Rolling Stones

These raucous rock n' roll rebels are living proof that this defiant style of music is a direct descendant of the blues. Their band's name even comes from a classic Muddy Waters song, and its also an age-old adage in English: a rolling stone gathers no moss. Please allow me to introduce this group, they're a band of wealth and taste. We can get some satisfaction as we suss out The Stones on this week's episode of FYI! 

Transcript

0:02

these rockus rock and roll Rebels are living proof that this defiant style of music is a direct descendant of the Blues their band's name even comes from a classic Muddy Water song and it's also an age-old adage in English a rolling stone gathers no Moss please allow me to introduce this group they're a band of wealth and[Music] taste we can get some satisfaction as we sus out the stones on this week's episode of f Yi welcome to for your info English you got got it you got[Applause][Music][Applause][Applause][Music] it hello hello hello and welcome to this another exciting edition of FYI the topic based show where we talk about anything and everything and we've looked at hundreds of topics so far and if you haven't heard a topic that you want to hear about all you have to do is let me know I'm really easy to find on social media or you can just go to my website Alberto Alonso docomo page Instagram and all that jazz also remember I have a daily radio show called The Show With No Name if you haven't heard it search for it or even easier Google it it's the show with no name and just put in my name in the search bar Alberto Alonso and voila you'll be learning English and having fun so this show is a topic based show that is more of a a variety show where we have a lot of different sections and it's also interactive so if you haven't checked it out check it out it's the show with no name and it's on Von radio and you can watch it live on YouTube if you guys are patrons you can also have access to an extra episode every week with tons of idiomatic expressions and vocabulary and of course fun facts as always and if you'd like to have PDF documents to follow along you can do so all you have to do is go over to patreon.com Alonso and join my Curious community and you can have access to a wealth of content I have over a thousand posts that the moment you sign up you'll have access to all of them and if you're in our higher levels our super duper students or our Interstellar students well then you will have a weekly class with me where we review key vocabulary from every episode and if you're in our Interstellar level where you'll even get a monthly private class with me where we can work specifically on you and if you do the math it's a deal a steal a bargain and I highly recommend that you sign up for a yearly membership for two reasons this way you make a commitment cuz let's be honest you don't learn English in one month this way you make a commitment and also I can give you a little discount so if you want access to so much more as we say if you're hungry for more then join us over on patreon.com Alberto Alonso and I'd like to take a moment to send a shout out to all my patrons especially my super duper students Mara Lena Javier Paco Roberto Jos Maria and Mila and don't forget about my Interstellar students the ones who get a monthly private class with me along with all that other stuff give it up for God AR Isa Paco David and Edgard keep up the great work guys and if you guys want to join our curious Community you can find out more on patreon.com Alberto Alonso my Curious Community is just a ston throw hey wait there's a good segue a Stones Throw atra you say the same thing in Spanish and later on we're going to take a look at a lot of idiomatic IC Expressions but let's start off with the intro I said these rockus rock and roll Rebels and rockus is that they make a lot of noise they are boisterous but I guess that word is synonymous with rock and roll that's the whole idea behind rock and roll rebellion and remember this a rebel Rebels so the verb is to rebel and the person is a rebel and these rock and roll Rebels are living proof that this def defiant style of music is a direct descendant of the Blues and defiant means someone is rebellious desaf insolente in Spanish again words that are often associated with rock and roll we're not supposed to go with the flow we're supposed to go against the grain rockers right well nobody exemplified this more than the stones oh yeah we don't call them Los rolling or the rolling no we call them the stones and it doesn't take a genius to know that this group's music is directly descended from the blues if you listen to some of their songs especially their early songs you can hear some of the most common Blues riffs ever and the blues is what brought them together the blues is what gave them their band's name but we'll get to all those juicy details in just a little bit as I just said their band's name comes from a classic Muddy Waters song Muddy Waters is one of the greatest Blues men ever a rolling going be a rolling going be a rolling and I'll tell you that story as I said a little bit later on then I said it's an old adage and an adage is like a proverb like a saying and we say a Rolling Stone gathers no Moss a rolling stone is somebody who never stops moving and Moss is that green stuff that grows on a rock it basically is a proverb that means if you don't settle in one place well you will not accumulate wealth or status or responsibilities or commitments or things like that but again that's the rock and roll style commitments aren't cool and then I had a few references to their songs I said please allow me to introduce this group does anybody know what song that is it's Sympathy for the Devil and the real lyric goes please allow me to introduce myself I'm a man of wealth and taste and when I was putting together this episode I could not think of what my favorite song was I couldn't even think of a top three because I love so many Rolling Stone songs and then this one you all know we can get some and I've got a question aren't double negatives a no no in English shouldn't it be we can't get any satisfaction instead of we can't get no absolutely but Mick Jagger doesn't care about grammar it's poetic license and he only needed that amount of syllables this is the song If we correct the grammar we can't get any satisfaction you're missing the pause the pause is everything so any is too many syllables no is perfect here it is with the pause I can get no pause satisfaction that pauses everything you'll notice those pauses in music make big hits I believe the song deso Too does something with a pause now we're comparing apples and oranges but there's something something in the Paw is what I'm saying and then I said we'll sus out the Rolling Stones and that's to explore to find out more about so if we had to define the stones they are an English rock band formed in London what year do you think they were formed in it was 1962 so that means for our mathematicians they have been in the business for seven decades and they are still one of the most popular bands ever and in the early 1960s when they formed the band pioneered this gritty sound so it wasn't polished polished means buulo gritty means like dirty again like the blues it's not supposed to be processed and clean even their voices if you listen to some of the blues artists their would their voices are not very clear it's gritty there's a certain grit to it and there's a very famous movie called True Grit as well and if you remember in one of our episodes on New York City maybe it was Time Square or Central Park I told you New York City is the pretty gritty City it's pretty but it's also gritty and I guess that could Define the Rolling Stones as well and their first stable lineup and a lineup is the the the members of the band consisted of vocalist you guessed it Mick Jagger guitarist Keith Richards multi-instrumentalist Brian Jones he was the one who named the band and he was originally the heart and soul of the band but drugs got the best of him and we'll talk about that tragedy a little bit later on but according to Keith Richards Brian Jones named the band during a phone call to Jazz news and he was asked by a journalist for the band's name and at that time they were tossing names around they were originally called the blues boys because they originally did Blues covers as I said before you wouldn't have the Rolling Stones without the blues not even their name and supposedly Brian Jones saw a muddy waters LP lying on the floor and he looked at one of the tracks which was called Rolling Stone and everything just clicked the planets aligned and there it was the Rolling[Laughter][Music] Stones another way to say a rolling stone is a globe Trotter you recognize that name from the basketball team that does all those tricks so at that time Brian Jones was kind of like the de facto leader of the group now as we know the core of the group is Mick Jagger and Keith Richards you know that's like the Paul McCartney and John lenon that's the duo the dynamic duo partners in crime and then you also had basist Bill Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts and then there was another guy named St what you've got to be kidding me have you ever heard of one of the original members of the band Stu I didn't think so well we're going to find out all about stew in the bonus episode but let's just put it this way you haven't heard of him for a reason so we'll hear his sad story in the bonus episode and Bill Wyman was only invited to join the band because he had an amplifier hey they needed an amplifier the amplifier came with Bill Wyman and as I said earlier they started out playing covers they mostly played Blues music that's what still keeps them together today they say their love of Blues and they played songs by Muddy Waters Chuck Berry Little Richard Howland wolf and Bo didley and their original name was the blues boys and Mick Jagger well he wasn't on board right away he had to make one of the biggest decisions of his life because just before the Rolling Stones started to take off that means to get popular he was balancing his budding rock and roll career and budding is like a flower it's starting to Blossom and he had to balance that with his studies at the time he was a student at the London School of economics and he knew that he couldn't do both and he said and I quote it was very very difficult because my parents obviously didn't want me to do it but in the end he made the right decision by quitting school and pursuing his career in rock and roll and we were just talking about his partner in crime Keith Richards well the Jagger Richards partnership became the band's primary songwriting and creative Force but what happened to Brian Jones well as I said before he couldn't handle his drug addiction and by the year 1968 it started to interfere with his ability to contribute to the band so The Story Goes that he left the band and shortly after he died he drowned in a swimming pool in 1969 and we'll talk about that in the bonus episode when we talk about the dark side he was then replaced by guitarist Mick Taylor in 1969 that was a big milestone for them as well because that was when they got one of their nicknames the greatest rock and roll band in the world and they were introduced that way at the beginning of all their concerts so Brian Jones was out of the band and well unfortunately he was out of life as well he died young a true rock and roll story and we'll find out more as I said later on but I want to talk more about the Jagger Richards partnership Keith rich Richards and MC Jagger met for the first time on a platform platform 2 at Dartford railway station this is in Dartford Kent on October 17th 1961 if you're ever in Dartford Kent you'll see that there is a blue plaque commemorating where Jagger and Richards met for the first time and they were just 5 years old but they already had had something in common their love of music and more specifically blues music as they called it back then colored music de los Negros and it was but these white boys from England were curious to know more they wanted to get in on the action they loved the blues and we'll take a look at a few Milestones right now the band played their first show as the Rolling Stones on July 12th 1962 in 1965 look at that 3 years later they had their first international number one hit does anyone know what that was I'll give you just the Riff of course I Can't Get No Satisfaction and this was the song that catapulted them to Global Fame The Rolling Stones became a household name and even their logo is one of the most recognized logos in the world I'm talking about the tongue with the lips well that was seen for the first time on the album Sticky Fingers in 1971 that album had the songs brown sugar which was very provocative and wild horses which was almost like a country tune wow wild wild horses couldn't drag me away MC Jagger even developed that southern twang when he sang the song and that's an idiomatic expression hey Alberto are you going to support me wild horses man and the whole expression is wild horses couldn't drag me away it's a beautiful song If you're not familiar with it a ballad that borders on country music and Folk music so as you can see they transcend genres as well they have songs that are pure blues songs and then they have songs that could be considered pure hard rock songs I mean they really experimented with a lot of different instruments on the very famous dark song Paint It Black they used a sitar and castanets you guys know those those are used with the seevas so they really were a blues band who decided to go everywhere and they did they even have songs that have a disco kind of feel to them and that famous tongue logo that we all know and love obviously was inspired by Mick Jagger's lips and tongue but also it was inspired by the Indian Hindu goddess cie the Destroyer you can show that logo to your grandma and she'll know it's the stones and has anybody ever asked you that question the stones or the be beetles or the Beatles or Elvis and that's when I flip them the bird in SE laa I refuse to choose they're totally different and we've got episodes on Elvis The Beatles and now the Rolling Stones and as we'll see in the bonus episode there are many links between the Beetles and the Rolling Stones just think of the cover of The Beatles album Sergeant Pepper lonely heart we hope you will enjoy the show it says on the front Welcome to The Rolling Stones so we'll talk more about that but you can't compare them it's apples and oranges as we say The Beetles especially in the early 60s they were clean cut they had the same haircut they wore the same suits they were the kind of boys you'd introduced to Mom but not the stones they were lired hippies now the Beatles eventually went and started experimenting with drugs and by Sergeant peppers they look like the stones but again their music is totally different although both bands were influenced by the blues heavily how do you compare your group with the Beatles I don't know how do you compare it with the v i i don't compare it at all you know there's no point well let's get right down to the Brass text do you think you're better than they are at what you know it's it's it's not the same group so we just do what we want and they do what they want and there's no point going on comparing us you can prefer us to them or them to us this is diplomatic you see very diplomatic and I don't want to liate but do you feel you do what you want to do better than they do what they want to do uh yes probably I don't know I don't know what they want to do you see very diplomatic but they realized they didn't want to be another Beatles you didn't need another Beatles The Beatles were doing their thing and really well they were taken over the world so there was room for the stones as well talented musicians young guys rocking and rolling only these guys had more of an edge longer hair they looked a bit Shaggy as we say in English they looked like a motly crew but they realized that that's what they needed to exploit they weren't good boys they were bad boys and now it's very common to see oh he's a bad boy but the Rolling Stones I mean they were the first bad boys of rock and roll the original bad boys of rock and roll and as I said before they've been in the business for seven decades and even though they are still huge they've had their ups and downs they had a period where maybe they were pushed aside people thought that they were overrated but they never faded away they were always there in the background preparing their next move and sure enough in 1989 steel wheels came out and this was widely considered their comeback album It Was Then followed by Voodoo Lounge in 1994 both of these albums were promoted with large Stadium or Arena tours so even though they had a period in the early 80s and late 70s where well they weren't as popular also music was changing disco music was getting big hip hop so the audience was listening to more kinds of music as well but they proved that they were here to stay that they were a force to be reckoned with and these Arena tours just kept getting bigger by 2007 they had recorded the all-time highest grossing concert tour three times and as recently as 2021 they were the highest earning live Act of that year and Mick Jagger is 80 years old okay Taylor Swift you're great but I don't know it seems like it takes a lot more Merit to do it after 70 years in the business and to still do it with style I saw the Rolling Stones at the Santiago bernabo Stadium they played for 3 hours they didn't look tired at all in fact I was ready to go home because I was exhausted but they were still jumping around the stage I guess it helps that now they don't do a lot of drugs you know they've gotten over that rock and roll lifestyle and they live more relaxing lives in fact we'll find out about some of MC Jagger's favorite hobbies in the bonus episode and you're going to be pretty surprised but love them or hate them the Rolling Stones are a rock and roll Revolution their music affected fashion even the mindset of young people and even though they have released over 30 Studio albums they have only had eight number one singles however some of their albums are on the list of the greatest albums ever made such as Exile on Main Street that's my favorite Rolling Stones album Exile on Main Street and Mick Jagger you know what he said about that one he said it's overrated it's funny how sometimes the fans like one thing and the group likes another thing and the Rolling Stones estimated record sales of 200 million units make them one of the bestselling artists of all time at the time of the recording of This podcast they've won three Grammy Awards a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award and they were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1989 and in October 2023 the band put out their first new album of original material in 18 years and that album is called Hackney diamonds so what am I getting at here if the Rolling Stones are still putting out albums that means they're going to do a tour that means I recommend you go see them while you can they are living legends and even if you don't know the names of the songs you'll be singing along with each and every one of them we're going to wrap up this episode but in the bonus episode we're going to take a look at some of Mick Jagger's interesting hobbies we'll take a look at his family life we'll look at Keith Richard's partying we'll also take a look at some more records that the Rolling Stones have broken we'll look at Mick Jagger's Knighthood we'll look at many of their arrests and how they dodged tax authorities plus we'll take a look at the Rolling Stones in pop culture and the dark side we'll look at Brian Jones death and the very tragic Altamont Speedway free Festival plus we'll look at some vocab and idioms and many more fun facts so I sure hope you'll join us in the bonus episode of today's[Applause][Music][Music] FYI