The Rolling Stones, 50th Anniversary Tour

Today I did something I never thought I’d do: I paid a bunch of money to see a band of geezers play music they made 40ish years ago.  The Rolling Stones have long been one of my favorite favorite bands.  But I’m a superficial fan.  Something about old men playing the music of young men, prancing about like the 20-something bad-boys they once were, makes me kinda uncomfortable.  But whatever.  Mick Taylor (lead guitarist from 1969-74) will be there.  This is sort of a once-in-a-lifetime thing.  So I’m pretty stoked.  Still, I’ve seen other older bands and ended up being more saddened than stoked.  I want to remember the Stones as they were, as the sexualized antithesis to The Beatles, as the dangerous ‘don’t-play-with-me-cause-you’re-playing-with-fire’ dudes, as the elegantly wasted ‘torn and frayed’ country-blues rockers, not wrinkly old coots.  But like I said, I’m pretty stoked.  Once in a lifetime and all.  Here’s hoping that these old dudes don’t ruin or pervert the image and ideal I hold so dear.