The Unknown Stones
An alternate reality in which The Rolling Stones never existed
Cover of new album by The Unknown Stones, 2026 (artwork stolen/modified by Canva AI).
If you’re still walking the planet, you must admire the surgical precision of marketing for the new Rolling Stones album, and its tsunami of social media and print and television (Good Morning America??), partnerships with FIFA, AI-generated younger versions of themselves, and endless interviews of the chuckly/calculated Jagger and the gravely Richards and the eager little brother Wood, and all the special guests and producers, and the intricate description of the recording process, and the tips for longevity, and the clichéd headlines that play off the lyric “What a drag it is getting old,” or endless clickbait like “Ten things about the Stones you already know and you’re reading it again because you’re an idiot.” Their promotion machine is fine-tuned and completely shameless and should be studied in university classes. But it’s so much of the same, over and over, and you realize these guys have been interviewed regularly for OVER SIXTY YEARS, and I’ve been reading about them since I was 12, and why do I still read stories about them? What really is there left to learn about the Stones, and will it impact my life in any way, and will they ever tour again, and is this the final album, and honestly what more is there to say? What is left to discuss? Or should it be a meta-discussion, one or two spheres outside reality, where we talk about “We need to talk about the Stones,” or “What we talk about when we talk about the Stones?” Or do we now overfarm the catalog and plunge into the abyss of trivia, where podcaster Andrew Hickey laboriously spends four entire episodes of A History of Rock Music in 500 Songs, covering ONLY ONE SONG, “Sympathy for the Devil.” Have we not exhausted all masturbatory insights into the religio-philosophical undercurrents of Jagger’s lyrics, the hermeneutics of Richards’ guitar tunings, the asymmetrical entropy of Ronnie Wood’s hair? How much patience do any of us have left? What do the Stones even want anymore? What do we want? There’s a new album and probably no more touring, so all we can do is argue about if it’s great, or somewhat great, or pockets of greatness, or mediocre, or terrible, or not nearly as good as 1972 when they were all high as kites. It’s a lot.
I mean, I love and respect the Stones. They’ve made some great timeless music. I was a huge fan in college, my freshroom dorm room even commissioned a local artist (from down the hall) to render a Stones tongue on our wall. But now, when the algorithms spit their faces back up on my feeds, I have a visceral reaction and my face twitches and I think, “Oh Jesus Christ, there’s still more??” I want to see something about the Stones I haven’t seen a zillion times. I want to hear about the album as if the Stones had never existed, as if the band is just a bunch of random British guys in their 80s. So this is my review of The Unknown Stones. Feel free to add comments, and don’t forget, it’s only $6 a month to support this nonsense.
Retired coach Mick Jagger and retired bricklayer Keith Richards performing at the
Ridgeway Rise Care Home in Swindon, 2026 (photo by Canva AI)
FOREIGN TONGUES
(Friends of the Elderly, July 2026)
The Unknown Stones
By Eddie Dinosaur
For ClassicRockRips.com
Let’s just say it—Foreign Tongues is an unusually competent eponymous debut album made by a group of completely ordinary and obscure musicians. According to family members, The Unknown Stones formed last year at a party for Ronnie Wood’s 66-year-old son Clifford (“Cliffie”), who had just retired as assistant regional manager for Bexley Computer Rental & Repair. The gathering, held one afternoon at Bexley’s Wayward Horse pub, introduced three pensioners to each other, and in between glasses of sherry, the men all realized they had once played instruments in their youth, mostly blues and R&B.
Liner notes tell us that Ronnie Wood, 79, was born in a canoe in Stanwell Moor just outside Heathrow airport. In the ‘60s he spent six months in Germany playing guitar for Ian and the Zodiacs, then left the group due to the stress of puberty. Kicked out of several art schools, he was eventually hired by Royal Mail to imitate other artists for postage stamp illustrations. Most notably he was able to mimic the style of David Gentleman, especially the Battle of Britain 25th Anniversary stamps of 1965. He retired from Royal Mail in 2003, and two days a week he renders sidewalk portraits for tourists at Covent Garden.
Keith Richards, 82, also once a guitarist, was born in the hamlet of Thong, in Kent, and briefly played rhythm for The Sorrows, a British beat group formed by Pip Whitcher in Warwickshire. He lasted just two weeks and was fired for his refusal to accept dental treatment, which was negatively impacting the band’s image. Furious at the dismissal, he turned his back on the music scene, sold his guitars, and became a bricklayer for the next 52 years. He currently volunteers as an assistant prep cook, specializing in vindaloo, and recently qualified for low-cost Band 3 dentures (upper and lower) from the National Health Service.
Retired girls footy coach Mick Jagger, who just turned 83, was born in Thamesmead, next door to the Crossness Pumping Station, “The Cathedral of Sewage.” His career highlight came in 1963, when he auditioned as vocalist for Gary Farr and the T-Bones, but they already had a singer, Gary Farr. This enraged the group, which was quite happy with their name as is, and so he was sent away. He continued with second harmonica in West End pub bands until 1969, when a sandwich made with outdated mayonnaise triggered a fierce bout of diarrhea, symptoms which recur to this day. His U14 team, Limehouse Laces, based in Tower Hamlets, East London, placed fourth in the Mayor’s Cup 1997 finals.
Retired postage stamp artist Ronnie Wood sketches a portrait of a tourist at
Covent Garden, 2026 (photo by Canva AI).
The three grew excited at the prospect of returning to music, and decided to jam a bit at each others’ extended care facilities. They still can’t remember which of them came up with the name Unknown Stones, but they all agreed they needed a drummer, so they pooled pension checks and hired Flippy Stigger (62), a friend of Keith Richards’ dentist’s nephew. For the past year they’ve been playing weekends on the outskirts of London, in clubs within range of a Dial-a-Bus. Their biggest shows to date have been a three-night residency in Swindon at the Ridgeway Rise Care Home, where Mick Jagger’s granddaughter Claire Jagger-Talbot (43) drove them in her Toyota Yaris.
Through a generous grant from Friends of the Elderly, which operates primarily in England and Wales, funding was made available for the group to record a full-length album, and facilities were donated by London’s Metropolis Studios. Their assigned producer is currently Andrew Watt (35), who’s worked with everyone from Justin Bieber and Lady Gaga to Miley Cyrus, Madonna, Elton John, Paul McCartney, Ozzy Osbourne, and Jung Kook. He’s produced the biggest acts in the music industry. So what on earth is he doing making a record with these unknown octogenarians? He’s admitted that it’s essentially a tax write-off, a perfect project that takes very little time and appears altruistic, without any of the pressure of working with actual performers.
So let’s get to the album itself. Musically it quotes from a variety of genres, blues and R&B and soul and rock and even country, as if the oldsters are still feeling their way as a unit, and can’t decide on a concrete idea of their sound. Watt faces the task of having to record three doddering men—stubborn, sedentary, and fumbling for eyeglasses—who have most likely never before worked in a studio. The challenge is astonishing, but the results occasionally do surprise.
Guitar parts come in and out, weaving around each other, as if they’re not sure who should be playing next. Some tempos run so fast you begin to wonder, well, these guys ARE from the 1960s, could this be attributed to artificial enhancement via cocaine or methamphetamine? It’s far more realistic to assume that Watt kept them going with instant coffee, which old British men prefer, as well as the odd energy drink, or a gargle of salt water for the vocals.
One of two of the tunes strive for a disco dance sound, which makes one wonder, when was the last time these guys were even in a dance club? But throughout it all, Watt sprinkles his miracle fairy dust, adding sudden chord changes and ear-pleasing tonics, that might have given this record a chance on the pop charts, if not for the fact only 160 copies were pressed.
Inexplicably, perhaps as a gag, Watt has brought in a professional rhythm section, drummer Steve Jordan (63), and bassist Darryl Jones (64), each with dozens of impressive credits. So why are these guys even here? Again, circumstances point to charity as a primary motivation—let’s try to give the old guys a good sound, they don’t have much time left.
The lyrics, presumably written by Coach Mick Jagger, reside squarely in the realm of fantasy, with references to Rome, Naples, Dallas, Puerto Rico, Jamaica, Spain, and Silver Lake, locations most likely foreign to a bunch of guys who’ve never left the UK. But we live in a modern world, and no doubt much of the contemporary details came from Google and Wikipedia searches by one of the grandkids. Occasionally Jagger comes up with lines that defy any rational explanation. Here’s the chorus of “Jealous Lover”:
Yeah, hands off, jealous lover
Please let me be
You pray like a mantis
You’re emerald green
First of all, the notion that a geriatric male in his 80s, amidst a daily routine of medications, physical therapy, adult nappies, and cognition puzzles, would also have room in his brain for contemplating a jealous lover, is simply preposterous. A recent study published in Basic and Applied Social Psychology finds that romantic jealousy drops drastically for adults over 50, with a mere 15% admitting so. Also, the image of a lover reminding one of a praying mantis suggests a random senior moment of a tottering retiree inspecting plants in the garden: “Wot’s this? Now that’s a funny-looking green bug, reminds me of…what was her name?”
Another track, “Hit Me in the Head,” greets listeners thusly:
Baby, take a little chunk of my heart
One of these days gonna fall down dead
And I’ll go a lot quicker if you hit me in the head
Yeah, I’ll go a lot quicker if you hit me in the head
Falling down among seniors is quite common, due to muscle weakness, balance and gait issues, vision loss, or Vitamin D deficiency. Not to mention the loose rugs and poor lighting. But to attribute a fall to a lover stealing a part of one’s heart, is simply poor taste. A senescent adult has a rough time already. And as for the character’s Kevorkian-like request for someone to just murder him, how is this legal? Does Interpol know about this?
There’s obviously a great deal of room for improvement in The Unknown Stones, but all in all, this is a serviceable effort from a first-time group. I won’t be traveling to Swindon to see them play, but I do look forward to their next album.
I approve this use of AI 😄
Ah, man this is great stuff. The only thing I want to read about the Stones this time around.