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Wednesday, March 14, 2007

Rolling Stones Rock and Roll Circus

While I was channel surfing last night I stumbled upon something called "Rolling Stones Rock and Roll Circus" on MPT. The name pretty much describes it all. The Rolling Stones along with a slew of other artists performed in a replica circus tent. The performance took place in December of 1968 and included performances by Jethro Tull, The Who, Taj Mahal, The Stones, and a band I had never heard of called "Dirty Mac." This supergroup consisted of Eric Clapton on lead guitar, John Lennon on lead vocals and guitar, Keith Richards on bass, and Mitch Mitchell on drums.

Some notable things to mention about the show:

1. It was the last public performance Brian Jones made with the Stones.
2. It was the first time John Lennon had played publicly without any of the other Beatles.
3. Tommy Iommi, guitarist from Black Sabbath, played with Jethro Tull as he was part of the band for a few weeks.
4. The performance wasn't released until the mid 90's. The Stone said that they didn't release the footage because they were exhausted and it showed. Others say that The Who upstaged them and that The Stones didn't want people to see that.

I'm glad I caught it as I thought it was great and a lot of fun seeing these legends when they were in their 20's. I hope you check out the performance Dirty Mac put on of "Yer Blues"


1 comment:

The Knitter said...

Special. I think the main reason for the non-release might have been the ghostlike appearance of Brian Jones. He certainly looks "out of it", and his distance from the rest of the Stones (on stage) is apparent. Other than that the performance of the Stones and the other performers is top-notch.