If you're in the market for just one Stones album this year, make it A Bigger Bang. But if you happen to be shopping for an additional stocking stuffer, you could do much worse than this odds-and-sods set. Most of the tracks on Rarities aren't very rare — all of them have been previously released in some form. But this disc works as a discriminating collection of lesser-known gems. The live tracks are revelatory: They include a torrid "Wild Horses," from 1995's live album Stripped, and an achy rendition of "Beast of Burden," from Sucking in the Seventies. The stunner is a live version of "Tumbling Dice," inexplicably left off Stripped. The first two verses (recorded at a rehearsal, then spliced together with a full-on live performance) are backed only by Chuck Leavell's rollicking piano and some righteous hand claps. Then there's a track that captures the early spark of the Stones: a loving cover of Chuck Berry's "Let It Rock," recorded in Leeds, England, in 1971, at the height of the band's powers. Once a B side of "Brown Sugar," it's a keeper — and it has finally found a loving home in a good neighborhood.

“Help Me”

Joni Mitchell wrote and recorded this song for her album Court and Spark, but she had to switch from her regular band to make the song sound exactly the way she wanted. "I had attempted to play my music with rock & roll players," she told Rolling Stone. "They’d laugh, 'Awww, isn't that cute? She's trying to teach us how to play.'" Mitchell switched to a jazz band, Tom Scott’s L.A. Express, and scored the biggest hit of her career in the process.