It has become something of a cliché to proclaim that “rock and roll will never die,” but the Rolling Stones — a band formed when my grandfather was a sprightly youth — seem intent on keeping it alive until I am a grandfather myself. It is 2026, and we have a brand-new Rolling Stones record: their 25th studio album in 64 years together, and their first since 2023’s “Hackney Diamonds.” Whether jolted by the passing of drummer Charlie Watts in 2021 or simply less inclined to believe that “Time Is on My Side,” the 82-year-old Mick Jagger has summoned the troops, written some songs, and, together with producer Andrew Watt, created a remarkable late-late-era record. Which brings us to “Foreign Tongues.” I will spare you the trite sophistry of declaring it “the best Rolling Stones record since” — insert some arbitrary benchmark such as “Some Girls” or “Tattoo You.” Mick Jagger is not granting me an interview anytime soon, and I doubt he believes such plaudits himself. But “Foreign Tongues” is a great, energetic, and joyous record on its own terms, and an even better one than “Hackney Diamonds.” The opening track, “Rough and Twisted,” begins with a gritty and bellicose blues in E, chugging on an E7 chord while threading playful licks through the arrangement. Jagger’s howling vocals arrive with the force and ferocity of a far, far younger upstart eager to make his mark. He also plays harmonica throughout the record — perhaps his most underappreciated virtuosity — and it acts as an extension of his voice, lending the arrangement a soulful, rhythmic pulse. The Rolling Stones have long maintained a playful tension between the modern and the traditional. Jagger’s appetite for momentum and new sounds has driven the band forward, while the purist instincts of Keith Richards and the late, jazz-trained drummer Charlie Watts kept it firmly rooted in the blues. My favorite Stones record has always been “Exile on Main St.” for its maximalist arrangements, replete with gospel singers, brass instruments, and piano frills. Many of my favorite Stones recordings feature Nicky Hopkins on piano; on “Foreign Tongues,” that role is served by Steve Winwood, who plays both organ and piano throughout. If I could offer one criticism of Watt’s production, it would be to turn up the piano tracks. On recordings such as “Let It Loose” or “Loving Cup,” each instrument occupies a distinct place in the mix; here, Winwood’s piano is too often buried beneath it. The tension between old and new is especially apparent on “In the Stars.” Its opening bars evoke a polished pop aesthetic, driven by piano chords and high-production vocables. Soon afterward, Steve Jordan’s drums go into full throttle and Richards begins strumming his signature open chords, which ring out like the exhaust note of a V-12 sports car. The Stones sound as energetic and lively as they did on “Tattoo You.” Fans of the band’s later catalogue will also recognize a verse structure resembling “Doom and Gloom.” The Stones have been around for so long that much of popular music’s evolution can be traced through their catalogue, from American blues and country rock to disco and beyond. “Jealous Lover” sounds like an outtake from “Some Girls” and features some of Jagger’s finest falsetto vocals since “Emotional Rescue.” I promised to spare you the “finest since” plaudits, but Jagger’s extraordinary performance cannot be overstated. Similarly, on “Mr. Charm,” Jagger sings in a rapid-fire, rap-pastiche cadence, delivering biting lyrics over a track that harkens back to “Shattered” while remaining unmistakably modern. Watt’s production pulls the vocals to the forefront and sharpens the instrumental tracks. Amid its wry jabs at tech billionaires, Jagger lauds Elon Musk for saving the astronauts, singing: “Who would you really trust? / Is it Boeing, is it NASA / Is it mad mogul Mr. Musk?” For “Ringing Hollow,” Jagger revives his country drawl for a Gram Parsons-inspired ballad redolent of the twee “Far Away Eyes.” There is a great deal on this album that leads back to “Some Girls.” Reluctant to traffic in specific political references, Jagger instead paints a broader malaise across the political spectrum. “Lady Liberty don’t look so good / When there’s a tear in her gown,” he sings, before turning to the fentanyl crisis — with some irony for a Rolling Stone who has encountered more drugs than the average pharmacy — with the lines “So pass ’round the fenty / Pass ’round the coke.” Yet his profound love for America and its virtues remains resolute and palpable: “I drove through the suburbs / And I lounged in the malls / Let the dreamers get the dream they want.” It is because Jagger loves America and believes in its greatness that he pines for it. Alongside this stellar track list, we have been treated to a generous press tour featuring a more open and candid Jagger than we have encountered before. For possibly the most famous man on the planet over the past five decades, he has remained something of an enigma in the public eye. Decidedly too old now for such artifice, he has given longtime Stones fans a treat in his recent interviews. In one segment, he concedes his reluctance to opine on politics. “My job in the live music world is just those people that come have the best time they possibly can … to forget all their problems and the problems of the world and their mortgages and their whatever.” Contrast this with Bruce Springsteen, whose recent $300-plus concerts have been dedicated to tirades about immigration enforcement and whatever nonsense “No Kings” entails. The Rolling Stones have always been a band of dualities: Mick and Keith, classic and modern, up-tempo rock and roll balanced by tender ballads. Think of “Start Me Up” and “Waiting on a Friend,” among countless other examples. On “Foreign Tongues,” that tender side arrives with “Back in Your Life,” the longest song on the record. Its melody and atmosphere evoke the Beatles’ wistful “In My Life,” inviting us to reminisce. It features a beautiful guitar solo from Ronnie Wood, which the guitarist explained he recorded in a single take after learning of Beach Boys mastermind Brian Wilson’s death, hoping to convey a tribute to the American genius. And what an inspired tribute it is. It is fitting that the record ends with “Beautiful Delilah,” a Chuck Berry cover. The Stones’ lo-fi interpretation reaches back to the country-blues textures of their “Beggars Banquet” days, awash in Richards’s acoustic strumming and slide guitar from Wood, painting a melancholy vignette of desolate, arid plains. Jagger has already confirmed that he is working on another album, with a possible tour planned for 2027. Whatever fire has ignited in the venerable frontman, we can only hope it burns for as long as it can. Formed in the tradition and image of American blues and R&B, the Rolling Stones adopted that uniquely American export and spent the ensuing decades infusing it with new styles and sounds. That they continue doing so on “Foreign Tongues,” more than six decades later, is remarkable. The record is a mosaic of their past that still points unmistakably forward. To borrow a title, “Time Waits for No One,” but we should all be grateful it continues waiting for the Rolling Stones. *** Harry Khachatrian (@Harry1T6) is a film critic for the Washington Examiner. He is a software engineer, holds a master’s degree from the University of Toronto, and writes about wine at BetweenBottles.com. This article is part of Upstream, The Daily Wire’s new home for culture and lifestyle. Real human insight and human stories — from our featured writers to you.

When you are a young father, you have to make a choice at some point about what is, to my mind, an important thing: what will be the first movie your children will ever see? It matters even if they don’t remember it. If they love it, it matters more. So you have to spend more than a moment of thinking about it, particularly if, as many of us are, the idea that you would put a barely cognizant child before a flickering screen begets responsibility for what comes from it. For this reason, my three children have all had the same movie play before them before their first birthday, intentionally and without hesitation: “Isle of Dogs,” Wes Anderson’s stop motion journey through the Japanese archipelago of the future. My daughters have memorized it fully – they quote the jokes and even the Japanese lines with readiness. There is, in the early days, a confusion that not all dogs sound like Bryan Cranston or Liev Schreiber. But they understand that there is a language gap. They know the label of man’s best friend. And they know what it means to say: I’ve gone to find my dog. Amidst the overheated discourse surrounding Christopher Nolan’s “Odyssey” – the summer flick which launched ten thousand takes – there was one thread which stuck out to me, even as someone who lacks the linguistic and antiquarian knowledge to fully analyze what that vest-wearing troublesome child of Westminster threw into our discourse. That was the rejection by the supposed poorly-tattooed muse for the screenplay, Emily Wilson, of key aspects of Nolan’s creation: she found it too modern, too wrought, too different from both the original and her own interpretation. Fine. But this was the line that stuck out to me: an irritation at an iconic scene of Odysseus’ reunion with his long-serving pup, Argos. Her dismissal was that it was too modern, too mawkish: “everybody’s a sucker for a dog”. Emily Wilson after watching the Odyssey: ‘The film presents an Odysseus who feels very bad about things that he’s done in war, and is struggling to process them in a very modern, psychiatrised way – and needs drugs to do so! He seems to feel bad about being a warrior, and we… pic.twitter.com/m0rfyHd7Ux — Gareth Harney (@OptimoPrincipi) July 22, 2026 Ms. Wilson is entitled to her opinion, but the role of Argos in “The Odyssey” is an emotional connection she seems unfamiliar with. Perhaps she is, as her appearance suggests, a cat lady. But even so, she should understand the unique nature of man’s relationship with dog, which the Greco-Roman era highlights throughout our discovery of their unique and heartfelt tributes. The ancients buried their dogs with markers; they wept and mourned them; they wrote verses for them; and they knew them as loyal friends, fellow hunters, and protectors of home and hearth. To dismiss Argos as if he is some inserted bit of sappy emotion – the sort of lazy, emotionally manipulative, unearthly thing that appears, CGI hair ubiquitous, in the films of James Gunn, brought to you by James Gunn – is to dramatically underestimate his importance. Am I saying Odysseus might have left Calypso just to find his dog, to say goodbye? Yes, I am. “Surely, even as you lie dead in this tomb, I deem the wild beasts yet fear your white bones, huntress Lycas; and your valor great Pelion knows, and splendid Ossa and the lonely peaks of Cithaeron.” This is the memory etched in the tomb of a Thessalian hunting hound, and it is of a piece with the memories that Greeks and Romans alike left behind for their companions. There is the dog of Eumelus of Malta – whose name was Bull, or Tauros – “This stone holds the white dog from Melita, the most faithful guardian of Eumelus; Bull they called him while he was yet alive, but now his voice is imprisoned in the silent pathways of night.” Or for the woman Rhodope, who buried her devoted protector beside her eventual grave. Or for Tauron, who protected his master to the end: A dog is interred beneath this marker—Tauron who was not undone when faced with a killer. For he encountered a boar in direct combat… But the dog struck two feet into its back and grabbed the bristling beast in the middle of its chest and drove it down into the ground—he made a gift of the beast to Hades and died himself… He saved the life of Zenon, the hunter he followed. So he is buried here beneath this light dust. The encounter with Argos is a particularly poignant one: he recognizes Odysseus after 20 years of absence, wags his tail in greeting, and dies an honorable death having stayed alive to welcome his master home. The story is so iconic that it is echoed across media for centuries, and it’s not like it’s gone now. Is there any question that the one episode anyone who ever watched “Futurama” remembers is Jurassic Bark, where Fry’s dog remains steadfast in wait of his master? Sam’s sacrifice in “I Am Legend” is the heart of a relatively forgettable movie. Or what about John Wick, a series which is entirely based on the premise of what a retired expert assassin would do if you kill his dog? As a former speechwriter, the notion that this love of dogs is some modern tendency is at odds with the understanding that the greatest single speech in American history isn’t the Gettysburg address; it’s a random speech in defense of a lonely dog, delivered by future Senator George Graham Vest in a courthouse in Missouri in 1870. The case was decidedly against the now deceased canine – but Vest won based on his eulogy, which is unmatched in American rhetoric: Gentlemen of the Jury: The best friend a man has in this world may turn against him and become his enemy. His son and daughter that he has reared with loving care may become ungrateful. Those who are nearest and dearest to us, those whom we trust with our happiness and our good name, may become traitors to their faith. The money that a man has he may lose. It flies away from him when he may need it most. Man’s reputation may be sacrificed in a moment of ill considered action. The people who are prone to fall on their knees and do us honor when success is with us may be the first to throw the stone of malice when failure settles its cloud upon our heads. The one absolutely unselfish friend a man may have in this world, the one that never deserts him, the one that never proves ungrateful or treacherous is the dog. A man’s dog stands by him in prosperity and poverty, in health and in sickness. He will sleep on the cold ground when the wintry winds blow and the snow drives fiercely, if only he may be near his master’s side. He will kiss the hand that has no food to offer. He will lick the wounds and sores that come in encounter with the roughness of the world. He guards the sleep of his pauper master as if he were a prince. When all other friends desert, he remains. When riches take wings and reputation falls to pieces he is as constant in his love as the sun in its journey through the heavens. If fortune drives the master forth an outcast into the world, friendless and homeless, the faithful dog asks no higher privilege than that of accompanying him to guard him against danger, to fight against his enemies, and when the last scene of all comes and death takes his master in its embrace and his body is laid away in the cold ground, no matter if all other friends pursue their way, there by his graveside will the noble dog be found, his head between his paws and his eyes sad, but open in alert watchfullness, faithful and true even to death. A statue is erected in Johnson County in honor of Old Drum, who was, despite his faults, a very good dog. Let Emily Wilson have her vagaries about “The Odyssey,” about masculinity and PTSD, modernity and its insufficient feminism – but do not, for one moment, let her take from us the friendship of a man and his dog.

The European Broadcasting Union just dropped new guidelines telling cameras how to film female athletes. No more low angles from behind or beneath. No prolonged close-ups of body parts. No slow-motion replays that don’t “contribute to the understanding of the sporting action.” All in the name of preventing the “sexualization” of women on screen. I reject it. I think it’s stupid.  These guidelines treat ordinary athletic movement as inherently suspect when it comes from a woman. A low angle under a high jumper or pole vaulter isn’t automatically pornographic. It’s often the best way to show the height and the technique. Slow motion isn’t automatically leering. It’s how we see elite skill and athleticism.  When we decide that certain shots of women require special moral scrubbing while the same shots of men are just “good television,” we are not protecting women. We are reinforcing the idea that their bodies are the problem. Film athletes playing their sports. That’s it. That’s the job. Capture the leap, the strain, the power, the precision, the moment she clears the bar and the moment the finish line breaks.  Do it for the men. Do it for the women. Same cameras. Same angles. Same standards.  The idea that we need a special rulebook because women’s bodies might make someone somewhere have a thought is exhausted, condescending nonsense. What’s next? Hijabs and total body coverings for female athletes so no bad men get distracted?  For years there have been cries to change the uniform for gymnasts — the leotard — to something more demure. But that is the uniform for good reason. I know this firsthand. I was a gymnast. The 1986 U.S. National Champion, in fact. The leo, as we called them, provides the most comfortable, least interfering outfit for an athlete flipping and flying through the air. Nothing gets caught on the bar or the beam. Nothing flies over the athlete’s head. Anything looser would be dangerous. If it covers the legs, it’s a problem on bars, where the thighs hit the bar for casting to handstand. Anything covering the legs can be slippery against the fiberglass in a way that skin, covered in chalk, is not. The leotard exists because it works. It is functional. It is the tool that lets the athlete do her thing at the highest level. Just like the swimsuit. Should swimmers not wear bathing suits now because they are too revealing and show women’s bodies?  The argument in gymnastics always comes up when a pedophile coach is arrested. Like it is somehow the athlete’s fault that he’s a sexual assaulter and abuser and serial rapist. It’s her outfit, you see. It’s the “what was she wearing?” approach. No. Just no.  It’s his fault for abusing young girls. Whoever he is. Larry Nassar, Don Peters (the 1984 Olympic coach now banned from the sport for allegedly assaulting three gymnasts) — the list of gymnastics creeps goes on and on. While of course nothing should be gratuitous in shooting female athletes, we don’t need separate rules for men and women. Film the athletes. Film what they do: their athleticism, their feats, their leaps and jumps and strength and flair. Should athletes be offered more modest uniforms if they prefer? Sure. Why not. But we don’t need to upend the world of sport so that pervy men don’t perv. I’ve got news: Pervy men are gonna perv no matter what. You can dress every female athlete in a potato sack, and the creeps will still find a way to ogle. The solution is not to hide the athlete. It is to stop treating her body as the story and start treating her performance as the story. I spent a career in a sport where the uniform is skin-tight for good reason. I know what it feels like to have people fixate on the outfit instead of the work. The answer was never to make us cover up. The answer was to demand that people look at the gymnastics. Look at the performances on bars and beam and floor exercise. Look at the amazing thing that a remarkable athlete just did. And, yes, rid the sport of pedophile coaches and instate a governing body that actually cares about its athletes.  These new guidelines treat women’s bodies as the problem. The irony, of course, is that in the name of protecting women’s sports, they implement silly camera guidelines while these same broadcasters won’t take a stand to ensure women’s sports are actually for women only.  Give us our sports back. And stop the special rules. Stop the pearl-clutching about athletic uniforms. Film the athletes. All of them. The same way. Their bodies are not the scandal. Their excellence is the point. *** Jennifer Sey is the CEO of XX-XY Athletics. She is an author, filmmaker, and retired national champion gymnast. This article is part of Upstream, The Daily Wire’s new home for culture and lifestyle. Real human insight and human stories — from our featured writers to you.

A North Carolina man is accused of torturing his 19-year-old girlfriend for months before she was found dead inside an apartment, according to court documents.   Charlotte-Mecklenburg police responded to a 911 call on May 1 after Thomaz Kenon Hamilton, 24, reported that his girlfriend, Isabella Mary Alexandria Stroupe, was unresponsive, according to Fox 11 News.  Officers found Stroupe dead inside an apartment in east Charlotte.  According to an affidavit cited by WBTV, she was wearing “minimal clothing” and was allegedly tied to a bed with a tow strap. Investigators said Stroupe suffered multiple traumatic injuries, including broken and fractured bones as well as stab wounds. Her death was ruled a homicide.  Hamilton, who authorities said was dating and living with Stroupe, allegedly told investigators they had been having sex when she suffered a heart attack. Investigators said the evidence was inconsistent with that account.  Police said they recovered what appeared to be a bloodstained knife wrapped in cellophane, along with a sword, a baseball bat, multiple cell phones, clothing with possible blood, and a bloodstained mattress. According to the affidavit, investigators concluded that “Stroupe was being tortured over a period of several months and that Stroupe would have been physically unable to provide consent for vaginal sexual intercourse.” Police arrested Hamilton on May 5 and charged him with first-degree murder and rape in connection with Stroupe’s death, according to the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department.  Stroupe’s family later created a GoFundMe to help cover funeral expenses, saying her death “has left a huge hole in our lives.”  “I loved Isabella deeply. She was a total bookworm, always reading and sharing her favorite stories with me,” Stroupe’s sister said. “She loved fan fiction and My Little Pony, and her creativity brought so much joy to our family. Remembering her passion for books and the happiness she brought to those around her makes this loss even harder.”

President Donald Trump on Wednesday ramped up his pressure campaign against Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD), urging supporters to flood his office with calls demanding action on the SAVE America Act.  “We have to pass the SAVE America Act to defend American elections. And I have to say, Mike Johnson and Congress have done a great job, but we’re having a hard time in the Senate,” Trump said at a rally in Georgia. “It’s like the Senate is a place where you send things when you want them to die.”  “We’re not going to take this any longer… I’m trying to be nice, Trump added. “Everybody call John Thune at the Senate, he’s the leader of the Republican party, and tell him to get this stuff approved!” The president also renewed his call to eliminate the filibuster, arguing Democrats would quickly abolish the 60-vote threshold themselves if they regain power. “The Democrats are going to terminate the filibuster as soon as they have a chance, and then they’re going to approve Puerto Rico and D.C. as a state. They got four more senators. They’re going to end up with 12 more congressmen. They’re going to get like 40 electoral votes,” the president said.  .@POTUS: “We have to pass the SAVE America Act to defend American Elections… We’re not going to take this any longer… Right now, Congress is working to get as much of our plan as possible into the budget bill… everybody call John Thune at the Senate… and tell him to get… pic.twitter.com/uBzhGziRSm — Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) July 22, 2026 “But I may be crying when I’ll be sitting home, and I’ll say, I told them, they’ve got to really terminate the filibuster, get everything approved right away,” he added.  Trump’s remarks came hours after the House passed a third version of the election integrity measure by attaching it to the GOP-backed Stop Insider Trading Act, legislation that would ban members of Congress from buying and selling stocks. The combined bill passed 232-198, with 13 Democrats joining Republicans to advance the measure, marking the first congressional stock-trading ban to receive a House floor vote, according to Politico. Frustration with Thune isn’t limited to the White House. House Republicans who have repeatedly passed the legislation have also grown increasingly vocal about the Senate’s inaction. “If John Thune has shown that he does not want to put the SAVE America Act on the Senate floor, he should step aside,” Rep. Andy Ogles (R-TN) said on social media. “There are plenty of other options in the Senate capable of securing our elections as Majority Leader.”  Republicans have also pointed to New Jersey’s recent admission that a “software error” led to thousands of non-citizens being registered to vote, arguing the situation shows the need for stronger election safeguards. New Jersey Democratic Gov. Mikie Sherrill revealed Tuesday that the state’s Motor Vehicle Commission (MVC) mistakenly registered roughly 6,600 non-citizens despite their indicating they were not U.S. citizens while applying for IDs and driver’s licenses between June 2023 and June 2024, The Daily Wire reported.  “These individuals answered ‘no’ when asked on a keypad whether they were a U.S. citizen when applying for drivers’ licenses and identification cards, but through no fault of their own, the system registered them anyway,” Sherrill wrote in an X post. Trump administration officials have said the non-citizens who illegally voted could face prosecution and deportation.  “People need to see the consequences of voting when you’re not allowed to,” Harmeet Dhillon, Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights, told conservative podcast host Benny Johnson.  Back on Capitol Hill, Democrats argued the stock trading ban didn’t go far enough, but ultimately opposed the bill because it included provisions from the SAVE America Act. “Republicans have corrupted their so-called stock trading bill with a decaying piece of the SAVE American Act corpse,” Rep. Joseph Morelle (D-N.Y.) Morelle said, according to Politico. The bill now moves to the Senate, where it faces an uncertain path forward.