Rolling Stones, ‘From the Vault: The Marquee Live in 1971′: DVD / Album Review

The Rolling Stones' From the Vault: The Marquee Live in 1971 DVD and album captures one of rock's most important bands at the height of their creative powers, performing some of their very best songs in an unusually intimate setting.

It's also performed, filmed and recorded fantastically. Basically, there's no reason on earth any self-respecting Stones fan shouldn't go buy this right now. The only sign of the bloated, campy excess that would creep into the band's mid-'70s stage shows is Mick Jagger's big floppy hat. And you'll get over that very quickly as he teams up with Keith Richards, Mick Taylor, Bill Wyman and Charlie Watts to deliver strong, raw performances of Sticky Fingers tracks such as "Bitch," "Brown Sugar" and "I Got the Blues."

The latter features particularly excellent work from saxophonist Bobby Keys, who leads a three-piece horn section that, together with pianist Ian Stewart, fills out the band's live sound without taking away the urgency or turning things into a big Broadway revue – as has been the case in recent decades.

Theoretically, if you wanted to quibble you could wish it was longer than 38 minutes, but that would just be greedy. The packaging for the LP/DVD combo package deserves bonus points, as the gate fold is packed with vintage photographs, advertisements and newspaper clippings. In short, Marquee Club Live in 1971 is one of the best entries yet from the Stones' From the Vault series.

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