Jamming with Edward!

Though many feel that the Stones were at their best when playing loose, sloppy rock & roll a la Exile on Main St., with this 1972 release on Rolling Stones Records the unrehearsed style of the album is more of a hindrance than a call to ragged glory. Not an official Rolling Stones release, the assembled band does contain three-fifths of the group (Mick Jagger, Bill Wyman, and Charlie Watts) along with session man extraordinaire Nicky Hopkins and guitarist Ry Cooder. The band stumbles through keyboard-dominated original numbers such as 'Boudoir Stomp' and 'Edward's Thrump Up,' as well as more conventional cuts like a cover of Elmore James' 'It Hurts Me Too.' Yet the songs never get beyond giving the listener the impression they were thrown together during a drunken night's rehearsals. In that sense the album is a bit of a letdown; though any Stones fan would surely clamor for lost material from the band's golden age, Jamming With Edward instead makes one wish it had never been released.