Album Of The Day

Aug 21 2022

3

I saw The Rolling Stones in 1997 on the Bridges to Babylon tour. My mom took me and my brother to Giants Stadium for the show. I was 16 and had only been to a few concerts prior. This concert stood out to me, if only because of the sheer number of inebriated middle aged people I was witness to. I don’t know if you ever been in a place with 70,000 drunken 50 year olds at 16, but it’s an experience. No exaggeration…because I wasn’t old enough to drink, I immediately became one of the most responsible people in attendance. For further context, I had been to separate concerts by Metallica and Pantera within a year of this Stones concert and for the first time I was legitimately concerned about something seriously bad happening at a concert. These Stones fans were out of control. Here’s two examples: Giants stadium, like every other football stadium on earth is essentially a bowl. Our seats were in the nosebleeds: on the third level and about 1/4 of the way up. Let’s say row 8 of 32. Not great seats, but also not the worst. A few minutes prior to the Stones’ set, and shortly after the Foo Fighters had finished, a man began making his way back to his seats (two rows in front of mine) after returning from the concession stand. He was drunkenly balancing a cardboard drink tray with 4 very large plastic glasses of beer in it and not doing it very well. His seats were in the middle of the row, so he had to navigate around about a dozen concertgoers, in the cramped walkway, to reach his destination. Well, about four people in, he lost his balance and fell, sliding down over three rows of seated people and sending his four beers flying into the air, drenching probably a dozen people in Bud Light. Luckily, the drunk and the half dozen people he fell on/over all ended up being ok. That was death-defying act number one. Number two occurred shortly before the end of the concert: If you’ve been to a stadium concert, you know they usually don’t sell seats behind the stage, because, well…no one wants to pay to watch the back of the band. Turns out there’s another good reason for that as well…. As the band was nearing the end of their set, my mother pointed to the area behind the stage, in the upper bowl of the stadium, and said “look, there’s somebody up there behind the stage. What’s he doing up there?” I watched the guy intently, thinking maybe he was a stage hand or maybe he was also so drunk that he would fall down the upper level of the stadium as well, but this time there would be no other concertgoers around to slow his descent. About a minute in, I see a few security guards quickly approaching the man, and what looks like an argument ensues. The man doesn’t seem to care about the security guard’s directives, but eventually, they grab him and remove him from the area. As they are escorting him down the stairs of the upper level - Mick says “this is our last song”, the band launches in to “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” and a massive barrage of fireworks launches from behind the stage, almost exactly where the drunk was hanging out a minute prior. Those security guards likely saved this guy from a pretty serious trip to the hospital and did so right in the nick of time. “So what does this have to do with Beggars Banquet?”, you’re probably thinking. Honestly, not much…It’s just a Rolling Stones anecdote I needed put out into the world, but I’ll tie it together any way: Beggars Banquet is arguably the first record where the Stones became the band that everyone knows today: they found their blues, country and honky tonk swagger, solidifying their status as a band that’s synonymous with the hard-partying rock and roll lifestyle. So, without a record like Beggar’s Banquet, I may not have ever experienced the accidental near-deaths of two 50 year old drunks in 1997, and in turn, you wouldn’t be here reading about it. It’s truly a rock and roll version of the butterfly effect.

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Apr 27 2022

Beggars Banquet

The Rolling Stones

1968

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