From left, Ronnie Wood, Keith Richards and Mick Jagger perform during the Rolling Stones’ “No Filter” tour stop at Allegiant Stadium, Saturday, Nov. 6, 2021.
Thursday, Nov. 11, 2021 | 2 a.m.
This wasn’t your father’s Rolling Stones concert Saturday at Allegiant Stadium. Heck, it wasn’t your father’s father’s Rolling Stones concert.
But it was pretty close.
The Stones — just shy of six decades into making music and packing concert venues worldwide — stopped in Las Vegas on their “No Filter” tour — their first concert here since playing a pair of dates in fall 2016 at T-Mobile Arena.
And as they have for most of the past half-century plus, the Stones wowed their audience with their familiar blues-inspired classics, including “Honky Tonk Women,” “Sympathy for the Devil,” “Paint it Black” “Miss You” and “Start Me Up.” They peppered in a new tune, “Living in a Ghost Town.”
The “world’s greatest rock ’n’ roll band,” but for “Ruby Tuesday” — selected by fans in a “ballad roulette” vote prior to the concert — stuck to their bread and butter.
Frontman Mick Jagger, two years removed from heart valve replacement surgery and two years shy of 80 years old, continues to defy age. The voice of the Stones at some times picked up and played guitar or blew on a harmonica. But at all times he used the entire stage, which took up the width of Allegiant’s south end zone and included a catwalk in the middle that extended about 35 yards into the audience on the floor.
He skipped, strutted and ran throughout most of the set, leaving the stage only briefly when Stones’ co-founder Keith Richards performed a pair of songs, “Connection” and “Happy.” Otherwise, Jagger was his usual high-energy self. His kinetic moves were matched throughout the night only by his dizzying change of shirts and jackets — blue, black, red, pink, green, orange, purple, some plain, some bedazzled.
Richards and Ronnie Wood, even as the lines on their faces become more pronounced, continue to prove their worth as rock guitarist royalty. Wood flayed the chords on “Living in a Ghost Town,” which Jagger referred to as the Stones “lockdown” song, and “You Can’t Always Get What You Want.”
As if the night needed any more energy, Richards boosted the level when he riffed the familiar opening to “Jumping Jack Flash.”
Wood may have had the shirt of the night: a yellow beauty with the words “Tumbling Dice” displayed in red on the right panel and accentuated by red dice on the cuffs. Wood, of course, revealed the shirt during the song of the same name.
But the night wasn’t just about the three remaining mainstays of the Rolling Stones. As the concert started, a tribute was displayed on the four giant floor-to-ceiling LED video columns behind the stage with images of the band’s famed drummer, Charlie Watts, who died just short of three months ago at age 80. After the third song of the set Jagger dedicated the night to Watts and noted that the COVID-interrupted North American leg of “No Filter” was the first time since 1962 that “we’ve not done a tour without him.”
Steve Jordan, who in addition to drumming with house bands on “Saturday Night Live,” and “Late Night with David Letterman,” and has had a long musical relationship with Richards, set the beat on the skins.
Bassist Darryl Jones was solid, and his extended solo on “Miss You” was powerful.
Sasha Allen, who provided backing vocals throughout the night, brought the house down when she performed at center stage with Jagger on “Gimme Shelter” during the encore.
Jagger and Richards shared some thoughts with the audience about Allegiant Stadium, Las Vegas’ newest and biggest concert venue.
Jagger, as with many tourists, noted he hadn’t before realized that Allegiant Stadium was actually “in somewhere called Paradise. Who knew that Paradise looked like this? Seven football games a year, Garth Brooks and the Raiderettes.”
Richards said it was “great to be back” in Las Vegas. “A new joint, too. Not bad.”
The Stones called it a night after “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction,” their 19th song, having spent nearly two hours onstage.
That might have been short for the band back in grandpa’s day. But any night you can sing and dance with the Rolling Stones, it’s nothing but a win.
Rolling Stones setlist
“Street Fighting Man”
“It’s Only Rock ‘n’ Roll (but I Like It)”
“19th Nervous Breakdown”
“Tumbling Dice”
“Rocks Off”
“Ruby Tuesday”
“You Can’t Always Get What You Want”
“Living in a Ghost Town”
“Start Me Up”
“Honky Tonk Women”
“Connection”
“Happy”
“Miss You”
“Midnight Rambler”
“Paint It Black”
“Sympathy for the Devil”
“Jumpin’ Jack Flash”
Encore:
“Gimme Shelter”
“(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction”
