'Exile On Main St.'

I've always tended to like the 1960s Rolling Stones more than the 1970s Stones for no other reason than I just like the music better.

This still may or may not be entirely true because I've developed a really healthy admiration for albums such as Exile on Main St.

One big reason I like the early Stones is Brian Jones. He made that band. Once he died in 1969, a change took place and Mike Jagger really came into his own in several facets including being the coolest motherfucker on the planet. This is not easy to do.

However, once that transformation took place, the Stones were destined to continue recording and touring the next 40 years, otherwise, I could see them breaking up or calling it quits after Goat's Head Soup or later after Tattoo You or something.

It's that momentum that kept them going.

Given this fact, the best of those post-Jones albums is Exile on Main St. A classic without even having to say it or tell anyone else. All you need to do is listen.

It's rock music at its rawest. It probably hasn't been rawer since. It's simple guitar rock. There are no gigantic hits outside of "Tumbling Dice" (a great song) and a small hit in "Happy." No hits. No hype. Just rock music.

I'll still stand by my 196os Stones for posterity's sake, but I will say that the Stones did or have ever produced an album to this standard. It was tough to precede and impossible to follow up.