* I’ve been hoping they’d do an album like this for years. They’re just too old to be rock stars. I loved the “Stripped” album because it was a grownup departure from their usual stadium rock nonsense. Keep it simple, keep it basic and keep it bluesy…

Those who like their Rolling Stones music raw and unfiltered may get their wish Dec. 2 when a new studio album, “Blue and Lonesome,” will be released. […]

Produced by Don Was, who has been working with the band for more than two decades, the 12 blues covers were recorded in a rapid-fire three-day session in London last December. “Blue and Lonesome” includes songs associated with Howlin’ Wolf (“Commit a Crime”), Jimmy Reed (“Little Rain”) and Magic Sam (“All of Your Love”). Eric Clapton adds guitar to two songs: Johnny Taylor’s “Everybody Knows About My Good Thing” and Dixon’s “I Can’t Quit You Baby.”

The Stones — Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Charlie Watts, Ronnie Wood — plus sidemen Darryl Jones (bass), Chuck Leavell (keyboards) and Matt Clifford (keyboards) approached the sessions as more of a live recording and avoided overdubs, according to a statement released by the band.

With a few exceptions, they dug a layer or two deeper than the obvious Chicago blues classics on these tracks, reflecting their roots as fledgling blues appreciators who listened obsessively to albums released on Chess, Vee-Jay and other labels imported from overseas in the early ‘60s. As Was said in a statement, for the Stones, the blues is “the fountainhead of everything they do.” That hadn’t always been reflected in their post-‘70s recordings, but it appears they’re doubling down on that commitment now.

Finally.

* A brief snippet…

I’ll take it.