Oh yeah, alright... ooeee, ooeee, ooeeeh!

Wandering Spirit (Atlantic, 1993)

MICK JAGGER

On July 26th, 1943, Mick was born. Seven decades ago, he's still singing and writing songs for the greatest and oldest rock and roll band in the world. Of course, if you don't know what band I'm talking about you can close this window and go out of your house for the first time in your life.

I didn't know what Rolling Stones CD should I review for Mick's big day. However, there's a fact: whenever I think of Mick or see his face on TV, I think of this CD; his most personal record to date, the beautifully recorded Wandering Spirit. A Rick Rubin production released in 1993 celebrating Jagger's first half century. It was also a cathartic and sensitive album about a man's life blues. What kind of blues a man like Mick Jagger could have strong enough to make a personal record like this?

Mick Jagger is an icon by himself and with the Rolling Stones. He has the kind of life 99% of the occidental heterosexual male population want to have: wake up, exercise, travel, eat the finest food at the finest restaurants, sing your own songs and hear the people singing them with you, get paid for this, meet beautiful women, lots of them, so many women that you forget their names and you don't care when a hot supermodel comes to you pregnant and says "it's yours." He meets presidents, kings, queens, artists, and as I said, women. They sleep with him and the very next day they are just a name and a number in his black book ready to be called again, if so, whenever he goes back in town. OK, it's not 99%, it's 99.9%.

In this album, Mick tries to tell us that, even when he's a wandering spirit and a super-cool guy, sometimes he gets the feeling that he's alone and bored like a mushroom. We don't care about the blues, we just want to live his life. Fine women, good wine, caviar, crossing the Atlantic like we cross the streets to go to the grocery? We're in!

For instance, there's "Put Me in The Trash," a rock and roll number about a former millionaire who's calling her ex-girlfriend for a loan. He bought her shoes, a Ferrari and tickets to the Opera. Now he's asking for some dough. What could have happened? He wasted his money on parties, alcohol, drugs and women. He realized he should have saved some money in the bank for skinny-cow times.

The greatest moment comes when Lenny Kravitz and Flea join Mick to pay tribute to 70's soul with Bill Withers' "Use Me," definitely one of Jagger's favorite songs. He sings Lowman Pauling's "Think" as a tribute to James Brown. So the dues are paid here. The album closes with an Irish violin and Mick singing "Handsome Molly," leaving the listener with the feeling that the singer was alone at the beginning, and it's the same for him at the end.

Jagger did something he never did before, releasing his album the same day as a Beatle released his (Paul McCartney's Off The Ground hit the streets on February 9th, 1993), breaking the old principle that kept Beatles and Stones separated with their respectives parts of the music market. McCartney didn't care, for sure. In 1993 CD sales were at the top of their game -remember, this was the year of Nirvana's In Utero and Pearl Jam's Vs. -and there were CD buyers with money for all of them. Anyways, Paul and Mick are millionaires on their own right. Even if the records didn't sell 2 copies, they wouldn't starve.

Nowadays, this CD is a forgotten treasury. You can get it used for less than 4 bucks on Amazon.com Z-shops; and for a small price you can prove that I'm being honest. This was an outstanding record, comparable with Stones productions like Some Girls, Tatoo You and Emotional Rescue. Let's see what happens in 2013 when Mick hits 70.

Sweet thing: http://youtu.be/nXZUr3v6gNo

More Mick:

Goddess at The Doorway (Virgin, 2001): Rolling Stone Magazine rated this album as classical (5 stars). It's OK, but Wandering is better, way better.

 Primitive Cool (Atlantic, 1987): Do people actually remember "Let's Work"? It was a great radio tune!

 She's The Boss (Atlantic, 1985): A hard woman to please, Mick's debut was pretty decent.

And the Entire Rolling Stones catalog.