The Rolling Stones release "Foreign Tongues," their 25th studio album

The Rolling Stones released "Foreign Tongues" this month, their 25th studio album and a follow-up that arrived less than three years after 2023's "Hackney Diamonds," a far faster turnaround than the nearly two decades that separated "Hackney Diamonds" from 2005's "A Bigger Bang." Producer Andrew Watt, 35, returned to lead the sessions after also working on "Hackney Diamonds," and brought in guest turns from Paul McCartney on bass, the Cure's Robert Smith on guitar, Steve Winwood on keys and organ, and Bruno Mars on cowbell.

The album runs a dozen originals plus two covers in a little over an hour, moving through blues stomp, a country-leaning shuffle and disco-tinged grooves before closing with covers of Amy Winehouse's "You Know I'm No Good" and Chuck Berry's "Beautiful Delilah." NPR critic Ann Powers called the record danceable enough that "when a certain sound kicks in you're going to feel it," and noted that it includes a session from drummer Charlie Watts recorded before his 2021 death, alongside regular touring drummer Steve Jordan on the rest of the record.

The Los Angeles Times' Mikael Wood called "Foreign Tongues" the funniest Rolling Stones album in decades, even if it may not surpass 1978's "Some Girls" as their best since. He pointed to the punky "Hit Me in the Head" and a jab at "mad mogul Mr. Musk" tucked into "Mr. Charm" as signs that Mick Jagger, Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood, now in their late 70s and early 80s, are "clearly going on instinct rather than overthinking the music."

NPR's review also picked up on a darker undercurrent beneath the album's cheer, noting that songs including "Side Effects" and "Hit Me in the Head" brush against mortality even as the band keeps its tone light; the "Hit Me in the Head" chorus about preferring assisted suicide to waiting around carries extra weight because it was recorded during one of the band's final sessions with original drummer Charlie Watts before his death from cancer. Richards, asked about his own unlikely longevity, joked, "This could be the last time? I wrote it, mate."

"Foreign Tongues" is now on the release calendar as the band's latest entry in a decades-long run of rock records, but neither review mentioned any tour dates tied to the release, and it isn't clear whether the band, whose members are now well into their 70s and 80s, plans to play the new songs live anytime soon.