I suppose after more than 25 predecessors, it’s fair to ask whether we really need another live album from The Rolling Stones, especially knowing there will never be a repeat of Get Yer Ya-Ya’s Out. As somebody who has enjoyed listening to the Stones for some 40 years, I don’t have a problem with it; while I don’t necessarily love each and every new Stones record, I always find it cool when they release new albums, though it’s safe to assume I’m biased here.
Bridges To Bremen first and foremost is a concert film that’s also available in audio-only formats. It captures the Stones’ full show at Weserstadium in Bremen, Germany on September 2, 1998 during what was the fifth and final leg of their Bridges To Babylon tour. For the most part, it is a collection of the band’s greatest hits, combined with some songs from their then-new album Bridges To Babylon.
According to the Stones’ website, Ever the innovators, Bridges To Babylon was a tour of firsts – the first time the band went on the road with a permanent B-stage, and also the first time where fans could vote on the band’s website for a track they wanted to hear on the setlist – Memory Motel in the case of the Bremen fans. This concert film has been meticulously restored from the original masters, and the audio remixed and remastered from the live multitrack recordings.
Interestingly, the Stones opted to kick off the show with their best known song that is oftentimes reserved until the end of their concerts: (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction. The tune was first released as a single in the U.S. in June 1965 and was also included on the band’s U.S. version of Out Of Our Heads, their fourth studio release in America. I wouldn’t have called it out, would it not have been for the fact that there are currently only two clips on YouTube from the concert film and I didn’t want to settle for audio clips only. Plus, let’s be honest here, while I must have listened to the friggin’ tune more than one thousand times, I still get a kick watching Keith Richards launch into the song’s signature riff.
The other clip I’d like to highlight is a nice cover of Like A Rolling Stone. Obviously, the band’s formation predates the Bob Dylan tune, so there’s no connection between the song and Stones’ name. In fact, the latter was inspired by a 1950 Muddy Waters track called Rollin’ Stone. Dylan first released Like A Rolling Stone as a single in July 1965. The tune also was included on his fifth studio album Highway 61 Revisited that came out in August that year.
Bridges To Bremen came out today. Here’s the complete track list:
1. (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction
2. Let’s Spend The Night Together
3. Flip The Switch
4. Gimme Shelter
5. Anybody Seen My Baby?
6. Paint It Black
7. Saint Of Me
8. Out Of Control
9. Memory Motel
10. Miss You
11. Thief In The Night
12. Wanna Hold You
13. Its Only Rock ‘n’ Roll (But I Like It)
14. You Got Me Rocking
15. Like A Rolling Stone
16. Sympathy For The Devil
17. Tumbling Dice
18. Honky Tonk Women
19. Start Me Up
20. Jumpin’ Jack Flash
21. You Can’t Always Get What You Want
22. Brown Sugar
In addition, the concert film comes with four bonus tracks that were captured in Chicago during the same tour:
1. Rock And A Hard Place
2. Under My Thumb
3. All About You
4. Let It Bleed
Sources: Wikipedia, Rolling Stones website, setlist.fm, YouTube
Christian's Music Musings 
I spotted this one. I saw them on this tour and so was pretty interested in hearing this one. From what I can remember, the set list was very different and they started with Jumping Jack Flash.
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That’s interesting. From what I understand, the Bridges To Babylon Tour was pretty long, and that German gig was one of the final dates. I imagine the Stones may have switched up the order of the songs by that time.
Since I was wondering myself why the Stones would start a show with arguably their best known song, I checked and found the very concert in Bremen on setlist.fm. And, yep, it looks like they kicked off the concert with Satisfaction that night.
I suppose when you have a ginormous catalog that includes so many well known songs, you do have the luxury and start your gig with a signature tune – unlike most other music artists who would save such song for later in their set.
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I saw them in June 1999. It was a handful of rescheduled shows – if I can remember correctly, the original date was August ‘98.
But aye, with such a rich catalogue, they do have that luxury of picking any signature tune to start a gig.
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