More about: The Rolling Stones

The Rolling Stones have shared an animated video for ‘2000 Light Years From Home’ ahead of the release of Their Satanic Majesties Request: 50th Anniversary Special Edition which comes out on September 22.

The album is probably the band’s most controversial and contentious album. Released in 1967, Their Satanic Majesties Request is widely seen as The Rolling Stones’ answer to The Beatles’ epochal album, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, and opinion is still split over just how convincing the band’s forays into psychedelia really were.

That said, ‘2000 Light Years From Home’ is a bona fide third-eye cleanser. Propelled by the late Brian Jones’ pioneering work on proto-synthesizer/sampler, the mellotron, the track is one of the band’s most haunting recordings and this animated video gets right to the heart matter. It’s redolent of the work done by animator Terry Gilliam for Monty Python’s Flying Circus and the re-mastering has brought Keith Richards’ gnarly guitar playing to the fore.

Says record label ABKCO of the re-release: "The band’s first full venture into the world of psychedelia, it may have split critical opinion at the time but is long overdue for reassessment. It features some of their most imaginative soundscapes, which included African rhythms, mellotrons, ‘found voices’ and full orchestration.

"Amongst the song highlights are the beautiful ‘She's A Rainbow’ with its elegant harmonies, piano intro and strings, the powerful, riff-driven ‘Citadel’ and the imposingly dark cosmic rocker 2000 Light Years From Home’.”

Meanwhile, The Rolling Stones are gearing themselves for a European tour that will see them visit Hamburg, Paris and Amsterdam among others. There's still no news of any British dates.

More about: The Rolling Stones