Reel Around the Fountain

**2. "Winter" - The Rolling Stones** A overlooked gem buried on 1973's ragged *Goats Head Soup*, "Winter" finds the Stones in unexpectedly tender, orchestral territory. Mick Taylor's fluid, weeping lead guitar — recorded while Keith Richards was largely absent — carries the song's aching melody, doubled by Nicky Hopkins' piano and a swell of strings arranged by Nicky Harrison. The arrangement is loose, almost improvised, built on a slow soul-rock sway that recalls "Moonlight Mile." Jagger sings with rare unguarded warmth, his voice cracking around longing: he wants to wrap his coat around a lover, to be back in California, to burn through a cold season toward spring. The lyric is impressionistic, more mood than narrative, evoking emotional desolation and the yearning for thaw. Cultural context matters — this is the Stones in their exiled, drug-shadowed early-'70s wandering, recording in Jamaica, sounding road-weary and homesick. Taylor's solo is among the most beautiful the band ever captured, lyrical and unhurried, and his uncredited contributions to this era remain a sore point in Stones lore. It's a song for genuine winter melancholy, for staring out a frosted window, for missing someone across a great distance. Underrated and intimate, it shows a band capable of fragility beneath the swagger.