The Rolling Stones - Truth & Lies

How the media monitored Mick and the boys

The apparent hounding of Pete Doherty by today’s gutter press is a kissogram compared to the onslaught of moral superiority the Stones had to endure in their prime. Truth & Lies collects together reams of archive footage of the group’s legal woes and other skirmishes with the establishment, from mob-like crushes on the steps of court buildings to the feeding frenzy of Jagger’s wedding to Bianca in St Tropez.

Original Pathe newsreels, complete with public school plummy-voiced narration, help identify the battle lines. This was truly an us-versus-them conflict, with the band demonised as the most shocking menaces to society imaginable. The laughable �5 fines doled out for public urination in a garage forecourt are reported with as much outrage as Keith Richards’ heroin bust in Canada a decade later.

Yet the Stones emerge with their dignity intact, Jagger especially coming across as a level-headed and articulate man merely bemused by the perceived threat of a bunch of pop stars. Bonus features include additional vintage cinema shorts, including a charming portrait of a “with-it” 60s teen mag, Intro, although a little more of the cake-throwing footage from the launch party for the Beggars Banquet album would have been nice.

3 stars 3 stars 3 stars

Liberation | LIB 6112

Reviewed by Terry Staunton
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