'Rolling Stones: 50 Years of Rock'N'Roll' photo book focuses mainly on 1960s
Life magazine has had a long history of going through several incarnations. It was published as a humor/general interest magazine from 1883 to 1936; as a weekly photo-driven magazine from 1936 to 1972; as an intermittent special until 1978; as a monthly from 1978 to 2000; as a magazine supplement from 2004 to 2007; as a website (Life.com) partnered with Getty Images from 2009 to January 2012; and, as of January 2012, as a photo channel on sister website Time.com.
Those are a lot of photo archives.
And that's why it's disappointing that the photo book "Rolling Stones: 50 Years of Rock'N'Roll" (compiled and written by editors of Life), which is supposed to be what the title describes, is instead a collection of photos that primarily focus on just one decade. The book has 144 pages, and more than 100 of those pages are of the Rolling Stones in the 1960s. And the book ends at 2006, so it leaves out the band's public appearances for the 2008 concert documentary "Shine a Light" and the 2010 reissue of "Exile on Main Street."
As for the text, the book doesn't take great pains to present a chronological history of the Rolling Stones in tidy little chronological chapters. Instead, much of the band's history is the told in the hodgepodge of captions that accompany the photos.
There are some side chapters focusing on the individual band members or close associates who aren't Mick Jagger, Keith Richards and Charlie Watts. Ian Stewart fans will be glad to know that his individual chapter has the most pages.
Here is a list of the side chapters in the book:
"Who Was Ian Stewart?" - 9 pages
"Who Was Brian Jones?" - 6 pages
"Who Is Andrew Loog Oldham?" - 6 pages
"Who Is Mick Taylor?" - 4 pages
"Who Is Ronnie Wood?" - 4 pages
"Stones Alone" (about band members' solo projects) - 4 pages
Despite leaning too heavily on 1960s photos, "Rolling Stones: 50 Years of Rock'N'Roll" does make an attempt to present the band as more than just a touring act. Photos of the band members' personal lives are included, such as family pictures and Keith Richards' wedding to Patti Hansen.
However, as a comprehensive retrospective, "Rolling Stones: 50 Years of Rock'N'Roll" misses the mark by leaving out too much of the Rolling Stones' history that took place after the 1960s
