The first studio album to be released following Brian Jones departure from the band and subsequent death, it includes his replacement, 20 year old guitarist Mick Taylor.

Like Beggars Banquet it was produced by Jimmy Miller and it's also similar in that both sides of the LP open with two stone cold classics, "Gimme Shelter", with Merry Clayton's wonderful backing vocal, and "Midnight Rambler", songs that have been a part of Stones live shows for the last four decades. In another similarity to the band's previous studio album it also features a blues cover, this time, "Love in Vain", written by the King of the Delta Blues Singers, Robert Johnson. The last track on the record is the ambitious and very different "You Can't Always Get What You Want". featuring the London Bach Choir arranged by Jack Nitzsche and Al Kooper, late of Blood Sweat & Tears on keyboards and French horn. And finally... the future queen of British TV cookery shows, Delia Smith, baked the cake on the front cover. less