Quote
Mathijs
Fantastic track, great groove, just raw and aggressive. Fantastic bass by Richards, and the best sax solo on a Stones record ever. One of the absolute best Stones tracks.

Mathijs

Quote
Come On
It was a filler -83 but now a classic Yes! Songs tends to be when times flies...
...and the sax solo on Brown Sugar is way better...

Quote
stonehearted
Undercover is a strange animal in the zoo of the Stones canon, more a hybrid thana pure solid breed (and therefore a mere curiosity) because it couldn't quite decide exactly what it wanted to be: an album by a dance/club/funk band, or an album of good-time back to basics rock n roll? When it tries to be the latter, it succeeds on all attempts (She Was Hot, All The Way Down, It Must Be Hell), but when it tries to succeed as the former, it misses about half the time, and one of those misses is the tuneless funk experiment Pretty Beat Up.

Keith indulging in his bass lines is unfortunate, because the overall groove suffers without the booming bottom that Wyman would have contributed: instead, Keith is noodling somewhere in the middle of the fretboard the way a guitarist would, especially in the last half minute of the track, playing notes higher in the register that leave the bottom almost completely untended and making it sound like only half a rhythm section.

I disagree strongly. He is indeed sparse, and pushes all the right buttons to make this one groove tremendously.

His stops, for instance, he would normally use when playing guitar as well. But it is sparse, and highlighting why he is such a different (and brilliant) rhythm player.

Compared to Ronnie, and other guitarists who play bass, Keith never went into the "noodling trap", as far as I can hear.

There are three guitars, two pianos, one organ, and half a bass.

This track might have been better as a non-album B-side for later inclusion on a volume of rarities rather than a hit-and-miss follow-up to an album that everyone loved from start to finish. Because of misguided experiments like this, you can't get many Stones fans to agree on Undercover the way you can with Tattoo You.

Quote
Doxa

With "Hey Negrita" I think "Pretty Beat Up" also shows what Ron Wood is able to bring on the table creativity-wise. Not quite filling Jones's or Taylor's shoes in that sense in widering up their musical vocabulary, but I think the more to blame is the big boys - and especially the one with big lips - who not probably still aren't so inspired by 'little brother's' efforts.

- Doxa

Quote
DandelionPowderman
<nothing much else to remember about.>

I remember Mick's brilliant singing, the fantastic sax solo, excellent bass playing and a groove and an energy which they never have surpassed again.

Quite a lot, I'd say

Quote
DandelionPowderman
<What is also great in his vocals here is that he actually still sounds real without being so damn cliched and professional or struggled-cat-like as he would later do.>

Well, imo, he started sounding like that in the early 70s already.

Listen to TWFNO, Till The Next Goodbye and others.

Quote
drewmaster
A raucous, sweaty, super-funky jungle vamp that exudes violence and decay, and fits perfectly within all the other gory apocalyptic carnage on Undercover. Love that wailing sax solo, and those lyrics that nail how brutal and heartless a former lover can be. Great stuff, Ronnie.

Drew

Quote
DandelionPowderman
<even though there might be symptoms of that alraedy in the latter album>

Yep, on Winter and Hide Your Love in particular.

But PBU shows no signs of tiredness. On the contrary, it's full of energy, and Mick's vocals is spot on!

What I was referring to was the camp, vain-ish jadedness that came into Mick's vocals. The sniffing, the "new" pronounciation of words and the "I love myself, and I'm never gonna finish this phrase"-endings of his lines

They are cool to a point, but he steps over the line a few times, imo.

I know many people disagree with me here, but there is a difference between the high octan growling and the campy vocals. The growling is prominent on SG, and on PBU, while the campy thing evolved in the glam era (but it's of course evident on Miss You as well).

However, the growling went too far as well, and hit the nadir on She's The Boss as well as on Fight, imo.

Quote
Silver Dagger
It's a decent enough track but nothing too special. I think in the absence of new material a lot of people try and re-evaluate post 1981 Stones songs and fool themselves into thinking they are a lot better than they actually are.

My yardstick has always been, would this song have made it onto any of their albums from Aftermath to Some Girls. Unfortunately I don't think this one would have.

Quote
Doxa

Quote
DandelionPowderman
<even though there might be symptoms of that alraedy in the latter album>

Yep, on Winter and Hide Your Love in particular.

But PBU shows no signs of tiredness. On the contrary, it's full of energy, and Mick's vocals is spot on!

What I was referring to was the camp, vain-ish jadedness that came into Mick's vocals. The sniffing, the "new" pronounciation of words and the "I love myself, and I'm never gonna finish this phrase"-endings of his lines

They are cool to a point, but he steps over the line a few times, imo.

I know many people disagree with me here, but there is a difference between the high octan growling and the campy vocals. The growling is prominent on SG, and on PBU, while the campy thing evolved in the glam era (but it's of course evident on Miss You as well).

However, the growling went too far as well, and hit the nadir on She's The Boss as well as on Fight, imo.

Well, I think "Winter" is one of Jagger's strongest vocal performances ever, and actually one of the strongest vocal performances by anyone ever, and I was about to mention "Hide Your Love" as a counter example to "Pretty Beat Up" where he breathes the flow of the music convincingly and naturally, but I guess we have a huge taste difference here. I recall you once said that Jagger sings "Lies" as good as he does "Rip This Joint", which is for me a capital crime to claim...

I get the "campiness" point of the early 70's, but I think Jagger does a marvellous job there, using novel aspects of his natural and unique tone ("Let It Loose", "Angie", Winter", etc.), wheras the stuff he does from, say, PRIMITIVE COOL on, sounds more like vocal coached stuff, hiding losing some chords of his natural voice. I also think the growling/shouting of the early/mid 80's is partly hiding losing the powerfull sharpness and edge he naturally had in his younger age, especially in EXILE rockers (thinking of "Rocks Off", "Rip This Joint", "All Down The Line", "Soul Survivor").

- Doxa

Quote
Mathijs

Quote
Silver Dagger
It's a decent enough track but nothing too special. I think in the absence of new material a lot of people try and re-evaluate post 1981 Stones songs and fool themselves into thinking they are a lot better than they actually are.

My yardstick has always been, would this song have made it onto any of their albums from Aftermath to Some Girls. Unfortunately I don't think this one would have.

PBU is pretty much in the same ragged groove vein as Turd On The Run and Lies, so....

Mathijs

Quote
DandelionPowderman

Quote
Doxa

Quote
DandelionPowderman
<even though there might be symptoms of that alraedy in the latter album>

Yep, on Winter and Hide Your Love in particular.

But PBU shows no signs of tiredness. On the contrary, it's full of energy, and Mick's vocals is spot on!

What I was referring to was the camp, vain-ish jadedness that came into Mick's vocals. The sniffing, the "new" pronounciation of words and the "I love myself, and I'm never gonna finish this phrase"-endings of his lines

They are cool to a point, but he steps over the line a few times, imo.

I know many people disagree with me here, but there is a difference between the high octan growling and the campy vocals. The growling is prominent on SG, and on PBU, while the campy thing evolved in the glam era (but it's of course evident on Miss You as well).

However, the growling went too far as well, and hit the nadir on She's The Boss as well as on Fight, imo.

Well, I think "Winter" is one of Jagger's strongest vocal performances ever, and actually one of the strongest vocal performances by anyone ever, and I was about to mention "Hide Your Love" as a counter example to "Pretty Beat Up" where he breathes the flow of the music convincingly and naturally, but I guess we have a huge taste difference here. I recall you once said that Jagger sings "Lies" as good as he does "Rip This Joint", which is for me a capital crime to claim...

I get the "campiness" point of the early 70's, but I think Jagger does a marvellous job there, using novel aspects of his natural and unique tone ("Let It Loose", "Angie", Winter", etc.), wheras the stuff he does from, say, PRIMITIVE COOL on, sounds more like vocal coached stuff, hiding losing some chords of his natural voice. I also think the growling/shouting of the early/mid 80's is partly hiding losing the powerfull sharpness and edge he naturally had in his younger age, especially in EXILE rockers (thinking of "Rocks Off", "Rip This Joint", "All Down The Line", "Soul Survivor").

- Doxa

Winter is not even junior league, compared to Angie and Let It Loose, imo.

You really find Mick's singing on Hide Your Love "natural"?

The bridge on CYHTM, however, THAT is great singing from Mick.

And what's wrong with Mick on Lies? You can't get more powerful than that