{"id":606490,"date":"2026-07-27T13:18:13","date_gmt":"2026-07-27T13:18:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/606490\/"},"modified":"2026-07-27T13:18:13","modified_gmt":"2026-07-27T13:18:13","slug":"how-beggars-banquet-from-1968-saved-the-rolling-stones-from-psychedelic-failure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/606490\/","title":{"rendered":"How \u2018Beggars Banquet\u2019 From 1968 Saved The Rolling Stones From Psychedelic Failure"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Rolling Stones<\/a>\u2018 Beggars Banquet was a sobering record. At the time, their career was careening in a direction it shouldn\u2019t have gone. This record was their saving grace, propping them up as one of the most edgy, sharp, and raucous bands to emerge from the British Invasion. <\/p>\n

Everything pretty much fell into place on this 1986 record, or at least it set the stage for the band to get on the right track. From the perfect producer to the beginning of the end for a failing bandmate, this record was the start of The Stones\u2019 run that made them legends. <\/p>\n

\t\t\tVideos by American Songwriter\t\t<\/p>\n

[RELATED: On This Day in 1978, The Rolling Stones Hit No. 1, but Their Album Cover Sparked a Legal Firestorm]<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

The Story Behind \u2018Beggars Banquet\u2019<\/p>\n

To set the scene, The Stones were in hot water going into this album. Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, and Brian Jones were all facing the long arm of the law thanks to a drug bust. Additionally, their previous album, Their Satanic Majesties Request, wasn\u2019t their most commercially successful effort. That psychedelic effort wasn\u2019t their cup of tea. <\/p>\n

Needless to say, they needed this album to be a success. For that success, they have a lot to thank producer Jimmy Miller for. The previous effort saw the band produce themselves. They humbly fell on their sword and decided that for this record, outside help wasn\u2019t such a bad idea. <\/p>\n

Miller came to the rescue, helping bring The Rolling Stones back to what they did best: rootsy, bluesy rock. <\/p>\n

\u201c[Miller] had such a wonderful ability to sense where a band was at, get into their heads, get their confidence, and then fire them up in the studio and get great performances out of them,\u201d engineer Eddie Kramer once said<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was an extremely impressive individual. He could help them with song structures and be very involved on that level, or be a fly on the wall when he needed to be,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n

Fracturing Band Structure<\/p>\n

\t\t\tPlay video<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\"Play\"\/<\/p>\n

With a keen producer sorted, half the battle was won. But, you know what they say\u2026 Just as one part of your life is going well, there is bound to be trouble elsewhere. That was the case for The Rolling Stones, who had nailed down their sound but were actively losing a bandmate as they made this record.<\/p>\n

Jones was losing it. Shortly after the release of Beggars Banquet, the founding member would be dismissed from the band. His struggle with drugs and general apathy made him a pain during these sessions. Miller tried to combat it, but it was a looming issue getting in the way of creating this seminal album. <\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019d show up occasionally when he was in the mood to play, and he could never really be relied on,\u201d Miller once said<\/a>. \u201cLet\u2019s say he had just bought a sitar that day, he\u2019d feel like playing it, so he\u2019d look in his calendar to see if the Stones were in. Now he may have missed the previous four sessions.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019d be doing, let\u2019s say, a blues thing,\u201d he added. \u201cHe\u2019d walk in with a sitar, which was totally irrelevant to what we were doing, and want to play it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite this hurdle, the album got made and was well received. It was the return to the titular Stones sound that fans appreciated about this record. But, a large amount of its success can be attributed to the standout track: \u201cSympathy For The Devil\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cSympathy For The Devil\u201d<\/p>\n

Few songs are more iconic than \u201cSympathy For The Devil\u201d. It not only grounded this album but also became an era-defining track for the entire 1960s. Inspired by the Mikhail Bulgakov novel \u201cThe Master And Margarita\u201d, this song encapsulated the peacemaking affinity of rockers in this era. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt was one of those sort of songs where we tried everything,\u201d Charlie Watts once said<\/a>. \u201cThe first time I ever heard the song was when Mick was playing it\u2026and it was fantastic. We had a go at loads of different ways of playing it.\u201d<\/p>\n

This song, along with the rest of the record, reinvigorated The Rolling Stones\u2019 career. If they hadn\u2019t been able to turn things around, perhaps their legacy would be entirely different. As Keith Richards once noted<\/a>, \u201c[This album] helped take the Stones to a different level. This is where we had to pull out our good stuff. And we did.\u201d<\/p>\n

(Photo by Mondadori via Getty Images)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Rolling Stones\u2018 Beggars Banquet was a sobering record. At the time, their career was careening in a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":606491,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[264],"tags":[18,117,19,17,337,6321,17536],"class_list":["post-606490","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-eire","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-music","tag-rock-music","tag-the-rolling-stones"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116992141343526655","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/606490","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=606490"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/606490\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/606491"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=606490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=606490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=606490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}