap, now i have to unpack that comparison. Ok, Peirceian semiotics: the short, short version.

Peirce uses a three part model for meaning. There is a tangible sign (the representamen) which your mind translates into a more personally meaningful secondary sign (the interpretant), to produce a reaction (the object), and that series can go on indefinitely until you're thinking about what you had for breakfast yesterday but can't remember why.

So, whatever thing the Rolling Stones do, gets associated with other instances of hearing something similar, and it makes you think of The Beatles or whatever, and that association makes you say "aha!" or "barf" or "good god turn it off!" or whatever. If this is all new to you, then it probably just sounds like Jagger and Richards are high as balls but everybody's getting paid a lot of money to be there so no one bothers to stop them.

You know what, forget it's the Stones and it is actually pretty good space cadet music. Not quite as exciting as Dave Grusin, but not too far behind either. It's actually the real song parts that drag the album down, the free improvisation is great.

I know i said the recording/production itself is off the table, but don't ever fully pan your lead vocals. You can do whatever you want with instruments, but hearing full tilt Mick Jagger over my left shoulder is extremely annoying.

I'm not quite there yet, but it's starting to grow on me. The instrumentals are definitely the better part of the album, but the question "why can't we sing this altogether" is a pretty authentic LSD induced sentiment. I'm trying guys, i just think you tried too hard to make it coherent. I'll give it a few more listens eventually.

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