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We counted down the complete Beatles’ catalog, and now we take on their rivals for title of best rock band ever – The Rolling Stones. This time we’re going to break down the band’s 40+ year career in easily digestible chunks. Because Universal will be reissuing the Stones’ studio albums from the seventies, we figured that would be a great place to start. Besides, it was arguably their most fertile decade, at least in terms of variety. Their output ranged from the ragged brilliance of 1971’s Sticky Fingers to the unbridled energy of 1978’s Some Girls. In between we find the sprawling Exile on Main Street, the decadent Goats Head Soup, the fiery It’s Only Rock and Roll and the soulful Black and Blue. Keep in mind, the countdown only includes studio album cuts, no live or unreleased tracks. Check back each day for the next five songs on the list, prepare to hit the message boards to defend your favorites, and follow the countdown all the way to Number 1.

The complete list to date.

The Last Five:

15. “Loving Cup” (from Exile on Main St.)

14. “Bitch” (from Sticky Fingers)

13. “Beast of Burden” (from Some Girls)

12. “Angie” (from Goats Head Soup)

11. “Tumbling Dice” (from Exile on Main St.)

10. “Shattered”

From Some Girls

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Mick Jagger supposedly wrote this scuzzy classic off Some Girls during a New York City cab ride. Let’s just assume that the cabbie took Mick on all the back roads to get to his destination, because “Shattered” is a travelogue that will never be used by the Chamber of Commerce.

And yet, even with all the rats, crime, and maggots, there’s still somehow admiration to be found in Mick’s descriptions, in the way that he implies that only the strong can survive the city. I know that Blondie’s “Rapture” often gets the credit for bringing rap to the Top 40, but Mick’s talk-singing here has more than a little flow itself. Notice how many times during the song he repeats words several times in succession (e.g. the crime rate doesn’t just go up, it goes “up, up, up, up, UP!”) All of this repetition mirrors the excess on display in NYC.

Keith Richards contributes a grimy riff that sounds as if it’s been breathing the congested air of rush-hour traffic. Richards also gets the credit for the idea of the brilliant “Shadoobie” backing vocals; they give the track a twinkle in its eye, letting people know that the Stones love the city, warts and all.

After all, Jagger essentially tells the Big Apple to bring it on with his subversively brilliant final line: “Pile it up, pile it high on the platter.” Just what he wants to be piled up, well, I’ll leave that to your imagination.

9. “Shine a Light”

From Exile on Main St.

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The saga of Brian Jones is one of the saddest in rock history. He started the Rolling Stones only to be marginalized by the powerful personalities elsewhere in the band, his lack of songwriting acumen, and his own drug use. When he died of mysterious circumstances in 1969, he had already been fired from the band he helped to found.

The interesting thing about “Shine A Light,” Mick Jagger’s tribute to his former bandmate, is that the essence of the song was written in 1968, a year before Jones’ death. That means Jagger showed unfortunately accurate foresight with his lyrics. In the end, Jones was indeed left alone by his “late-night friends” in the “cold, gray dawn.” And, in the end, Jagger never could “get a line” on his doomed friend. The heartbreak and frustration at the useless inevitability of it all is evident in his vocal.

Mick would transform the song for its inclusion on Exile on Main St., adding the benedictory chorus as a bit of wish fulfillment. The arrangement is just janky enough to keep things from getting too maudlin, thanks to Billy Preston’s brilliant intermingling of mournful piano and jubilant organ. There’s also the irony of Jones’ replacement in the band, young Mick Taylor, ripping through a guitar solo that rages against the dying of the light.

Nobody will ever accuse the Rolling Stones of being overly sentimental, but they got this good-bye just right. All that they ask for Brian Jones is that he be allowed his favorite music. If they got their wish, then the sweet hereafter must be wall-to-wall blues.

8. “Dead Flowers”

From Sticky Fingers

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The Stones indulge their love of country with extraordinary facility here, playing this song with a flair that the finest in Nashville could only envy. It’s like an Allman Brothers song with all of the jammy energy harnessed into one radio-friendly, powerful package.

Jagger kisses a woman good-bye here because he knows he’ll never run in the same circles. While she’s with the rich and famous, he’s in the gutter indulging in all kinds of tawdriness. He still has the moxie to call out his ex on her wish for street cred: “I know you think you’re the queen of the underground.”

Mick Taylor is brilliant on lead guitar. For how young he was at the time, he shows remarkable restraint and uncanny timing, adding exactly the right dollops of sorrow to contrast Jagger’s straight-faced vocals. Keith Richards’ acoustic guitar and Ian Stewart’s piano are also savory elements in the mix.

It all leads to that effortlessly catchy and the final glory note, with Jagger and Richards harmonizing in shaggy glory. Music Row, eat your hearts out.

7. “Miss You”

From Some Girls

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Call it disco, if you must. The truth is that, whatever you wish you call the sound that the Stones conjured on “Miss You,” it’s perfectly apropos for the itchy energy of Mick Jagger’s protagonist on the prowl.

If “Shattered” captured the everything, all-the-time seediness of New York, “Miss You” expertly portrays the city in all its loneliness. The itchy urge that Jagger feels, so perfectly mirrored by the main riff, cannot be satisfied by anything, not his dreams, not any sensory pleasures, not even the promise of female accompaniment. Toward the end, he sums up the source of his misery: “I guess I’m just lyin’ to myself/It’s just you and no one else.”

It’s somehow fitting that the ever-humble Bill Wyman cedes credit for one of his few moments in the forefront with the Stones. His bottom-heavy bass-line that grounds the song, according to Wyman, was conceived by Billy Preston, who was there when Jagger was writing the song. That may be true, but Wyman had to execute it, and the way he finds spaces around Charlie Watts’ four-on-the-floor beat is pure magic.

Add in the excellence of session players Sugar Blue (on harmonica) and Mel Collins (the slinky sax solos) and you’ve got a track that still sounds cool long after the genre from which it borrowed has become kitschy nostalgia.

6. “Happy”

From Exile on Main St.

LISTEN HERE  

You never know when inspiration is going to strike, especially if you’re Keith Richards, a man with a riff for every nook and cranny on that famously weathered face. When it does, you best be ready to harness the muse, even if she calls on you when none of your other band members are present.

Such was the case with “Happy,” Richards’ irresistibly good-time showcase on Exile on Main St. When he came up with the idea, Keith laid down the track with producer Jimmy Miller on drums and Bobby Keys adding saxophone and maracas. Richards himself handled all the guitars with his usual aplomb, and added his memorably craggy vocal before the other half of the Glimmer Twins could butt in.

The result is pure rock ebullience, a song so energetic that Keith claims that it has the mystical power to restore good spirits to the down-hearted. And who am I to doubt him, because it certainly tugs at the corner of my mouth every time I hear him, in unapologetically unsavory mode, asserting that the outlaw life is the only way to be free.

The song was eventually beefed up from the original track with more horns and Jagger’s good-sport backing vocals, but really all you need is Keith chunking away at that main riff and warbling with soulful abandon. He doesn’t get the opportunity often, but Richards usually produces memorable results when he plays frontman in the Stones, and “Happy” is his finest in that role.

The complete list to date.

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