Let It Bleed

It’s Mick and Keith looking at the mess and refusing to disinfect it for polite society. This record doesn’t do “good vibes.” It doesn’t do fake optimism. It tells the truth the way grown men do: with dirt under the nails and zero interest in being liked.

That’s why it still hits today.

We live in an age of filters — filtered faces, filtered politics, filtered outrage, filtered courage. Everyone wants to curate the story, manage the risk, control the narrative. Let It Bleed says: stop managing. If you love anything real — a person, a cause, a country — it’s going to cost you. You’re going to take hits. You’re going to get cut.

So don’t flinch. Don’t sanitize it. Don’t pretend it didn’t happen.

The genius of Let It Bleed is that it doesn’t confuse “clean” with “good.” It doesn’t confuse “polite” with “right.” It understands the modern lie: that if you package yourself correctly, nothing can touch you.

Wrong.

The world touches everybody. The question is whether you hide, or you stand there and take it — and keep moving.

Some albums comfort you. Let It Bleed arms you.