Can't Get Enough of Mick's Love

It all depends whether your introduction to Mick Jagger’s new solo album, Goddess in The Doorway, was via the Lenny-Kravitz powered lead single, “God Gave Me Everything,” or the opening track off the album, “Visions of Paradise.” They’re both good old-fashioned rockers, and both preoccupied with religious imagery, neither of which should come as a surprise from the man who used to proclaim his “Sympathy For The Devil” on a nightly basis. And, indeed, “God Gave Me Everything” finds rock’s senior Peter Pan slipping back into his leather jacket (check out his double-jointed pelvis in the video) and breaking out the power-chords, courtesy of the lightning-bolt guitar of the reassuringly retro-styled Kravitz. The lyrics are pure Stonesian Jagger, “God gave me everything I want/Can’t stop/I’ll give it all to you!”

But if you took the plunge and bought the whole album, or were given it (or downloaded it if you’re too hip to pay for music these days), and curled up in the shade of your wilting Christmas tree to have a good listen, you might discover an album with an entirely different slant. Beginning with “Visions of Paradise,” Jagger undertakes the previously unimaginable task of coming to terms with the fact that he is possibly the only man alive over the age of 50 who is still allowed to wear denim jeans and a leather jacket, bed supermodels and sing about it in front of thousands of people. That is to say, Peter Pan starts to grow up, and, horror of horrors, perhaps even mature. But don’t expect Jagger to do so quietly and tamely: on “Too Far Gone,” he warns, “Always hate nostalgia/Living in the past/No use getting misty-eyed/It all screamed by so fast.”

Jagger has assembled an enviable guest-list on the album, even if the combinations do seem a little forced at times. As well as Kravitz, Pete Townshend, Wyclef Jean and Matchbox Twenty’s Rob Thomas make appearances, while Bono contributes all of about two lines to the euphoric “Joy,” an act of ego-compression worthy of applause in itself. Despite the collaborators, however, Jagger’s inimitable persona is emblazoned across the album, in every aspect, but most particularly his literally peerless voice. Though “Joy” definitely owes something to U2’s rediscovery of feel-good anthems, Jagger’s old-school inflection and nasal twang a la Billy Corgan gives the chorus “Jump for joy” a strut that Bono seems almost incapable of these days. “Hide Away” is so infused with trademark Jagger-swagger it would turn new-found fan Britney green. Jagger alternates between wailing like a saxophone and muttering like a gangster, “Make sure that I never come back/Disappear and I never come back/Haaaaaaaiiide away.”

Goddess is not without its dead-ends and irritating re-invented rocker electro-gimmickry. “Dancing in The Starlight” sounds worryingly like Toploader’s cover of “Dancing in The Moonlight.” “Lucky Day” never really gets beyond its spaghetti western premise, despite Jagger’s idiosyncratic approach to vowels, which can turn a single syllable into an entire phrase. Then again, “Everybody Getting High” would probably be unbearable in anyone else’s hands, with its lyrically deficient chorus (“Everybody getting high-high-high-high/Uh-high-high-high”) and free association verse. Yet Jagger infuses lines like, “My dress designers/They want to doll me up in blue (Pretty!)/Next fall collection/They’re going to show it in a zoo” with a certain kind of conviction, or at least attitude, that the song comes close to convincing that this whole getting high idea might be worth a shot sometime.

Of course Jagger has rather more than his fair share of looped beats and sampled noises (does anyone make an album without samples these days? Besides P. Diddy I mean) to prove that he’s not just an aging rocker, but is presumably in touch with his young, rebellious and computer-literate side as well. “Why Don’t You Just Get A Gun” sounds briefly like Jagger dabbling with Madonna-styled nu-dance schlock, until he breaks out the attitude for the snarling chorus. But the real shockers are the songs that leave Jagger’s musical mould fairly undisturbed, but take him into entirely uncharted lyrical waters. On any previous Jagger album, a song entitled “Goddess in the Doorway” would have been a paean to sex, beautiful women and more sex. Yet the title track of the new album is a troubled plea on which Jagger sounds, of all things, vulnerable. He sings, “Demons in the bedroom/Dogs are on the roof/I am in the basement/Looking for the truth.”

“Don’t Call Me Up” is in many ways the standout track on the album, despite being musically fairly unremarkable. The lyrics are written and sung with a depth of conviction that you wouldn’t think possible from Jagger until you heard it. He sings his way through the messy story of a divorce: “People ask have you seen her/I say not for a while/I’m going to see my girlfriend way down in Argentina/We going to have a blast for a while.” Jagger’s last high-profile conquest may have been Brazilian, but it’s hard not to admire the emotional honesty of the man: It may be the closest you’ll get to feeling sorry for a rock star. Jagger’s still looking out for himself though: “Don’t call me up/When you wanna cry/’Cause I might let you down/Don’t call me up/When some other guy hangs your heart strings out to dry.”

Jagger is probably the last person anyone would look to for radical musical innovation, though Goddess is an outstanding rock album. Yet what Jagger has achieved is far more surprising and engaging. Rock stars above the age of 50 who have not made the artistic move to Vegas are few and far between, and Jagger is possibly the first to sing with authority about how a life of sex, drugs and rock and roll might feel in retrospect. And by god, he can still shake those hips and flap those lips.

MICK JAGGER

Goddess in the Doorway

Virgin Records