The Rolling Stones were in LA in 1972, recording at Sunset Sound. They had spent part of the previous year in the south of France. In the basement of Keith Richards' rented villa at Nellcôte, they had recorded the basic tracks for their next album. Those tracks became the core of "Exile On Main Street."
In LA, photographer Robert Frank used 8mm to film the Stones as they walked along Main Street in LA's skid row and in Bel Air, a posh suburb nearby. Frames from this reel were used throughout the cover and inner sleeves of Exile. As available on DVD, it appears that Frank's original film was cut apart, sequences out of sequence, and interspersed with footage shot near Frank's home in NYC. As shown here, the NYC portions were omitted, and Stones sequences were re-arranged and slowed down.
FOR HISTORICAL PURPOSES ONLY
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