2023-09-06 20:28:16
The new Rolling Stones album Hackney Diamonds will be released on October 20th. At a PR appointment in London, the rock’n’roll icons were in a good mood and presented their new single.
London.
When the Rolling Stones release new music, the announcement itself is an event. Then a simple press conference is not enough, then it has to be great cinema. Or big theatre. On Wednesday, the legendary rock band invited to the traditional Hackney Empire theater in London to talk to US talk show host Jimmy Fallon about their upcoming studio album. The LP “Hackney Diamonds” is scheduled for release on October 20th. The first single “Angry” is already available. In front of invited guests, fans and journalists, the band was greeted with great cheering on Wednesday.
“We were very lazy,” frontman Mick Jagger (80) admitted jokingly. After all, it’s been 18 years since the last Stones album with their own songs, “A Bigger Bang”. “Well, we toured a lot too. But we know that maybe we were a bit too lazy. So we said: Come on, let’s set a deadline and make an album.” Then everything happened very quickly, confirmed Ronnie Wood (76). “We had a lot of ideas,” says the guitarist. “Just before Christmas we threw everything together, got going and recorded everything.”
They miss their drummer Charlie Watts
“Hackney Diamonds” marks a turning point in the Rolling Stones’ more than 60-year career, as it is the first album since the death of Charlie Watts. The drummer died in August 2021 at the age of 80. “Everything’s different since Charlie’s gone,” said cult guitarist Keith Richards (79), who wore a hat and sunglasses befitting his status. “Of course we miss him but thanks to Charlie Watts we now have Steve Jordan who Charlie recommended to us.”
The 66-year-old Jordan was friends with Watts and represented him at concerts when he had to sit out due to health problems. With Jordan on drums, the Stones also did their 60th anniversary European tour last year.
On the new album, Jordan drums on ten of the twelve songs. The Stones recorded the other two with Watts in 2019. Ex-bassist Bill Wyman, who was a Stones member from 1962 to 1993, also plays on one of the two. “We asked Bill to come into the studio and he recorded a track,” said Jagger, clearly pleased. “So we got the old band back together on one song.”
“We are a London band”
In conversation with talk show star, comedian and Stones fan Fallon, the Stones were in the best of moods. Sitting in red velvet armchairs, under glittering chandeliers, the trio chatted in front of the Stones’ famous lip-and-tongue logo, which lit up the stage in a shattered design. “Hackney Diamonds” is old East London slang for broken glass from a shop window or a car that’s broken after a robbery or break-in. “We’re a London band,” Richards said.
Jagger, Richards and Wood didn’t mention ex-Beatles Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, who are rumored to be in the studio with their Stones friends for “Hackney Diamonds”. However, it has been revealed that Lady Gaga will sing a duet with Jagger called “Sweet Sound Of Heaven” on the new album. The fact that Wood already revealed that was obviously not planned.
Music video for the new single “Angry”
After all these decades, what still drives the Stones? “I don’t want to sound cocky,” says Jagger, “but we wouldn’t have released this album if we didn’t really like it.” However, having fun with music doesn’t seem to be the only motivation. When asked why he works with many other musicians besides the Stones, Wood explained: “You have to keep your fingers moving when you get to our age.” To laughter from the audience and his Stones colleagues, he added: “You have to keep everything moving.”
At the end of the event, which was broadcast via live stream, the Rolling Stones presented the music video for their new single “Angry”, a riff-heavy rock’n’roll song with a lot of groove. In the clip, US actress Sydney Sweeney drives a car down Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles while the Stones, partially rejuvenated, play music on the scoreboards. The 25-year-old Sweeney sat in the audience in London alongside other guests such as the British film director Edgar Wright (“Shaun Of The Dead”) or the German TV and radio presenter Fritz Egner.
Two journalists came to the first PR appointment
The Rolling Stones did not comment on a possible new tour on Wednesday. However, that is not excluded. Keith Richards said that along with recording a new album, concerts are the “holy grail” for a band. After six decades, anything seems possible with the Rolling Stones.
By the way, when Mick Jagger and Co. released their first album in 1964, interest wasn’t quite as great. “Keith and I were at a pub,” the singer recalled. “There were two journalists there, one from NME and one from Melody Maker. We ordered them a beer and said, ‘Here’s our album, listen.’ Then we left and that was it.” How times change. (dpa)
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