London: The legendary British rock band Rolling Stones have announced their first new album in over 18 years, titled Hackney Diamonds. This marks the first time the band will be releasing a brand new LP with original material.
In a live conversation with late-night host Jimmy Fallon, the British group –comprised of lead vocalist Mick Jagger, guitarist Ronnie Wood, writer and guitarist Keith Richards and drummer Steve Jordan — announced ‘Hackney Diamonds’ will come out October 20, Aceshowbiz reported.
The Rolling Stones Hackney Diamonds will be a 12-track, LP is their first studio set of new material since 2005’s ‘A Bigger Bang’. In addition, the band also unveiled the first single from their album, ‘Angry’, which is accompanied by a music video starring ‘Euphoria’ actress Sydney Sweeney and directed by Francois Rousselet.
Wood said they began brainstorming ideas for Rolling Stones Hackney Diamonds around Christmas last year, and gave themselves a deadline to complete it by Valentine’s Day. They ended up with 23 songs spanning two albums. The upcoming album was completed in January and mixed in February.
The band confirmed that their late drummer and one of their original members Charlie Watts — who died from cancer aged 80 in August 2021 — features on two tracks of Rolling Stones Hackney Diamonds, with replacement Steve Jordan playing on the other 10.
On the song ‘Live By The Sword’, they are backed by both Charlie and former bassist Bill Wyman, reuniting the original rhythm section of The Rolling Stones. The second song featuring Charlie is ‘Mess It Up’.
Discussing how Charlie’s absence affected the band, guitarist Keith, 79, said: “Ever since Charlie’s gone it’s different, of course, he’s number four, he’s missing. Of course he’s missed, incredibly. But thanks to Charlie Watts we have Steve Jordan — who was Charlie’s recommendation should anything happen to him, Steve Jordan is your man. It would have been a lot harder without Charlie’s blessing.”
Addressing Charlie’s musical contribution, Mick, 80, added, “There’s 12 tracks on the album. Most are with Steve, but two are tracks we recorded in 2019 with Charlie. We used two of the tracks that we recorded with Charlie before. Bill played on one track, so we have the original Rolling Stones rhythm section on one track.”
In addition, Lady Gaga also appears on the album, singing a duet with Mick Jagger on the song ‘Sweet Sound Of Heaven’. Other guest artistes who will participate in the album include Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder.
The Stone’s frontman went on to say that the band members are very proud of the record and wouldn’t have released it unless they loved it themselves.
Mick Jaeger said: “I don’t want to be big headed but we wouldn’t have put this album out if we hadn’t really liked it. We said we had to make a record. We really love ourselves. We are quite pleased with it, we are not big headed about it, but we hope you all like it.”
Rolling Stones are not only of the most iconic rock bands of all time from the 1960’s and ‘70s, where they are frequently put in the list alongside The Beatles, The Doors, AC/DC, KISS, Rainbow, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Queen, Deep Purple, King Crimson, Black Sabbath and many more; they are also one of the best selling artistes of all time, having sold over 250-300 million albums worldwide. They are also the longest standing rock band of all time, having been active since 1962, making it to a total of 60+years.
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