Tribune News Service
By Carolyn Kellogg
Los Angeles Times (TNS)
Yes, it’s true. A very big-ticket Rolling Stones book is being published just in time for the holidays. Taschen is publishing a $5,000 collectors’ edition and a selection of $10,000 art editions of “Rolling Stones,” which officially goes on sale in December.
But of course readers of wealth and taste, with plenty of room on their credit cards, can preorder now online.
“Rolling Stones” is a really, really oversize 20 by 20 inches – Taschen calls it “sumo-size.” The 518-page book comes in a clamshell case, has an intro by former President Bill Clinton, three essays, materials from the bands’ archives, foldouts, detailed appendices and is packed with photos.
As with many of Taschen’s art books, the photos are the point. The roster of photographers who have shot the Rolling Stones is of course stellar; “Rolling Stones” includes pictures by David Bailey, Cecil Beaton, Anton Corbijn, Annie Leibovitz, Helmut Newton, Norman Parkinson, Albert Watson and dozens more.
The $5,000 collectors’ edition is being printed in a run of just 1,150. Each copy is signed by all of the members of the band: Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Ronnie Wood and Charlie Watts. Taschen has some snapshots of Richards and Jagger going to work with their sharpies earlier this year.
For the art editions, fans get all that plus a signed pigment print. There are six separate art editions, each with a different photograph of the band. With only 75 copies of each art edition, the first has already sold out (it was said to cost either $15,000 or $20,000). It comes with a photograph of Jagger from the 1973 “Goats Head Soup” photo shoot (not the exact one that appears on the record’s cover).
The remaining art editions are $10,000 each. There is one with a photograph by Bent Rej of young Keith Richards playing the piano; one of Mick and Keith from 1972; and three of the complete band by Anton Corbijn, Gered Mankowitz and Guy Webster.
On the Taschen website, Jagger is quoted as saying, “This volume brings together some incredible pictures spanning the last fifty years.”
