Additional personnel: Nanette Newman, Mary Clayton (vocals); Ry Cooder (mandolin); Byron Berline (fiddle); Bobby Keys (tenor saxophone); Al Kooper (French horn); Ian Stewart, Leon Russell (piano); Nicky Hopkins (organ); Jimmy Miller , Rocky Dijon (percussion); Doris Troy, Madeline Bell, London Bach Choir (background vocals).

Audio Remasterers: Jon Astley; Teri Landi; Steve Rosenthal; Paschal Byrne.

Mostly recorded without Brian Jones -- who died several months before its release (although he does play on two tracks) and was replaced by Mick Taylor (who also plays on just two songs) -- this extends the rock and blues feel of Beggars Banquet into slightly harder-rocking, more demonically sexual territory. The Stones were never as consistent on album as their main rivals, the Beatles, and Let It Bleed suffers from some rather perfunctory tracks, like "Monkey Man" and a countrified remake of the classic "Honky Tonk Woman" (here titled "Country Honk"). Yet some of the songs are among their very best, especially "Gimme Shelter," with its shimmering guitar lines and apocalyptic lyrics; the harmonica-driven "Midnight Rambler"; the druggy party ambience of the title track; and the stunning "You Can't Always Get What You Want," which was the Stones' "Hey Jude" of sorts, with its epic structure, horns, philosophical lyrics, and swelling choral vocals. "You Got the Silver" (Keith Richards' first lead vocal) and Robert Johnson's "Love in Vain," by contrast, were as close to the roots of acoustic down-home blues as the Stones ever got. ~ Richie Unterberger

The last Stones studio album of the '60s finds the band, for perhaps the first time, accurately reflecting the spirit of its age. The erstwhile bad boy outsiders of rock now found themselves firmly in the center of the social and political post-'68 whirlwind, and faced up to the challenge magnificently. The band's confident climb to its artistic peak was begun by BEGGAR'S BANQUET, but LET IT BLEED is a quantum leap even from that musical milestone.

The album's opener, "Gimme Shelter," with its insinuating guitar introduction, leads us decisively out of Flower Power and into a world where rape and murder are "just a shot away," and the Devil of BANQUET is very much alive and taking names. There's a nod to seminal influence Robert Johnson, whose "Love in Vain" is a mandolin-accompanied highlight. The climax arrives in the form of "You Can't Always Get What You Want," bearing references to the fallout of the Swinging London era. LET IT BLEED finds the Stones brimming with musical confidence and artistic inspiration.