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This is a page about the 1969 album by the Rolling Stones. For the 1996 book of the same name by Ian Rankin, see Let it Bleed (novel).

Let It Bleed
Studio album by The Rolling Stones
Released	5 December 1969
Recorded	16 November - 17 November 1968, 10 February - 2 November 1969, Olympic-Studios, London
Genre	Rock
Length	42:21
Label	Decca/ABKCO (UK) ABKCO (US)
Producer(s)	Jimmy Miller
Professional reviews
All Music Guide link Rolling Stone link
The Rolling Stones chronology
Through The Past, Darkly (Big Hits Vol. 2) (1969)	Let It Bleed (1969)	Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out! The Rolling Stones in Concert (1970)

Let It Bleed is an album by The Rolling Stones, released in 1969. The follow up to 1968's Beggars Banquet, it appeared shortly after the band's 1969 American Tour, their first in the U.S. in three years.

Contents 1 History 2 Track listing 3 Charts 4 Certifications 5 Trivia

Although they had begun the recording of "You Can't Always Get What You Want" in November 1968, before Beggars Banquet had been released, recording for Let It Bleed began in earnest in February 1969 and would continue sporadically until November. Brian Jones performs on two tracks, "Midnight Rambler" (although his part is minimal) and "You Got the Silver"; his replacement Mick Taylor also plays on two tracks, "Country Honk" and "Live With Me." Keith Richards, who had already shared vocal duties with Mick Jagger on a handful of songs ("Connection", "Something Happened to Me Yesterday" and "Salt of the Earth"), sang his first solo lead vocal on a Rolling Stones recording with "You Got the Silver."

During 1968, Richards had been hanging out in London with Gram Parsons, who had left The Byrds on the eve of their departure for a tour in the Republic of South Africa. By all accounts, Parsons had significant impact on Richards' taste in country music, and perhaps as a result of his influence, the band recorded a true honky-tonk song, "Country Honk," a more uptempo and rock and roll version of which would appear as their next single, "Honky Tonk Women." The LP track featured fiddle player Byron Berline, who worked with Parsons frequently throughout the latter's career. Parsons frequently took credit for the arrangement of "Country Honk", although both Jagger and Richards have stated that it was actually the original arrangement of the song as written and conceived while vacationing in Brazil in late 1968. In any event, Parsons had recently introduced the group to his cache of traditional country records and was at least indirectly responsible for this sea change. The singer's own cover, released on the 1976 rarities compilation Sleepless Nights, features a slightly different set of lyrics and yet another arrangement that combines elements of both Stones versions.

Recorded under trying circumstance owing to the band having reached the final impasse with Jones, the album has been called a great summing up of the dark underbelly of the 1960s.^{[citation needed]} In addition to being one of their all-time classics, Bleed is the second of the Stones' run of four studio LPs that are generally regarded as among their greatest achievements artistically, equalled only by the best of their great 45s from that decade. The other three albums are Beggars Banquet (1968), Sticky Fingers (1971), and Exile on Main Street (1972).

Released in December, Let It Bleed reached #1 in the UK (temporarily knocking The Beatles' Abbey Road out of the top slot) and #3 on the Billboard Top Pop Albums chart in the US, where it eventually went double platinum. The album was also critically well-received.

In 1998 Q magazine readers voted Let It Bleed the 69th greatest album of all time, while in 2000 the same magazine placed it at number 28 in its list of the 100 Greatest British Albums Ever. In 2001, the TV network VH1 placed Let It Bleed at number 24 on their best album survey. In 2003, it was listed as number 32 on the List of Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

In August 2002, this album was reissued in a new remastered CD and SACD digipak by ABKCO Records.

Objects visible on the cover, designed by Robert Brownjohn, include (from bottom) a Rolling Stones record, a dinner plate, a magnetic tape canister, a clock face, a small tyre, a cake, and the band as cake topping figures. The cake parts of the album cover construction were cooked by Delia Smith (The Scotsman - online edition).

All songs by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, except where noted.

1. "Gimme Shelter" – 4:31
   • Features Merry Clayton on backing vocals
2. "Love in Vain" (Robert Johnson) – 4:19
   • Features Ry Cooder on mandolin
3. "Country Honk" – 3:07
   • Country version of "Honky Tonk Women"
4. "Live With Me" – 3:33
   • Features both Leon Russell and Nicky Hopkins on piano with Keith Richards on bass
5. "Let It Bleed" – 5:28
6. "Midnight Rambler" – 6:53
   • Features Brian Jones on percussion
7. "You Got the Silver" – 2:50
   • Keith Richards' first lead vocal on a Rolling Stones song; Brian Jones plays autoharp
8. "Monkey Man" – 4:11
9. "You Can't Always Get What You Want" – 7:29
   • Features producer Jimmy Miller on drums and Al Kooper on French horn, piano and organ

Album

Year	Chart	Position
1969	UK Albums Chart	1
1970	UK Albums Chart	2
1969	Billboard magazine Pop Albums	3
1970	Billboard Pop Albums	3
1980	Billboard Pop Albums	177
2002	Billboard Top Internet Albums	—

Single

Year	Single	Chart	Position
1973	"You Can't Always Get What You Want"	The Billboard Hot 100	42

Organization	Level	Date
RAA – US	Gold	November 24, 1999
RAA – US	Platinum	October 20, 1989
RAA – US	2x Platinum	October 20, 1989
BPI – UK	Gold	July 2, 1999
BPI – UK	Platinum	July 2, 1999

• The cake on the album cover was baked by TV cook and Norwich City F.C. director Delia Smith.

v • d • e Albums by The Rolling Stones
UK studio albums 1964-1967	The Rolling Stones | The Rolling Stones No. 2 | Out of Our Heads | Aftermath | Between the Buttons
US studio albums 1964-1967	England's Newest Hitmakers | 12 X 5 | The Rolling Stones, Now! | Out of Our Heads | December's Children (And Everybody's) | Aftermath | Between the Buttons | Flowers
Studio albums 1967-present	Their Satanic Majesties Request | Beggars Banquet | Let It Bleed | Sticky Fingers | Exile on Main St. | Goats Head Soup | It's Only Rock'n Roll | Black and Blue | Some Girls | Emotional Rescue | Tattoo You | Undercover | Dirty Work | Steel Wheels | Voodoo Lounge | Bridges to Babylon | A Bigger Bang
UK EPs	The Rolling Stones | Five by Five | got LIVE if you want it!
Live albums	Got Live if You Want It! | Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out! The Rolling Stones in Concert | Love You Live | "Still Life" (American Concert 1981) | Flashpoint | Stripped | No Security | Live Licks
Compilations	Big Hits (High Tide and Green Grass) | Through the Past, Darkly (Big Hits Vol. 2) | Made in the Shade | Sucking in the Seventies | Rewind (1971-1984) | Jump Back: The Best of The Rolling Stones | Forty Licks | Rarities 1971-2003
Post-contract ABKCO albums	Hot Rocks 1964-1971 | More Hot Rocks (Big Hits & Fazed Cookies) | Metamorphosis | Singles Collection: The London Years| The Rolling Stones Rock and Roll Circus | Singles 1963-1965 | Singles 1965-1967 | Singles 1968-1971
Miscellaneous	Jamming with Edward

v • d • e The Rolling Stones

Mick Jagger • Keith Richards • Charlie Watts • Ron Wood Brian Jones • Bill Wyman • Mick Taylor • Ian Stewart See also Chuck Leavell • Darryl Jones • Andrew Loog Oldham • Allen Klein • Nicky Hopkins • Bobby Keys • Jim Price • Billy Preston Related articles Discography • The Glimmer Twins • Jagger/Richards • Nanker Phelge • Rolling Stones Records • Rock and Roll Circus Categories The Rolling Stones • Members • Albums • Singles • Songs • Tours