What's wrong with Goat's Head Soup?

It's interesting how an opinion of an album can be so different if someone heard it when it came out and is comparing it to their last one and someone just coming to it without that at all or has discovered the band and doesn't know when certain albums came out. They just listen to it as an album. While it is fun being there when it comes out, I really like the unbiased feel of discovering a band much later though each has valid points in their opinions.

 

What's wrong with Goat's Head Soup? The cover.

The cover is the only thing I didn't like about the album when I bought it back in the day. Loved the single, "Angie", and later "Heartbreaker".

It was my first Stones album save "Hot Rocks" which, of course, is a greatest hits package. It wasn't until a few years later that I backtracked to Sticky Fingers, Exile, etc. For its time Goats Head was a fine album and I still like it.

 

I liked Goats from day one, which was when Angie first appeared on the radio. It was great to have a new Stones album and I never had a problem with any of the songs, though sometimes I skip the boring Down and out of place Music. The Doo Doo name is dumb as is the album name, but otherwise it has always been one of my most played Stones albums.

Not only can I, but I just did.

 

Love it!!! It's my favorite Stones album by far. It's so dirty, filthy and gritty and it's got some of that yummy soulful, 1970s ghetto street funk to it. I also love the hell out of "Tops," "Waiting on a Friend," and "Through the Lonely Nights" so there must be something special about the time period of these recording sessions.

 

Nuttin’

 

It’s a decent album.
If anything, the production lacks the forward moving percussive drive that characterized earlier Jimmy Miller/Stones production.

Jumpin Jack Flash really pushes forward when the percussion comes in.
Same for Gimme Shelter and Brown Sugar.

Dancin With Mr D would have been less stagnant sounding with tambourine or maracas, for example.

The songs are good- the production is off.

 

I have 2 original U.S. vinyls and I like the songs, but the mix is flat and terrible.

 

I don't mind the album, but don't think it has any amazing tracks, though it has several good ones. I find the weaker tracks rather dull and the bland lifeless production make this an album I find hard to get through, especially when the last track is so pathetic.

 

I think it continues the great streak starting with Beggars Banquet

 

It has some good tunes for fans but...

It was the first time they made a professionalized LP where they weren't living together in some way, as a, maybe the, proto rock band, and I'm assuming the songs were written in the studio.

It's an evolution out of being "the rolling stones" and into being something like a corporation, one that doesn't ever have to die. If you are looking for when the heart, and brain got replaced by the simulation that we know as them, it was this LP.

It was a little like Rod Stewarts Smiler, a format that was a little played.

 

very sloppy, lazy sound. several songs suck (Coming down again, Star Star, first song)

 

That cover and insert were so fake and embarrassing. The music still had some kick but when that train left the station I could not help but cry. All my Stones love was in vain after GHS.

 

Well said...right on

 

That’s the impression I get from IOR&R.
B&B comes as a revelation after that, as if they rose up to the challenge of trying to find a replacement for MT.

GHS sounds murky, dark and dangerous.
It’s got a druggy, mysterious vibe and it’s an album that grows on you with repeated listens.

 

In a way Can You Feel The Music captures the essence of the album. I wouldn’t really call it filler as it fits right in with the other songs.
As unloved as it might be, GHS is remarkably consistent.
That’s more than can be said about IOR&R.
Although I still like the album I can count at least 5 filler tracks.

 

Personally, I like IORR better.

 

It’s always been a great album to me.

 

I ‘like’ it, but each time I try to ‘love’ it it always ends up feeling longer than the 49 minutes it is.
Stones-albums aren’t known for their brevity, but in this case it seems to work against them.
It feels padded, the experimental tracks don’t work as well as how they would do afterwards and Jagger seems too omni-present with some overlong, dull ballads. But that’s just my opinion and I do think Time Waits For No One is splendid.

 

You could argue that Time Waits For No One, Fingerprint File and It's Only Rock 'N' Roll are better than anything on Goats Head Soup.

 

Loved 'Angie' for its frightful, mirthlessness. (The album, on a whole, hit or miss.)
Call me nowhere, but this album kept me from doing hard drugs.
So thanks to the Stones for that.

M

 

Can someone who's purchased the recent boxset please share their thoughts on how GHS sounds with remastering?

Not sure if it was remixed as well (I don't think it was), but I'd love to hear whether or not the new issue is a sonic improvement over the original issue...

 

Time, I wouldn’t doubt that.
The other two I’m not so sure. Fingerprint File rolls along nicely, but imo they improved with that kind of thing afterwards. The titel track always struck me as one of the weaker singles from the classic period, but it’s still a highlight on the album imo.
GHS may not have something along the lines of Time Waits For No One or Can’t You Hear Me Knocking, but it’s a very consistent listen, very much of a piece.

 

Among first generation Stones fans, this is probably the Stones album whose reputation has improved the most over the five decades since its release. Upon release, everyone liked the "Stonesy" tracks like "Star Star", "Silver Train", "Heartbreaker" and "100 Years Ago", but other tracks were disliked and sounded weak compared to what preceded it.

If you listen now, though, "Mr. D" and "Hide Your Love" are great grooves for Mick Taylor, and the three ballads, "Winter", "Coming Down Again" and "Angie" sound beautiful to mature ears where they might have sounded wimpy to middle school kids in 73.

 

You could argue that, but you could also make the argument that "100 Years Ago" and "Winter" -because I'm feeling generous today I'll toss in "Coming Down Again" for good measure- are better than anything on It's Only Rock And Roll

 

Winter is good but I like Time Waits For No One better. Coming Down Again is just meh for me and I've never been as big a fan of 100 Years Ago as some people. Heartbreaker is my favorite song on Goats Head Soup.