Rolling Stones excite 600 fans with tiny Paris club gig

Edna Gundersen, USA TODAY | USATODAY

The Rolling Stones rolled out the hits in a Paris club Thursday night, thrilling 600 fans who crammed into the small LaTrabendo venue for a sweaty, high-energy one-hour set.

Admission was 15 Euros ($19.42), a pittance compared to ticket prices for the band's upcoming arena shows in Newark and London, where seats are priced from $172 to $650.

The Paris gig, the band's first live performance since 2007, took place 48 years to the day after the Stones made their debut appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show. The Stones are celebrating their 50th anniversary this year with a batch of concerts and the Nov. 13 release of GRRR!, a greatest-hits set containing two new songs, One More Shot and Doom and Gloom.

The latter cropped up midway through a classic-heavy 12-song set list that opened with Route 66 and flashed back to early peaks across the band's five-decade career: It's Only Rock and Roll, Shattered, When the Whip Comes Down, Champagne and Reefer, Miss You, Tumbling Dice, Start Me Up and Midnight Rambler, closing with an encore of Jumping Jack Flash and Brown Sugar. Mick Jagger, who addressed the crowd in French, signed autographs after the show.

Jagger, drummer Charlie Watts and guitarists Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood were accompanied by keyboardist Chuck Leavell and bassist Darryl Jones.

The "secret" show, announced on Twitter early Thursday, was no surprise, especially to fans aware of the band's long tradition of previewing tours with intimate warm-up club appearances.

The Stones will play the O2 Arena in London on Nov. 25 and 29. Those tickets sold out in seven minutes. The Dec. 13 and 15 concerts at the Prudential Center in Newark go on sale Friday.