The Rolling Stones are leaning deeper into the instinctive guitar interplay between Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood on the upcoming album Foreign Tongues, with Ronnie Wood revealing that the same guitar used on Faces classic Stay With Me reappears on the new track Rough And Twisted, while Mick Jagger has detailed how Robert Smith of The Cure unexpectedly became part of the record.
by Paul Cashmere
The Rolling Stones have pulled back the curtain on the creative process behind Foreign Tongues, the band’s forthcoming 25th studio album due on July 10, with Ronnie Wood describing the sessions as an extension of the loose, instinctive guitar “weaving” that has defined the Stones’ sound for decades.
At the centre of the new material is ‘Rough And Twisted’, one of the first songs previewed from the album and a track Wood says reconnects directly to his early 1970s work with Faces. “The same guitar I use on Stay With Me I use on Rough And Twisted,” Ronnie said. “And it’s still in open E. Rough And Twisted was just a fantastic release and it was so spontaneous. We even surprised ourselves with it. We were like wow, what did we just do. It was great.”
The reference to Faces’ 1971 anthem ‘Stay With Me’ places ‘Rough And Twisted’ squarely inside the lineage of British blues-rock that shaped both Wood and Keith Richards before Wood officially joined The Rolling Stones in 1975. Open tunings have long been central to the Stones’ guitar architecture, particularly Richards’ trademark open G approach, which became a defining feature of songs including ‘Brown Sugar’, ‘Start Me Up’ and ‘Honky Tonk Women’.
According to Wood, the chemistry between the two players remains instinctive rather than technical. “Keith and I call it an ancient form of weaving,” he explained. “It is an interaction between two guitars that happens.”
Wood referenced legendary Stax Records guitarist Steve Cropper as one of the musicians who recognised the uniqueness of the Stones’ dual-guitar approach. “Steve Cropper, a famous guitar player from Booker T and The MG’s and Stax, said to me that his favourite song was Beast Of Burden because he loved the way the guitars interacted. That was a pure accident and pure weaving. The same thing is happening right now for the Foreign Tongues album.”
Wood further broke down the mechanics of the interplay. “I play open E and Keith plays open G and somewhere in between is the mesh we call weaving.”
The balancing act between the two guitarists was overseen by producer Andrew Watt, who returned after steering the sessions for 2023’s Hackney Diamonds. “That’s why we bring in a referee and he is sitting over there, Andrew Watts,” Wood joked during the launch event in Brooklyn.
Keith Richards framed the process less as arrangement and more as instinct. “You can’t plan this kind of stuff. You just follow it and hope you come out the other end,” Richards said.
Foreign Tongues arrives less than three years after Hackney Diamonds and continues one of the most productive late-period phases in The Rolling Stones’ history. Recorded at Metropolis Studios in London, the album was completed in under a month with Jagger describing the sessions as “very intense”. The accelerated workflow reflects a broader trend among heritage artists working with modern production schedules while maintaining analogue recording sensibilities.
The album also extends the Stones’ increasingly collaborative modern era. Alongside guest appearances from Paul McCartney, Steve Winwood and Chad Smith, the record includes a contribution from Robert Smith of The Cure.
Mick Jagger revealed the collaboration came together almost accidentally. “There was a guy with a long gown and lipstick and I said ‘you’re Robert Smith of The Cure’. We had never met, so I said while you are here you better go and do something. That’s how collaborations work sometimes.”
The inclusion of Smith broadens the tonal palette of Foreign Tongues by linking the Stones’ blues-rock framework with one of Britain’s most influential post-punk figures. It also reinforces how legacy acts are increasingly crossing generational and stylistic boundaries in contemporary recording projects.
Jagger also expanded on the narrative behind ‘Rough And Twisted’, describing it as a darkly comic blues story. “Rough And Twisted is about a woman who promises you a lot of things and like what happens to you in life, you get involved in these terrible places that she takes you to,” Jagger said. “She promises you the world but you get delivered bad food, bad air, bad clubs, bad politics, bad everything. It’s a blues fancy really.”
The album carries additional significance as one of the final Rolling Stones projects to feature late drummer Charlie Watts through archival recordings captured before his death in 2021. His presence continues the band’s integration of past and present, combining new material with performances tied directly to the group’s classic era.
While some observers have questioned whether the rapid recording pace of recent Stones albums can match the depth of landmark releases such as Exile On Main St or Sticky Fingers, Foreign Tongues appears designed less as a retrospective exercise and more as evidence that the band still functions as a living recording entity.
What emerges from the early details is a record built on immediacy, interaction and the familiar tension between Richards’ rhythmic grounding and Wood’s freer melodic movement. More than sixty years into the band’s career, that guitar conversation remains central to the identity of The Rolling Stones.
Foreign Tongues Tracklisting
Rough And Twisted
In The Stars
Jealous Lover
Mr. Charm
Divine Intervention
Ringing Hollow
Never Wanna Lose You
Hit Me In The Head
You Know I’m No Good
Some Of Us
Covered In You
Side Effects
Back In Your Life
Beautiful Delilah
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