Video Du Jour (X2): The Rolling Stones

Yep, the Rolling Stones are back. They played the first of their 50th anniversary shows in London last night, and the grizzled Stones were joined onstage by former band members Mick Taylor and Bill Wyman, along with the ubiquitous Jeff Beck.

Save your pennies – the Stones are threatening to tour. Meanwhile you can amuse yourself with the official video for “Doom and Gloom,” featuring Swedish actress Noomi Rapace (Prometheus, the original Girl With The Dragon Tattoo). By the way, there’s some nudity in here, so it’s not safe for work!

Bonus: The Rolling Stones performing “Honky Tonk Women” in London on 11/25, apparently with Bill Wyman on bass.

The Rolling Stones official web site

Lost Classics! Andy Fairweather-Low

Andy Fairweather-Low, a British guitarist and singer, got his start as a U.K. teen idol in the pop band Amen Corner.  The group had a brush with the British Top 40 in the late 1960s but in 1970 Fairweather-Low went underground.  Nothing was heard from him until 1974 and his first solo album, Spider Jiving.  A triumph of straight-ahead rock and roll, Spider Jiving sounded like a sober Faces, good-time music that gets under your skin.

This little lost classic combines scruffy English pub rock with some American soul horn blasts, all tied together by Fairweather-Low’s husky singing voice.  This shaggy-dog album yielded one hit, “Reggae Tune,” which landed in the U.K. Top 10.

Over the years Andy Fairweather-Low has become widely known as a backing guitarist for Roger Waters, Bill Wyman and especially Eric Clapton.  He has been a part of Clapton’s band since 1992, and he has also appeared on George Harrison’s Live In Japan (1992) and sang backup on the Who’s Who Are You (1978).   This month, Fairweather-Low released a greatest hits album in Britian, The Low Rider – The Very Best of Andy Fairweather-Low. 

MP3: “Spider Jiving”

MP3: “Reggae Tune”

MP3: “Keep On Rocking”

Andy Fairweather-Low official website