''SuperHeavy'' is the only album by the
rock
Rock most often refers to:
* Rock (geology), a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals or mineraloids
* Rock music, a genre of popular music
Rock or Rocks may also refer to:
Places United Kingdom
* Rock, Caerphilly, a location in Wales ...
supergroup SuperHeavy. It was released on 16 September 2011 by
A&M Records
A&M Records was an American record label founded as an independent company by Herb Alpert and Jerry Moss in 1962. Due to the success of the discography A&M released, the label garnered interest and was acquired by PolyGram in 1989 and began distr ...
.
Background and recording
The SuperHeavy project began in 2009. In early 2009,
Mick Jagger
Sir Michael Philip Jagger (born 26 July 1943) is an English singer and songwriter who has achieved international fame as the lead vocalist and one of the founder members of the rock band the Rolling Stones. His ongoing songwriting partnershi ...
,
Dave Stewart,
Joss Stone,
Damian Marley
Damian Robert Nesta "Jr. Gong" Marley (born 21 July 1978) is a Jamaican DJ, singer, lyricist and rapper. He is the recipient of four Grammy Awards.
Early life, education and family
Damian Marley is the youngest son of reggae musician Bob Marle ...
and
A. R. Rahman experimented at a studio in Los Angeles, trying to "write songs which had meaning". They had a couple more sessions after that trying to perfect every song that was written.
Jagger stated in an interview that "they had entered with just ideas, a few guitar riffs and a few snippets of lyrics... which isn't his usual style of working, but music evolved quickly."
The majority of the album was recorded at
Jim Henson Studios in Los Angeles, with parts recorded off the coasts of Greece and Turkey on the ''
Octopus'', a
megayacht owned by
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washin ...
co-founder
Paul Allen
Paul Gardner Allen (January 21, 1953 – October 15, 2018) was an American business magnate, computer programmer, researcher, investor, and philanthropist. He co-founded Microsoft Corporation with childhood friend Bill Gates in 1975, which ...
.
The band recorded 29 songs in 10 days.
Some of the songs recorded were even an hour long. In total, there was more than 35 hours of music recorded, from which Stewart and his engineer found the highlights that would work as the roots of songs.
However, the standard version of the album only included 12 songs.
Release and promotion
The band gathered at Jim Henson Studios in Los Angeles on 30 June 2011 to preview the album. The preview began with a short documentary showing SuperHeavy recording at the studio. The group played eight of the recorded songs at the event.
Singles
"
Miracle Worker
Thaumaturgy is the purported capability of a magician to work magic or other paranormal events or a saint to perform miracles. It is sometimes translated into English as wonderworking.
A practitioner of thaumaturgy is a "thaumaturge", "thauma ...
" was released as the album's lead single on 7 July 2011. It is a
reggae
Reggae () is a music genre that originated in Jamaica in the late 1960s. The term also denotes the modern popular music of Jamaica and its diaspora. A 1968 single by Toots and the Maytals, " Do the Reggay" was the first popular song to use ...
song performed by Marley, Stone and Jagger. The single peaked at number 136 on the
UK Singles Chart
The UK Singles Chart (currently titled Official Singles Chart, with the upper section more commonly known as the Official UK Top 40) is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-s ...
. The music video was released on
YouTube
YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...
on 12 August 2011. Directed by Stewart and filmed at
Paramount Studios
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film and television production and distribution company and the main namesake division of Paramount Global (formerly ViacomCBS). It is the fifth-oldest film studio in the world, the second-oldest ...
in Los Angeles, the video features all five members of the band.
"
Satyameva Jayathe" (named after the
national motto of India, which literally translates to "Truth Alone Triumphs") was released as the second single from the album on 9 August 2011, a week before
India's Independence Day on 15 August. Composed by Rahman to have an Indian feel, Jagger sings in
Sanskrit
Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...
on the song, which also features Stewart, Stone and Marley. The song premiered exclusively on
Radio Mirchi
Radio Mirchi (also known as 98.3 Mirchi) is a nationwide network of private FM radio stations in India. It is owned by the EntertainmentNetwork India Ltd (ENIL), which is one of the subsidiaries of The Times Group. ''Mirchi'' is Hindi for re ...
98.3 FM on 9 August across 22 Indian cities, and
Tata DoCoMo
Tata Docomo was an Indian mobile network operator, a wholly owned subsidiary of Tata Teleservices. In October 2017, Bharti Airtel announced a merger deal with Tata Teleservices and the acquisition of Tata Docomo. As of 21 July 2019, all Tata ...
was set to simultaneously promote the song and the album on mass media.
"Beautiful People" reached number 64 on the Dutch
Single Top 100 chart.
Track listing
Charts
Weekly charts
Year-end charts
Release history
Notes
References
{{Authority control
2011 debut albums
A&M Records albums
Albums produced by David A. Stewart
Albums produced by Mick Jagger
Polydor Records albums
SuperHeavy albums
Universal Republic Records albums