The Rolling Stones Live in Hyde Park, 1969

As the Rolling Stones gear up for their first full tour in five years, we take you back to a more inno­cent time, when the band was young and the tick­ets were not $500 each.

The year was 1969. The hip­pie coun­ter­cul­ture was still in bloom, and the Stones were at a moment of tran­si­tion. The band was in the process of fin­ish­ing its Let it Bleed album at Olympic Stu­dios in Lon­don with­out founder and mul­ti-instru­men­tal­ist Bri­an Jones, who was asked to leave the group in ear­ly June because of his esca­lat­ing drug prob­lem and increas­ing­ly dif­fi­cult per­son­al­i­ty. The Stones replaced Jones with the tal­ent­ed gui­tarist Mick Tay­lor. Eager to get rolling again, the group asked a pro­mot­er to orga­nize a free music fes­ti­val in Hyde Park, with the Stones at the top of the bill.

On July 5, 1969, a crowd of between 250,000 and 500,000 peo­ple gath­ered for the con­cert. Only three nights ear­li­er, Bri­an Jones was found dead at the bot­tom of his swim­ming pool. In his hon­or, Mick Jag­ger start­ed the Hyde Park con­cert by read­ing a pas­sage from Per­cy Bysshe Shel­ley’s “Adon­ais: An Ele­gy on the Death of John Keats.”  The Stones then released thou­sands of white but­ter­flies and launched into a raw set that includ­ed both clas­sics and rar­i­ties:

1. “I’m Yours & I’m Hers”
2. “Jumpin’ Jack Flash”
3. “Mer­cy Mer­cy”
4. “Down Home Girl”
5. “Stray Cat Blues”
6. “No Expec­ta­tions”
7. “I’m Free”
8. “Lov­ing Cup”
9. “Love in Vain”
10. “(I Can’t Get No) Sat­is­fac­tion”
11. “Honky Tonk Women”
12. “Mid­night Ram­bler”
13. “Street Fight­ing Man”
14. “Sym­pa­thy for the Dev­il”

The con­cert was doc­u­ment­ed by film­mak­ers Leslie Wood­head and Jo Dur­den-Smith for Grana­da Tele­vi­sion and was lat­er released on DVD as The Stones in the Park. You can watch the com­plete film above, although the songs will not appear in the same order as in the con­cert. It is a fas­ci­nat­ing and enjoy­able record of one of the most notable con­certs the Stones ever gave.

This com­ing July 6, exact­ly 44 years and a day after the 1969 con­cert, the Stones will return to Hyde Park for anoth­er con­cert. This time around it won’t be free. And oh yes: The con­cert will be spon­sored by Bar­clay­card, from the bank with the trusty slo­gan, “Flu­ent in Finance.”

Relat­ed Con­tent: 

The Rolling Stones Sing Jin­gle for Rice Krispies Com­mer­cial (1964)

The Rolling Stones Sing the Bea­t­les’ “Eight Days a Week” in a Hotel Room (1965)

The Rolling Stones First Played 50 Years Ago; Watch Them Explode Into Fame Short­ly There­after