Rolling Stones Announce ‘Hackney Diamonds,’ First Studio Album in 18 Years

After years of speculation and a remarkably unsubtle teaser campaign that saw the group’s iconic logo projected onto iconic structures in New York, Los Angeles, London, Paris and other major cites, the Rolling Stones have announced the forthcoming release of “Hackney Diamonds,” their first studio album since 2005.

Full details will be announced Wednesday at an event in the Hackney district of East London on Wednesday, where the group’s three principals, Mick Jagger, Keith Richards and Ron Wood, will be interviewed live by “Tonight Show” host Jimmy Fallon. The launch event will be hosted by and streamed exclusively worldwide via YouTube.

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“Hackney may be at the heart of Hackney Diamonds, but this is a truly global moment we want to share with fans around the world via YouTube,” the group said in a statement Monday.

The group has been recording new material for many years — they “took a break” from it to record an album of blues standards released in 2016 — and at least one song has been reported to feature the two surviving members of the Beatles, Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr.

The album will be the group’s first release since the 2021 death of Charlie Watts, a founding member who had played each of the band’s thousands of concerts except one, and nearly every recorded song, since the Rolling Stones formed in 1962. The group toured last fall with drummer Steve Jordan.

Even as its members reach their eighties, the Stones have toured regularly throughout the 21st century, with Jagger retaining nearly his full measure of vocal and physical energy despite turning 80 on July 26. After a pandemic-induced delay, the group resumed its “No Filter” North American tour in the fall of 2021, shortly after Watts’ death, and underwent a multi-date “Sixty” tour of Europe last year, observing the band’s sixtieth anniversary.

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