Rolling Stones 79109
Producers: The Glimmer Twins
Track listing: If You Can’t Rock Me / Ain’t Too Proud to Beg / It’s Only Rock ‘n Roll (But I Like It) / Till the Next Goodbye / Time Waits for No One / Luxury / Dance Little Sister / If You Really Want to be My Friend / Short and Curlies / Fingerprint File
November 23, 1974
1 week
It’s Only Rock ‘N Roll is important for several reasons. One, it marked the last Rolling Stones album featuring guitarist Mick Taylor and featured the Stones debut of his eventual replacement, Ronnie Wood of the Faces. It was also the first album produced by the Glimmer Twins, the pseudonym adopted by vocalist Mick Jagger and guitarist Keith Richards.
It wasn’t a particularly happy time in the Stones camp when the sessions began in November 1973 at Munich’s Musicland Studios. “A lot of drugs were going on, which made it kind of difficult,” says Andy Johns, who split the engineering duties with Keith Harwood. “It was not the most fun I had working with those guys. It certainly wasn’t as fun as Exile on Main St., and the material was not as good.”
The title track, which would eventually join the ranks of “Satisfaction” and “Brown Sugar” as one of the band’s best-known anthems, was credited to Jagger-Richards, but rumor has it that the song was actually written by Jagger and Wood in the latter’s basement. In the album’s liner notes, Wood is credited with the “inspiration” for the song. The track featured the Faces’ Kenny Jones on drums, rather than the Stones’ Charlie Watts, and R&B great Willie Weeks on bass, rather than Bill Wyman.
However, the other tracks on the album featured the core Stones lineup, often augmented by the usual assortment of outside players. For example, Billy Preston, known for his work with The Beatles, played on “If You Can’t Rock Me,” “Ain’t Too Proud to Beg,” and “Fingerprint File.” Says Johns, “Billy was fantastic. He had been touring with them as an opening act previous to that record, so he ended up playing on those sessions.” Other outside players featured on the album included keyboardists Nicky Hopkins and longtime Stones session player Ian Stewart, as well as percussionist Ray Cooper from Elton John’s band.
In addition to the nine originals on the album, the Stones opted to cover the 1966 Temptations hit “Ain’t Too Proud to Beg,” but it wasn’t Richards’s first choice. “Keith kept wanting to do the Dobie Gray song ‘Drift Away,”‘ says Johns. “They tried it for four or five days, but it never quite worked. Ronnie was there for that and Mick Taylor wasn’t, so I just kind of assumed that Ronnie was going to be in the band.”
In its fourth week on the chart, It’s Only Rock ‘N Roll reached Number One, becoming the Stones’ fifth career chart-topper. Its one-week stop at the summit gave it the dubious distinction as the Stones’ shortest stay at the top.
On December 12, less than a month after It’s Only Rock ‘N Roll hit Number One, the Stones officially announced that Taylor had left the group due to creative differences.
THE TOP FIVE
Week of November 23, 1974
1. It’s Only Rock ‘N Roll, The Rolling Stones
2. Photographs & Memories, His Greatest Hits, Jim Croce
3. Holiday, America
4. Not Fragile, Bachman-Turner Overdrive
5. Cheech & Chong’s Wedding Album, Cheech & Chong