The Rolling Stones' 1969 Tour of the United States took place in November 1969. With Ike & Tina Turner, Terry Reid, and B.B. King (replaced on some dates by Chuck Berry) as the supporting acts, rock critic Robert Christgau called it "history's first mythic rock and roll tour", while rock critic Dave Marsh wrote that the tour was "part of rock and roll legend" and one of the "benchmarks of an era." In 2017, Rolling Stone magazine ranked the tour among The 50 Greatest Concerts of the Last 50 Years.
History
This was the Rolling Stones' first US tour since July 1966, with the absence partly due to drug charges and subsequent complications. Instead of performing in small- and medium-size venues to audiences of screaming girls, the band was playing to sold-out arenas with more mature crowds that were ready to listen to the music. They used a more sophisticated amplification system, and lighting was overseen by Chip Monck. It was Mick Taylor's first tour with the band; he had replaced Brian Jones that June, shortly before Jones's death, and had only performed one gig (the free concert in Hyde Park) with them before the tour.
Some rehearsals for this tour occurred in the basement of Stephen Stills' Laurel Canyon home.
The tour began on 7 November with a warm-up show at Colorado State University, and then proceeded generally west to east, often playing two shows a night. The tour's second stop, at The Forum in Los Angeles, attracted national media attention as the outing's formal opening. Shows sometimes ran past midnight, and the Rolling Stones' performance lasted about 75 minutes. Terry Reid, B.B. King (replaced on some dates by Chuck Berry), and Ike & Tina Turner were the supporting acts; audiences were typically in their seats for three hours, including long delays between acts, before the Rolling Stones materialized on stage.
On 23 November, the band appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show. "Gimme Shelter" opened the show. The show closed with "Love in Vain" and "Honky Tonk Women." The band mimed to prerecorded tracks and Jagger sang live. The performance was recorded at the CBS studios in Los Angeles and edited into the show to appear like they were in New York.
In his review of the shows on 27 and 28 November at New York City's Madison Square Garden, Francis X. Clines of The New York Times characterized the tour as "the major rock event of the year." Ike & Tina Turner were a fan favorite, and they reportedly upstaged the Rolling Stones. Janis Joplin joined the Turners on stage for an impromptu performance of "Land of 1000 Dances" at one of the Madison Square Garden shows.
Another well-known show from the tour was the second concert in Oakland, California on 9 November, which was captured on Live'r Than You'll Ever Be, one of the first-ever live bootleg recordings.
The final show of the tour as initially planned was on 28 November in New York City, but 30 November in West Palm Beach, Florida was added as a gesture to the organiser. The band also organised and headlined the free concert at Altamont on 6 December, which was tacked on at the end of the tour as a response to the high ticket prices of the tour itself.
Tour manager Sam Cutler introduced the Rolling Stones as "the greatest rock and roll band in the world", a title he had first bestowed upon them at their concert in London's Hyde Park the previous July. The tour set lists were derived mostly from 1968's Beggars Banquet album and the forthcoming Let It Bleed. The performance itself featured the Stones showmanship that would become familiar: Charlie Watts businesslike drumming leavened by an occasional wry smile, Bill Wyman's undertaker persona on bass, the guitar interplay of Mick Taylor with Keith Richards, and most of all Mick Jagger's prancing, strutting, leering and preening in front of the crowd. "Ah think I've busted a button on my trousers, I hope they don't fall down" he teased the audience. "You don't want my trousers to fall down, now do ya?" At one point in some shows, Jagger motioned for the audience to rush past ushers to the edge of the stage; of the group's reaction to the crowd's fervor, a spokesman said, "They loved it."