Concert film captures the Stones' 1978 performance in Fort Worth
Associated Press archives
Mick Jagger, left, sings to guitarist Keith Richards in Philadelphia's John F. Kennedy Stadium in 1978.
"Quite intense" is how Mick Jagger remembers the summer of 1978.
His band, the Rolling Stones, had just released Some Girls, a follow-up to 1976's Black and Blue, and was touring America for the first time in three years. It was nearing the end of the Exile on Main Street era, a tumultuous period of drug problems, tax dilemmas and intra-band squabbles.
The '78 schedule wasn't too grueling -- 25 dates in two months, including a July 18 stop at Fort Worth's Will Rogers Memorial Auditorium -- but, of course, the offstage antics were enough to bring even the hardiest rock stars nearly to their knees.
It's the wearied yet exhilarated faces that stick with you the most in the new concert film Some Girls Live in Texas, which screened nationally Tuesday.
Captured by a Dallas film crew but officially unreleased for the better part of three decades, this document of a band near its prime is being released Nov. 21 on Blu-ray and DVD in conjunction with a reissue of Some Girls.
The remastered film, decked out with an immaculate image and a roaring soundtrack, was preceded by a 15-minute interview with Jagger, which was filmed in August with journalist Paul Sexton.
Sexton prefaced his chat with a few clips from the '78 Fort Worth gig. Cutting from the youthful, lascivious Jagger to the extremely well-worn, modern-day version was downright shocking.
"It's not sloppy," Jagger said of the Fort Worth show. "Everyone's having fun, but you can see they're concentrating."
And indeed, there's an almost workmanlike feel to the set list, which pulled heavily from the then-fresh Some Girls. The core group (Jagger, Keith Richards, Charlie Watts, Ronnie Wood and Bill Wyman) was augmented by pros like Ian McLagan. In a neat twist, several of the smaller shows, including Fort Worth, were performed under a pseudonym, the London Greenshoe Cowboys.
But that gimmick was the only one in sight (a far cry from the Stones' later years). Powered by the phenomenal Some Girls (which produced classics like Beast of Burden), the Stones appear burned-out but rock-solid throughout the performance, which swings from punk-inspired fury ( Shattered) to beautifully battered country ( Far Away Eyes).
A visceral document of an era lost to memory, Jagger fairly understated the electricity generated by the Stones: "This particular era was, musically, very interesting."
Preston Jones is the Star-Telegram pop music critic. 817-390-7713
