The Rolling Stones Undercover of The Night

Having not hit the road for most of the 80s, The Steel Wheels Tour was an astounding return for the Rolling Stones, not least as it was the longest tour they had by that point undertaken. It was also to be their last with Bill Wyman. Steel Wheels Live was recorded towards the end of the band’s 60-date run through the stadiums of North America, in the second half of 1989.

Having not hit the road for most of the 80s, The Steel Wheels Tour was an astounding return for the Rolling Stones, not least as it was the longest tour they had by that point undertaken. It was also to be their last with Bill Wyman. Steel Wheels Live was recorded towards the end of the band’s 60-date run through the stadiums of North America, in the second half of 1989.

Once simply viewed as a ramshackle overview of the Rolling Stones' decidedly uneven career throughout the '70s and into the early '80s, Rewind (1971-1984), ironically enough, is now also considered something of a collector's item since going out of print…

Once simply viewed as a ramshackle overview of the Rolling Stones' decidedly uneven career throughout the '70s and into the early '80s, Rewind (1971-1984), ironically enough, is now also considered something of a collector's item since going out of print. And let's not forget that a Stones collection, however imperfect, is still bound to showcase some of the greatest rock & roll tunes ever recorded, and in this case the offerings include everything from "Brown Sugar" to "Angie" to "Miss You" to "Start Me Up," etc., etc. Of course, all of these and many, many more are now represented in the 2002 Forty Licks set, consigning Rewind to its bizarre afterlife as a rarity – go figure.

Universal's 2018 set The Studio Albums Vinyl Collection 1971-2016 isn't the first time the Rolling Stones] post-Decca catalog has been boxed up. Back in 2010, all the albums up to 2015 (which means it didn't include 2016's blues record Blue & Lonesome) were offered in a set that was a companion to the similarly limited-edition box The Rolling Stones 1964-1969. In a sense, the 2018 set functions as a cousin to ABKCO's The Rolling Stones in Mono – a 2016 box containing mono mixes of all the material the Stones officially released on Decca – but where that set was issued on both CD and LP, The Studio Albums Vinyl Collection 1971-2016 is, as its title suggests, explicitly designed as a vinyl package…