The Rolling Stones rolled out their forthcoming 25th album, Foreign Tongues, in New York on Tuesday afternoon, bringing friends, journalists and fellow artists into the room for a first listen. Mick Jagger, Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood then took the stage with Conan O’Brien and used the event to make a blunt case for why the band still sounds dangerous.
Richards said Andrew Watt was the referee when things stopped working. “When it’s not working, that’s when we bring in the referee,” he said, pointing to the producer, then added, “He kicks us up the arse.” O’Brien did not hide his enthusiasm. He called the record “kick ass” and said he had listened to it “25 times” since getting it a few days earlier.
The preview drew Leonardo DiCaprio, director Baz Luhrmann and actor Odessa A’zion, a reminder that even a new Stones album still arrives as a cultural event, not just a release. The band is now a three-piece after Charlie Watts died in 2021, and Foreign Tongues was cut with Watt and a slate of guests that includes Steve Winwood, Paul McCartney, Robert Smith and Chad Smith.
Jagger said the album has 14 songs and said the band still moves easily between styles. “The thing about this record is – the Stones are a rock band that also has the capacity to do ballads, country music or dance music. So we don’t get stuck in one kind of style,” he said. He described “Ringing Hollow” as “a country tune” inspired by Hank Williams, said “Beautiful Delilah” draws from the delta blues, and called “Hit Me in the Head” “a real punk rocker,” with parts recorded by Watts before his death.
Jagger said the album was recorded in about a month and that the short schedule sharpened the band’s focus. “Only having four weeks gave us an urgency. We’re having fun most of the time in the studio, but it’s a lot of concentration too – you’ve really got to make [a song’s] five minutes count,” he said.
Wood, for his part, described his exchange with Richards as “an ancient form of weaving,” and Richards later said that after Watts died, Steve Jordan took over the drum chair because “Charlie handed the baton to Steve [Jordan].” That handoff has become part of the band’s new shape, but not its new attitude: the chemistry on stage in New York was the chemistry of a group that still expects argument, invention and friction to produce the goods.
The cover art for Foreign Tongues is a painting by New York-based artist Nathaniel Mary Quinn, which Jagger called “Mr Ugly” and said was “not computer-generated.” It is the kind of deliberately unpolished image that fits a band now well into its sixth decade and still comfortable making a point of not smoothing anything out.
The Rolling Stones have sold more than 250 million albums, and their 2023 release Hackney Diamonds was widely seen as a return to form. Tuesday’s preview suggested they are not treating Foreign Tongues as a victory lap. It is a new album built on old instincts: pressure, collision and the stubborn belief that a rock band can still make a room stop and listen.