High End Sound

Mid-life Ramblers: Sometimes You Get What You Need

The Rolling Stones. An institution so familiar, so valued that it distorts our critical faculties. Nevertheless, we think the Stones gave us the best concert of the year. We think we heard world-class rock 'n' roll on Tattoo You and that the Stones, creeping around the age of 40 to a man, were the musical event of the year.

We also think the Stones have hit upon a great new option for financing live shows. A few years ago, Keith Richards suggested to writer George W. S. Trow that some corporation ought to underwrite a Stones tour, thereby keeping ticket prices down. No one's ever raved about Keith's business sense, but it's clear he had a point. And this year, the Stones found their corporate backer in Jovan, Inc., the young fragrance firm that bills about $140,000,000 annually. Jovan's president, Richard E. Meyer, told us he decided to take the Stones' offer in a very expensive three seconds -- considering that the final Jovan investment came to more than $3,000,000. Meyer, who grew up in the era of drugs and sex and Rolling Stones, knew at a glance that his firm's demographics and the Stones' were close.

"I don't think I have to come out with a fragrance that has a tongue on the package to see if our involvement with the Stones sells product."At the end of the tour, Meyer was able to conclude, "I think the only better value than the Stones in concert is a $7.50 bottle of musk oil--ours."

Musk oil notwithstanding, Mick Jagger filled us in on other aspects of the tour in a conversation with writer Ben Fong-Torres, who found Jagger in his hotel room. Fong-Torres spotted a note that read: "You are in Philly ... gargle ... make song list ... choose clothes ... exercise--outdoors if possible."

Playboy: How do you prepare for a tour?

Jagger: You have to exercise all the time. You make sure you eat really right. You can't talk about what you do mentally ... you have to get really serious. [Laughs]

Playboy: This year, everyone seemed to be asking, "Are the Stones too old to rock?" Is this the last time around?

Jagger: You gotta be joking! How can you expect anyone so successful at selling tickets to fucking outdoor rock-'n'-roll shows to even consider giving them up? It's absurd!

Playboy: The total gross was originally planned at $530,000,000. In the end, it exceeded $40,000,000. Did you expect that kind of success?

Jagger: It passed everyone's wildest dreams! Why should there be this demand for tickets? We totally underestimated. We fucked up.... The demand is there. It may not be there next year.

Playboy: Why do you do such big outdoor shows? Is it for the money or the demand?

Jagger: Money ... demand. Also, we're quite good at doing them.

Playboy: In concert, are you just having a good time?

Jagger: If you get onstage, the first rule is: Don't be shy. No one wants to see a shy person. They want to see you having a good time, and why shouldn't you have a good time? You're having a great time, they're having a good time, and so you'll have a good time, even if you fuck up.

Playboy: You once said you

felt lucky: You could act like a child and get away with it. Have you since grown up?

Jagger: Being onstage, you can feel anything. You can feel 100 years old or like a child. That's what the stage is for. To act. If you want to act the fool, you can act it--at any age. You don't want to do that in your own private life; that'd be stupid. But onstage you can perfectly well act it-- so long as you do it well.

Try A Little Tenderness

R&B is boogieing back. After all, even Katharine Hepburn showed up at the Jacksons' most recent Madison Square Garden concert. Smokey Robinson's Being with You put him right back at the top, just 20 years after Shop Around. Endless Love, the Lionel Richie, Jr.-Diana Ross duet, had a seemingly endless run on the radio. Crossover history was made when Richie produced Kenny Rogers; and Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards of Chic produced Deborah Harry. David Byrne and Brian Eno got funky for their opus My Life in the Bush of Ghosts. It seems that when disco, with its cool, emphatic march beat, finally got stomped, its audience and artists were ready for the warm, sweet passion of what we once called soul, displayed at right in all its glory by Nick Ash-ford and Valerie Simpson.

Watch for Elektra/Asylum, until now the official repository of mellow, to become an R&B powerhouse with The Pointer Sisters and a tie-in to the Solar label, including Shalamar, Lakeside and The Whispers. Solar producer Leon Sylvers, III, says that rock/funk will be the next wave. If you wonder what that is, check out Rick James or Prince, your basic androgynous mulatto New Waver, who performs nearly naked--Little Richard sans wardrobe.

Despite Five Zillion Loyal Fans, Hi Infidelity Still Puts Critics To Sleep

REO Speedwagon is the kind of standard touring band that can fill a hall in Moline ... a bit sleazy and infantile....--Joel vance, Stereo Review

Critics call it schlock 'n' roll. They call it boing-boing music, referring to allegedly simple melodies. Then they play on their own joke, wondering what happened to the "r" in the middle of "boing."

But those who stay awake for it call it power rock, and the best of it is by REO Speedwagon, Journey and Styx.

None of the three is a New York, Los Angeles or Liverpool band. Styx and REO are from Illinois; Journey, from San Francisco. Maybe that's why they don't get no respect. (When the five members of REO went to pick up their gold record for Hi Infidelity, they found it inscribed, Red Speedwagon.) But now, all of a sudden, even though none of them has ever been on the cover of Rolling Stone, they're the three top bands in the country. Some body out there likes them.

Styx sold more than 3,000,000 albums and 1,000,000 singles last year--for the fourth year in a row. They played in front of 1,500,000 people, always without the added draw of an opening act.

Journey fans bought 4,000,000 albums and 1,200,000 concert tickets in 1981. The group earned $38,200,000 overall.

REO, the biggest success (concluded on page 218) Hi Infidelity(continued from page 161) story of the year, finally chugged into the big time with its 11th album. Hi Infidelity may go uranium any day now. It sold a staggering 6,000,000 copies and defended the album summit for more than four months. More than 1,440,000 people saw REO in concert.

Of course, popularity is not necessarily a qualitative measure. While many zillion satisfied customers can be wrong, there are a few plausible reasons people listen to these bands.

Memorable melodies, for one. They are (dare we say it?) catchy. Listen to Roll with the Changes, Time for Me to Fly or Who's Crying Now? and try to keep them from bouncing around in your head. It's like trying not to think of an elephant.

Lead vocalists Dennis DeYoung of Styx, Kevin Cronin of REO and Steve Perry of Journey sing with similar styles--high, strident, almost instrumental, while their background harmonies are on the money. Critics' note: Remember Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young?

These bands give knockdown drag-out concerts, too, professional and still exuberant. They sound as good onstage as on vinyl.

But we suppose the bicoastal music critics won't reconsider. They're still depressed at Dylan's defection and mad that they can't put U2 and Oingo Boingo on the radio. So they won't pay much attention to REO, Journey and Styx; but the three big bands keep on playing--not just for the tin-eared unwashed but for all the musical democrats.

Class Music-digtal Top 10

Digital recording has sent classical-music fans into a frenzy familiar to rockers. Remember when you'd toss Pink Floyd onto the turntable, crank up the volume and see how soon you turned into Jell-O? Now that many classical records are digital, you can look for new highs and lows--the ones that were lost by conventional recording processes. Here are ten of the year's best matings of digital sound and great performance.

1. Beethoven: Symphony No. 3, "Eroica"-- Staatskapelle Berlin, Otmar Suitner conducting (Denon).

2. Boiling: Concerto for Classic Guitar and Jazz Piano--with Angel Romero and George Shearing (Angel).

3. Debussy: Prelude to The Afternoon of a Faun, Images--London Symphony, André Previn conducting (Angel).

4. Morton Gould: Latin American Symphonette and Other Works--Gould conducts the London Symphony (Varèse Sarabande).

5. Music of Holst, Bach, Handel--Cleveland Symphonic Winds, Frederick Fennell conducting (Telarc).

6. Holst: The Planets--Scottish National Orchestra, Sir Alexander Gibson conducting (Chandos).

7. Janácek: Sinfonietta, Taras Bulba--Vienna Philharmonic, Sir Charles Mackerras conducting (London).

8. Orff: Carmina Burana and Hindemith: Symphonic Metamorphosis--Atlanta Symphony Orchestra & Chorus, Robert Shaw conducting (Telarc).

9. Strauss: Also sprach Zarathustra--Philadelphia Orchestra, Eugene Ormandy conducting (Angel).

10. Tchaikovsky & Dvorák: String Serenades--Berlin Philharmonic, Herbert von Karajan conducting (Deutsche Grammophon).