Black and Blue

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For other uses, see Black and Blue (disambiguation).

Black and Blue
Studio album by
the Rolling Stones
Released23 April 1976 (1976-04-23)
Recorded
  • 5 December 1974 – 4 April 1975
  • 19 October 1975 – February 1976 (overdubs)[1]
Studio
Genre
Length41:24
The Glimmer Twins
The Rolling Stones chronology
Rolled Gold: The Very Best of the Rolling Stones
(1974) 		Black and Blue
(1976) 		Love You Live
(1977)
Singles from Black and Blue
  1. "Fool to Cry"
    Released: 16 April 1976[2]

Black and Blue is a studio album by the English rock band the Rolling Stones, released on 23 April 1976 by Rolling Stones Records.

This album was the first record after former guitarist

The Glimmer Twins
", a pseudonym used by Jagger and Richards for their roles as producers.

Black and Blue showed the band blending their traditional

funk music. Only one single from the album, "Fool to Cry", had any significant chart success, and reception to the album was mixed. The album received a few positive reviews at the time of release, though many reviewers found it mostly forgettable, and tended to rank it very low compared to prior Stones releases. Retrospective reviews from more recent publications such as AllMusic have been kinder to the album, with critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine stating that the album's "being longer on grooves and jams than songs" ended up being "what's good about it".[5]

History

The Rolling Stones returned to

Tour of the Americas
.

Following the conclusion of the tour, the band went to

Sanibel Island, Florida, to be photographed by fashion photographer Hiro for the album cover art.[6]

Stylistically, Black and Blue embraces hard rock with "Hand of Fate" (solo by Wayne Perkins) and "Crazy Mama"; funk with "Hot Stuff" (solo by Harve Mandel); reggae with their cover of "Cherry Oh Baby" (Ronnie Wood and Keith Richards weaving guitars); and blues with "Melody," featuring the talents of Billy Preston – a heavy contributor to the album. Musical and thematic styles were merged on the seven-minute "Memory Motel," with both Jagger and Richards contributing lead vocals to a love song embedded within a life-on-the-road tale.

While all the album's songs except "Cherry Oh Baby" were officially credited to Jagger/Richards as authors, the credit for "Hey Negrita" specifies "Inspiration by Ron Wood" and "Melody" lists "Inspiration by Billy Preston". Bill Wyman would later release a version of "Melody" with his Rhythm Kings, crediting Preston as author. "Melody" is based on "Do You Love Me" by Billy Preston and Bruce Fisher, from Preston's 1973 album Everybody Likes Some Kind of Music. The only song to include both session players Wayne Perkins and Harvey Mandel is Memory Motel where Perkins plays acoustic, Mandel electric, but without a guitar solo.

Two extra tracks recorded in the Rotterdam sessions were later released on 1981's

Slave" and "Worried About You" (guitar solo by Wayne Perkins).[7]

Release and reception

Released on 23 April 1976[8] – with "Fool to Cry", a worldwide top 10 hit, as its lead single – Black and Blue reached No. 2 in the UK and spent an interrupted four-week spell at number 1 in the United States, going platinum there.

The album was promoted with a controversial billboard on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood that depicted the model Anita Russell, bound by Jagger[9] under the phrase "I'm Black and Blue from the Rolling Stones – and I love it!" The billboard was removed after protests by the feminist group Women Against Violence Against Women, although it earned the band widespread press coverage.[10]

Critical reception

Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
The Great Rock Discography
6/10[14]
MusicHound[15]
NME7/10[16]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide[17]
The Village VoiceA−[18]
Tom HullB+[19]

Critical view was polarised. According to writer Bud Scoppa, some critics were bewildered by the album, while others dismissed it for its dissimilarities to Exile on Main St. (1972), which by then had become regarded as the group's best work.[20] Author Gary J. Jucha describes the mixed critical reaction as typical of "most progressive albums by an established recording artist."[8]

The Miami Herald highlighted the record as a musical departure for the band, writing: "Black and Blue is not a rock album. It is a sampler, of sorts, a musical term paper. In it the Stones examine the several influences on pop music today: salsa, disco, reggae. By and large, they do so superbly. But in committing themselves to exercises in musical formulae as tight as these, the Stones attach their music to styles subject to rapid eclipse."[23]

Retrospectively, Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic praised the album for being "longer on grooves and jams than songs", which he felt was inevitable as it was recorded while the Stones auditioned a replacement for Taylor, and for profiling the band's musical chemistry. He felt that "groove and sound" characterise the record, generally eschewing straight rock songs for reggae, funk and disco excursions that "sound like integral parts of the Stones' lifeblood".[11] Bud Scoppa of Uncut described the record as an "unlikely triumph", with the groove-oriented material and guesting "hotshot musicians" combining for strong performances, "expertly brought out by the ultra-dry sonics of engineers Glyn Johns and Keith Harwood". He wrote: "Forty-one minutes of super-tight, bone-dry, hi-fi rock and soul, Black and Blue is one of the Stones' most underrated albums – the only Stones LP to focus primarily on feel rather than subject matter."[20]

Less favourably,

cowboy tale 'Hand of Fate'."[17]

In 2000, Black and Blue was ranked at number 536 in Colin Larkin's All Time Top 1000 Albums.[26]

Legacy

In 1977, Keith Richards said that the album "wasn't very good – certainly nowhere as good as Let It Bleed", though he reappraised the record in 1984. Mick Jagger offered his assessment in the 1990s: "It was a bit of a holiday period. I mean, we cared, but we didn't care as much as we had, not really concentrating on the creative process."[20] Mick Taylor praised the album in a 1979 interview.[20]

In 1994, Black and Blue was remastered and reissued by

Universal Music, and once more in 2011 by Universal Music Enterprises in a Japanese-only SHM-SACD
version. The 1994 remaster was initially released in a Collector's Edition CD, which replicated in miniature many elements of the original gatefold album packaging.

Track listing

All tracks are written by

Hot Stuff" 5:202."Hand of Fate" 4:283."Cherry Oh Baby"Eric Donaldson3:574."Memory Motel
" 7:07
Side two
No.TitleLength
5."
Ron Wood)
4:59
6."Melody" (inspiration by Billy Preston)5:47
7."Fool to Cry"5:03
8."Crazy Mama"4:34

Personnel

  • Track numbers noted in parentheses below are based on the CD track numbering.

The Rolling Stones

  • Mick Jagger – lead vocals (all tracks), backing vocals (1, 3, 4), percussion (1), piano (4), electric piano (7), electric guitar (8)
  • Keith Richards – electric guitar (all but 4), backing vocals (1-5, 8), electric piano (4), bass guitar and piano (8), co-lead vocals (4)
  • Bill Wyman – bass guitar (all but 8), percussion (1)
  • Charlie Watts – drums (all tracks), percussion (1)

Additional personnel

Technical

Charts

Certifications

Certifications for Black and Blue
Region Certification Certified units/sales
Canada (Music Canada)[46] Gold 50,000^
France (
SNEP)[47]
 Gold 100,000*
Netherlands (NVPI)[48] Gold 25,000[48]
United Kingdom (BPI)[49] Gold 100,000^
United States (RIAA)[50] Platinum 1,000,000^

^ Shipments figures based on certification alone.

References

  1. ^ "Overdub work 1975 and 1976". Archived from the original on 5 August 2011. Retrieved 5 September 2012.
  2. ^ "Rolling Stones singles".
  3. ISBN 0-7119-4303-6
    .
  4. ^ Wood 2007. pg. 137.
  5. ^ Erlewine, Stephen Thomas. "Black and Blue – The Rolling Stones". AllMusic. Archived from the original on 21 March 2021. Retrieved 31 March 2021.
  6. ^ "Led Zeppelin Crashed Here – The Rock and Roll Landmarks of North America" by Chris Epting, p. 109
  7. ^ ""Slave" and "Worried About You" recorded during sessions in January–February 1975". Archived from the original on 20 March 2012. Retrieved 5 September 2012.
  8. ^
    ISBN 9781493050741
    . Retrieved 2 April 2023.
  9. ^ "Anita Russell: Stones" Archived 14 January 2009 at the Wayback Machine
  10. Time
     (7 February 1977).
  11. ^ a b Erlewine, Stephen Thomas. "Black and Blue – The Rolling Stones". AllMusic. Archived from the original on 21 October 2023. Retrieved 21 October 2023.
  12. ISBN 089919026X. Archived
    from the original on 25 May 2020. Retrieved 9 March 2019 – via robertchristgau.com.
  13. ^
    ISBN 1-85227 745 9
    .
  14. ISBN 978-1841956152
    .
  15. ISBN 1-57859-061-2
    .
  16. ^ "The Rolling Stones – Black and Blue CD". CD Universe/Muze. Archived from the original on 20 July 2012. Retrieved 15 November 2014.
  17. ^ a b "The Rolling Stones: Album Guide". rollingstone.com. Archived version retrieved 15 November 2014.
  18. ^ Christgau, Robert (14 June 1976). "Christgau's Consumer Guide". The Village Voice. New York. Archived from the original on 25 March 2014. Retrieved 27 May 2013.
  19. ^ Hull, Tom (30 June 2018). "Streamnotes (June 2018)". tomhull.com. Archived from the original on 12 October 2020. Retrieved 11 February 2020.
  20. ^ a b c d Scoppa, Bud (2021). "Black and Blue". Uncut Ultimate Music Guide: The Rolling Stones. London: BandLab UK Limited: 76.
  21. ^ Bangs, Lester (July 1976). "State of the Art: Bland on Bland". Creem. Vol. 8, no. 2.
  22. ^ a b -Christgau, Robert. "Robert Christgau: CG: The Rolling Stones". robertchristgau.com. Archived from the original on 6 June 2020. Retrieved 28 August 2019.
  23. ^ Cosford, Bill (29 April 1976). "Stones Turn Trendy". Miami Herald: 10-D. Retrieved 2 April 2023.
  24. ISBN 1-85828-457-0
    .
  25. ISBN 1-84195-860-3
    .
  26. ISBN 0-7535-0493-6
    .
  27. ^ "Bea Feitler wins book". lilianpacce.com (in French). 20 August 2012. Archived from the original on 20 December 2017. Retrieved 31 March 2021.
  28. ^ Barker, Emily (2 June 2015). "The Rolling Stones' Album Artwork Secrets Revealed: The Story Behind Every Sleeve". NME. Archived from the original on 13 January 2020. Retrieved 31 March 2021.
  29. ISBN 0-646-11917-6
    .
  30. ^ "Austriancharts.at – The Rolling Stones – Black and Blue" (in German). Hung Medien. Retrieved 22 December 2022.
  31. ^ "Top RPM Albums: Issue 4135a". RPM. Library and Archives Canada. Retrieved 22 December 2022.
  32. ^ "Dutchcharts.nl – The Rolling Stones – Black and Blue" (in Dutch). Hung Medien. Retrieved 22 December 2022.
  33. ISBN 978-951-1-21053-5
    .
  34. GfK Entertainment Charts
    . Retrieved 22 December 2022.
  35. Musica e Dischi
    (in Italian). Retrieved 27 May 2022. Set "Tipo" on "Album". Then, in the "Artista" field, search "Rolling Stones".
  36. ISBN 4-87131-077-9
    .
  37. ^ "Charts.nz – The Rolling Stones – Black and Blue". Hung Medien. Retrieved 22 December 2022.
  38. ^ "Norwegiancharts.com – The Rolling Stones – Black and Blue". Hung Medien. Retrieved 22 December 2022.
  39. ^ "Swedishcharts.com – The Rolling Stones – Black and Blue". Hung Medien. Retrieved 22 December 2022.
  40. ^ "The Rolling Stones | Artist | Official Charts". UK Albums Chart. Retrieved 22 December 2022.
  41. ^ "The Rolling Stones Chart History (Billboard 200)". Billboard. Retrieved 22 December 2022.
  42. ISBN 0-646-11917-6
    .
  43. ^ "Top 100 Albums of '76". RPM. Library and Archives Canada. Retrieved 11 October 2021.
  44. ^ "Jaaroverzichten – Album 1976". Dutch Charts. Retrieved 11 October 2021.
  45. Recorded Music New Zealand
    . Retrieved 11 October 2021.
  46. ^ "Warner /Elektra /Atlantic Sets Canada's AII- Time,12 -Month Sales Record – 44 Gold and Platinum Albums:Platinum-Album" (PDF). Billboard. 2 October 1976. p. 63. Retrieved 20 December 2020.
  47. ^ "French album certifications – The Rolling Stones – Black and Blue" (in French). InfoDisc. Retrieved 25 February 2024. Select THE ROLLING STONES and click OK. 
  48. ^ a b "Bill Wyman Gold Record 'Black and Blue' / for sales of 25,000 units / in the Netherlands". 20 December 2020.
  49. ^ "British album certifications – The Rolling Stones – Black and Blue". British Phonographic Industry. Retrieved 11 June 2016.
  50. ^ "American album certifications – The Rolling Stones – Black and Blue". Recording Industry Association of America. Retrieved 11 June 2016.

External links

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