| Black and Blue | ||||
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 Front cover with photograph byHiro | ||||
| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | 23 April 1976 (1976-04-23) | |||
| Recorded |
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| Genre | ||||
| Length | 41:09 | |||
| Label | Rolling Stones | |||
| Producer | The Glimmer Twins | |||
| The Rolling Stones chronology | ||||
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| Singles from Black and Blue | ||||
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Black and Blue is the thirteenth studio album by the English rock bandthe Rolling Stones, released on 23 April 1976, byRolling Stones Records.
This album was the first record after former guitaristMick Taylor quit in December 1974. As he had done the previous time the Stones were between second guitarists in 1968,Keith Richards recorded the bulk of the guitar parts himself, though the album recording sessions also served as an audition for Taylor's replacement. Richards said of the album that it was used for "rehearsing guitar players, that's what that one was about."[3] Numerous guitarists showed up to auditions; those who appeared on the album wereWayne Perkins,Harvey Mandel, andRonnie Wood. Wood had previously contributed to thetitle track from theIt's Only Rock 'n Roll album, and became a temporary touring member of the Stones in 1975 and official member in 1976.[4] The Stones rhythm section of bassistBill Wyman and drummerCharlie Watts appear on nearly all tracks, and frequent collaboratorsNicky Hopkins andBilly Preston play keyboards on most of the album, with percussionistOllie E. Brown also appearing on about half of the tracks. The album was the third to be self-produced, credited to "The Glimmer Twins", a pseudonym used by Jagger and Richards for their roles as producers.
Black and Blue showed the band blending their traditionalrock and roll style with heavy influences fromreggae andfunk music. Only one single from the album, "Fool to Cry", had any significant chart success, and reception to the album was mixed. The album received a few positive reviews at the time of release, though many reviewers found it mostly forgettable, and tended to rank it very low compared to prior Stones releases. Retrospective reviews from more recent publications such asAllMusic have been kinder to the album, with criticStephen Thomas Erlewine stating that the album's "being longer on grooves and jams than songs" ended up being "what's good about it".[5]
The Rolling Stones returned toMunich, Germany, in December 1974—where they had recorded their previous albumIt's Only Rock 'n' Roll—and began the recording of their new album atMusicland Studios, withMick Jagger andKeith Richards (asthe Glimmer Twins) producing again. With a view to releasing it in time for a summer 1975Tour of the Americas, the band broke for the holidays and returned in January inRotterdam, Netherlands, to continue working—all the while auditioning new guitarists as they recorded. Among the hopefuls wereSteve Marriott,Harvey Mandel,Wayne Perkins,Peter Frampton,Robert A. Johnson andRonnie Wood (although only Mandel, Perkins and Wood's guitar work would appear on the finished album). Guitar heroesRory Gallagher andJeff Beck both went over for ajam with the band "just to see what was going on", but both declined interest in joining the group, happy with their solo careers. Jeff Beck stated that, "in two hours I got to play three chords – I need a little more energy than that." Beck's jamming with the Stones remains unreleased to date, but is available onbootleg recordings. With much work to follow, it was decided to delay the album for the following year and release theMade in the Shade compilation instead. "Cherry Oh Baby" (which was a cover version ofEric Donaldson's 1971reggae song) would be the only song from the upcoming album sporadically played on the 1975Tour of the Americas.
Following the conclusion of the tour, the band went toMontreux, Switzerland, in October for some overdub work, returning to Musicland Studios in Munich in December to perform similar work. After some final touch-ups,Black and Blue was completed in New York City in February 1976. That month the Stones flew to Sanibel Island Beach onSanibel Island, Florida, to be photographed by fashion photographerHiro for the album cover art.[6]
Stylistically,Black and Blue embraceshard rock with "Hand of Fate" (solo by Wayne Perkins) and "Crazy Mama";funk with "Hot Stuff" (solo by Harvey Mandel);reggae with their cover of "Cherry Oh Baby" (Ronnie Wood and Keith Richards weaving guitars); andblues with "Melody", featuring the talents ofBilly Preston – a heavy contributor to the album. Musical and thematic styles were merged on the seven-minute "Memory Motel", with both Jagger and Richards contributing lead vocals to a love song embedded within a life-on-the-road tale.
While all the album's songs except "Cherry Oh Baby" were officially credited to Jagger/Richards as authors, the credit for "Hey Negrita" specifies "Inspiration by Ron Wood" and "Melody" lists "Inspiration by Billy Preston".Bill Wyman would later release a version of "Melody" with hisRhythm Kings, crediting Preston as author. "Melody" is based on "Do You Love Me" by Billy Preston andBruce Fisher, from Preston's 1973 albumEverybody Likes Some Kind of Music. The only song to include both session players Wayne Perkins and Harvey Mandel is "Memory Motel", where Perkins plays acoustic, Mandel electric, but without a guitar solo.
Two extra tracks recorded in the Rotterdam sessions were later released on 1981'sTattoo You: "Slave" and "Worried About You" (guitar solo by Wayne Perkins).[7]
Released on 23 April 1976[8] – with "Fool to Cry", a worldwide top 10 hit, as its lead single –Black and Blue reached No. 2 in the UK and spent an interrupted four-week spell at number 1 in the United States, going platinum there.
The album was promoted with a controversial billboard onSunset Boulevard in Hollywood that depicted the model Anita Russell, bound by Jagger[9] under the phrase "I'mBlack and Blue from the Rolling Stones – and I love it!" The billboard was removed after protests by thefeminist groupWomen Against Violence Against Women, although it earned the band widespread press coverage.[10] Russell later said that she did not mind the ad, saying she was "happy for the work" and felt the ad was "tongue-in-cheek".[11]Evelyn McDonnell, author of the bookWomen Who Rock: Bessie to Beyonce. Girl Groups to Riot Grrrl, believed that the campaign overshadowed the album's release, saying: "It certainly didn't let the music speak for itself, and the controversy doesn't age well."[11]
| Review scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |    [12] |
| Christgau's Record Guide | A−[13] |
| Encyclopedia of Popular Music | [14] |
| The Great Rock Discography | 6/10[15] |
| MusicHound | [16] |
| NME | 7/10[17] |
| The Rolling Stone Album Guide | [18] |
| The Village Voice | A−[19] |
| Tom Hull | B+[20] |
Critical view was polarised. According to writer Bud Scoppa, some critics were bewildered by the album, while others dismissed it for its dissimilarities toExile on Main St. (1972), which by then had become regarded as the group's best work.[21] Author Gary J. Jucha describes the mixed critical reaction as typical of "mostprogressive albums by an established recording artist."[8]
Lester Bangs wrote inCreem that "the heat's off, because it's all over, they really don't matter anymore or stand for anything [...] this is the first meaningless Rolling Stones album, and thank God".[22] However,Robert Christgau commended the band for taking musical risks, and singled out "Hot Stuff" and "Fool to Cry" for particular praise before concluding: "diagnosis: not dead by a long shot".[23] He also felt that the album represents the Stones' biggest exploration ofblack rhythms and styles sinceDecember's Children (1965).[23] Bill Cosford ofThe Miami Herald highlighted the record as a musical departure for the band, writing: "Black and Blue is not a rock album. It is a sampler, of sorts, a musical term paper. In it the Stones examine the several influences on pop music today:salsa,disco, reggae. By and large, they do so superbly. But in committing themselves to exercises in musical formulae as tight as these, the Stones attach their music to styles subject to rapid eclipse."[24]
Retrospectively,Stephen Thomas Erlewine ofAllMusic praised the album for being "longer on grooves and jams than songs", which he felt was inevitable as it was recorded while the Stones auditioned a replacement for Taylor, and for profiling the band's musical chemistry. He felt that "groove and sound" characterise the record, generally eschewing straight rock songs for reggae, funk and disco excursions that "sound like integral parts of the Stones' lifeblood".[12] Bud Scoppa ofUncut described the record as an "unlikely triumph", with the groove-oriented material and guesting "hotshot musicians" combining for strong performances, "expertly brought out by the ultra-dry sonics of engineersGlyn Johns andKeith Harwood". He wrote: "Forty-one minutes of super-tight, bone-dry, hi-fi rock andsoul,Black and Blue is one of the Stones' most underrated albums – the only Stones LP to focus primarily on feel rather than subject matter."[21]
Less favourably,The Rough Guide to Rock contributorPeter Shapiro wrote that following the addition of Wood to their line-up, the Stones slowly transformed into "caricatures of the worst rock'n'roll excesses", adding that onBlack and Blue, the group "tried to answerLeRoi Jones's comment that white people were 'the keepers of last year's blues' by appropriating contemporary funk and reggae stylings, with mixed results."[25]Colin Larkin ofThe Encyclopedia of Popular Music wrote that the album "showed the group seeking a possible new direction playing variants onwhite reggae, but the results were less than impressive."[14] Similarly,Martin C. Strong ofThe Great Rock Discography noted that the record saw "[Wood] brought into the fold and a half hearted attempt at reggae stylings".[26] InThe Rolling Stone Album Guide,Black and Blue is described as a "nearly song-free" album which works best on the sincere ballads "Fool to Cry" and "Memory Motel" and "the silly but shitkickingcowboy tale 'Hand of Fate'."[18]
In 2000,Black and Blue was ranked at number 536 in Colin Larkin'sAll Time Top 1000 Albums.[27]
In 1977, Keith Richards said that the album "wasn't very good – certainly nowhere as good asLet It Bleed", though he reappraised the record in 1984.Mick Jagger offered his assessment in the 1990s: "It was a bit of a holiday period. I mean, we cared, but we didn't care as much as we had, not really concentrating on the creative process."[21] Mick Taylor praised the album in a 1979 interview.[21]
In 1994,Black and Blue was remastered and reissued byVirgin Records, again in 2009 byUniversal Music, and once more in 2011 by Universal Music Enterprises in a Japanese-only SHM-SACD version. The 1994 remaster was initially released in a Collector's Edition CD, which replicated in miniature many elements of the original gatefold album packaging.
A super deluxe reissue ofBlack and Blue was released on 14 November 2025, featuring a remix of the album bySteven Wilson, unreleased jams and outtakes and a 1976 live performance atEarls Court. The band also released a cover version of the song "Shame, Shame, Shame" byShirley & Company that originated as anouttake from the original album's recording sessions, and which featuredChanel Haynes on backing vocals.[28] Reviewing the super deluxe set,Rolling Stone's Kory Grow gave the reissue four stars out of five, selecting the three jam sessions recorded withJeff Beck as highlights. Grow described theBlack and Blue album as underrated, writing: "On a purely musical level, the tracks are nuanced and well crafted, mature rock & roll songs (whether the Stones themselves cared to admit it.)"[29]Stephen Thomas Erlewine gave the reissue three stars out of five.[30]
All tracks are written byMick Jagger and Keith Richards, except "Cherry Oh Baby" written byEric Donaldson.
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Hot Stuff" | 5:21 |
| 2. | "Hand of Fate" | 4:28 |
| 3. | "Cherry Oh Baby" | 3:54 |
| 4. | "Memory Motel" | 7:06 |
| Total length: | 20:49 | |
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Hey Negrita" (inspiration byRonnie Wood) | 4:58 |
| 2. | "Melody" (inspiration byBilly Preston) | 5:48 |
| 3. | "Fool to Cry" | 5:02 |
| 4. | "Crazy Mama" | 4:32 |
| Total length: | 20:20 | |
The Rolling Stones
Additional personnel
Technical
Weekly charts[edit]
| Year-end charts[edit]
|
| Region | Certification | Certified units/sales |
|---|---|---|
| Canada (Music Canada)[57] | Gold | 50,000^ |
| France (SNEP)[58] | Gold | 100,000* |
| Netherlands (NVPI)[59] | Gold | 25,000[59] |
| United Kingdom (BPI)[60] | Gold | 100,000^ |
| United States (RIAA)[61] | Platinum | 1,000,000^ |
* Sales figures based on certification alone. | ||
