Mick Jagger on Foreign Tongues, AI in Music, and Rolling Stones Momentum

Mick Jagger sat down with Billboard for a cover interview that covers a lot of ground: the making of Foreign Tongues, the Rolling Stones' creative process, and how AI and modern recording tools fit into the picture. For anyone paying attention to how legacy artists are navigating the current music landscape, this one is worth your time.

Jagger is direct about what's driving the momentum. He had a stockpile of songs ready before sessions even started, which meant the band could pick up where Hackney Diamonds left off without starting from scratch. Three songs from those sessions were intentionally held back with the next album already in mind. That kind of deliberate pacing is easy to overlook, but it says a lot about how the Stones are operating right now.

What Mick Jagger Said About AI and Studio Technology

On the AI question, Jagger isn't panicking and isn't dismissing it either. His take is that the studio has always been a technology, and smart artists have always used it to their advantage. He's more interested in what the tools can do for the work, specifically making tedious parts of the process faster, than in debating whether AI belongs in music at all. That's a grounded position, and it tracks with how a lot of working producers and engineers are actually approaching the conversation.

The album itself, Foreign Tongues, was finished last year. The label wasn't ready to move that quickly, so the release got pushed to this year. Two albums in roughly two years from the Rolling Stones is not something anyone had on their bingo card, but here we are. Jagger credits producer Andrew Watt and the same recording method they used on Hackney Diamonds for keeping things moving.

He also gets into the craft side of things: building melodies in real time, getting the groove right before anything else, the role of falsetto in his vocal approach. This is the kind of detail that tends to get buried in broader industry coverage but matters if you're actually making music.

Why Independent Creators Should Pay Attention

The Stones aren't an indie band, but the way Jagger talks about the process is relevant well beyond their budget. Banking songs between sessions, locking in a recording method that works and repeating it, staying focused on the groove as the foundation, these are practical instincts that apply at any level. The willingness to use technology without being precious about it is also something worth sitting with, especially as AI tools become a bigger part of independent production workflows.

Foreign Tongues is out now. If you're working on your own releases and want to stay plugged into what's moving in music and culture, [drop your project in our submit section](/submit) and we'll keep an eye on it.