Beggars Banquet is the seventh studio album by The Rolling Stones and it was released on December 6th, 1968. It saw the band return to their rock roots after the much more experimental Their Satanic Majesties Request.
The Stones forsook psychedelic experimentation to return to their blues roots on this celebrated album, which was immediately acclaimed as one of their landmark achievements.
A strong acoustic Delta blues flavor colors much of the material, particularly ‘Salt of the Earth”‘ and ‘No Expectations’, which features some beautiful slide guitar work.
Basic rock & roll was not forgotten, however: ‘Street Fighting Man’, a reflection of the political turbulence of 1968, was one of their most innovative singles, and ‘Sympathy for the Devil’, with its fire-dancing guitar licks, leering Jagger vocals, African rhythms, and explicitly satanic lyrics, was an image-defining epic.
On ‘Stray Cat Blues,’ Jagger and crew began to explore the kind of decadent sexual sleaze that they would take to the point of self-parody by the mid-’70s. At the time, though, the approach was still fresh, and the lyrical bite of most of the material ensured Beggars Banquets place as one of the top blues-based rock records of all time.
Tracklist:
1. Sympathy for the Devil
2. No Expectations
3. Dear Doctor
4. Parachute Woman
5. Jig-Saw Puzzle
6. Street Fighting Man
7. Prodigal Son
8. Stray Cat Blue
9. Factory Girl
10. Salt of the Earth
Photo Credit: Charlie & Kasie Bennett
