The Rolling Stones - Foreign Tongues (Album Review)
Friday, 24 July 2026
Written by Jeremy Blackmore
Photo: Kevin Mazur
The Rolling Stones’ late-career renaissance continues with ‘Foreign Tongues’, which draws heavily on the sound of classic albums ‘Some Girls’ and ‘Emotional Rescue’. Driven for the most part by rhythm, groove and feel, it is undoubtedly their best and most consistent album in decades.
Those rhythmically agile verses are often counterbalanced by sweeter, poppier choruses as producer Andrew Watt again delivers a modern-sounding Rolling Stones record. Mick Jagger’s vocals are extraordinary. He has lost none of his power and dances around the percussive heart, while guitarists Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood serve the songs and the groove, rather than seeking to dominate.
They start with a bang on the rootsy Tough And Twisted. Full of explosive energy, Jagger plays some great blues harp while Richards and Wood trade licks. It’s followed by In The Stars, which begins with an ominous Gimme Shelter vibe before deftly transitioning into a great pop hook.
Jealous Lover starts the switch to groove-focused rock. It’s firmly in ‘Emotional Rescue’ territory, combining soul, disco and reggae, with Jagger playing with the falsetto he used in those years.
Mr Charm, which takes a barbed pop at billionaires, is almost rap-like, before briefly adopting the swagger of Brown Sugar, while Divine Intervention evokes Respectable from ‘Some Girls’. The country-tinged Ringing Hollow provides light relief in the vein of that LP’s Far Away Eyes but, far from a novelty song, it’s a heartfelt lament for America and the American culture Jagger and Richards held so dear.
The pace picks back up with the rapid-fire Never Wanna Lose You and Hit Me In The Head. While the latter is a straight-ahead punk song it’s a poignant one, featuring the late Charlie Watts on drums one last time. The similarly punky Covered In You ropes in Paul McCartney on bass — it’s unmistakably him, but he’s content to sit inside the groove and drive the track without becoming showy.
You Know I’m No Good is an Amy Winehouse cover that adapts the Miss You groove, while the beautiful gospel-soul-tinged Back In Your Life builds to a crescendo with a gorgeous guitar solo from Wood. They finish by returning to their roots with a bluesy take on a lesser-known Chuck Berry song, Beautiful Delilah, which they first recorded for BBC Radio 62 years ago. It still sounds great.
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