Mick Jagger shares what makes Exile on Main St. ‘different’ to earlier Rolling Stones albums

A crucial difference between early albums from The Rolling Stones and Exile on Main St. has been highlighted by Mick Jagger.

The band’s frontman shared what makes the album unique, especially when compared to earlier releases, in an interview with Rolling Stone Magazine founder Jann Wenner. Let It Bleed. would be the first album to feature guitarist Mick Taylor, and while it was a major change in the studio, it’s not the sole reason Jagger gives for the “different” feeling. Jagger would say Exile on Main St. was the first album to feature Taylor’s work in his interview. Taylor’s work was credited as a major shift in The Rolling Stones’ sound, especially after the death of Brian Jones, but Jagger also says the “stoned” feeling at the time gave the band a fresh sound. As well as the stoned feeling, a series of legal disputes and tax issues had given the band a new set of problems.

Jagger explained: “It’s the first album Mick Taylor’s on, really. So it’s different than previous albums, which had Brian on them – or Brian not on them, as the case may be. It was a difficult period, because we had all these lawsuits going with [business manager] Allen Klein.

“We had to leave England because of tax problems. We had no money and went to live in the South of France – the first album we made where we weren’t based in England, thus the title.” Wenner suggested the band was at their “drug zenith” around this time, with Jagger agreeing.

He would go on to say The Rolling Stones were “staying up all night” and “winging it” around this time, with Keith Richards’ drug use at an all-time high. The rest of the band fared no better, with Jagger going on to say everyone was “stoned on something” while making the seminal album.

Jagger shared: “Stoned on something; one thing or another. So I don’t think it was particularly pleasant I didn’t have a very good time. It was this communal thing where you don’t know whether you’re recording or living or having dinner; you don’t know when you’re gonna play, when you’re gonna sing – very difficult. Too many hangers-on.

“I went with the flow, and the album got made. These things have a certain energy, and there’s a certain flow to it, and it got impossible. Everyone was so out of it. And the engineers, the producers – all the people that were supposed to be organised – were more disorganised than anybody.”

Part of Exile on Main St. was recorded at Nellcote, a rented villa in the south of France. Bassist Bill Wyman had trouble with these days recording, and noted something had changed within the band. He recalled: “Not everyone turned up every night. This was, for me, one of the major frustrations of this whole period.

“For our previous two albums, we had worked well and listened to producer Jimmy Miller. At Nellcôte things were very differen,t and it took me a while to understand why.”