The new reissued, remastered, expanded etc. edition of the Rolling Stones
classic live album Get Yer Ya Ya's Out is now available and it comes with a
heap of the proverbial bonus material. There's the basic show that's been
around 39 years (!) on disc one, plus a second disc of previously unreleased
Stones songs from Madison Square Gardens, plus another disc with the opening
sets from B.B. King and Ike and Tina, plus a DVD of film shot by the Maysles
brothers for the Gimme Shelter movie of Altamont infamy--bits of which have
already been seen. In that context at the close of the DVD there are
several minutes of footage of the Stones hanging around by SF's Ferry
Building waiting for the chopper that is to take them to Altamont Speedway.
And who is waiting with them? First we see Jerry's smiling face (not a grey
hair in sight), and soon the rest of the Dead, they all seem in good spirits
despite Garcia's claim that they'd already been waiting a couple of hours.
If they had known what was about to happen they might have been happy if the
chopper had never arrived. In the category of what might have been there is
footage of Hendrix jamming with Mick Taylor in the MSG dressing room, and a
happy Janis Joplin as a member of the audience, dancing along to the
music--both of them would be gone all too soon.
As reissues go the basic concert on disc one is no better than the 2002
remastered edition, but the wealth of bonus material is sure nice if you
don't mind coughing up forty bucks for a box-set with a book and a mini '69
tour poster and so on. If you want the super extra deluxe version (with
vinyl LPs as well) that's something like seventy bucks. I'm torn on some
reissues, I don't like buying the same album for the third or fourth time
just to get a couple of bonus tracks. But in this case three entire discs
of bonus material makes it enough of an upgrade to justify cracking open my
wallet. A couple of years back hardcore stones fans organized an online
petition that was passed around various fan websites and mailing lists
suggesting that a reissue of GYYYO would be very welcome if it was done
right--who knows, maybe they listened to the fans for once. Rumor has it an
expanded deluxe version of Exile On Main Street is in the pipeline as well
and if they do it this well that will be another reissue the bastards sell
me.
|
