The album was the last to be produced by Jimmy Miller, who was a key architect of the Rolling Stones sound during their most acclaimed period which began with 1968's Beggars Banquet.

Regular Rolling Stones collaborators, including saxophonist Bobby Keys, organist Billy Preston, and pianists Nicky Hopkins and Ian Stewart, also feature.

By that time about the only country that I was allowed to exist in was Switzerland, which was damn boring for me, at least for the first year, because I didn't like to ski ... Nine countries kicked me out, thank you very much, so it was a matter of how to keep this thing together ..."[3] Of the recording process, Marshall Chess, the president of Rolling Stones Records at the time, said in 2002, "We used to book studios for a month, 24 hours a day, so that the band could keep the same set-up and develop their songs in their free-form way, starting with a few lyrics and rhythms, jamming and rehearsing while we fixed the sound.

[11] In 1993, Richards, in the liner notes to the compilation album Jump Back: The Best of The Rolling Stones, said that the title was inspired by his baby daughter, Dandelion Angela.

Aside from the official band members, other musicians appearing on Goats Head Soup include keyboard players Billy Preston, Nicky Hopkins and Ian Stewart.

Two of these – "Tops" and "Waiting on a Friend" – would surface on Tattoo You in 1981, and feature Mick Taylor on guitar;[14] "Through the Lonely Nights" became the B-side to the "It's Only Rock 'n Roll (But I Like It)" single and was released on CD for the first time on the 2005 compilation Rarities 1971–2003.

It is a soft rock ballad that features Richards on wah wah/Leslie speaker filtered guitar with Taylor playing a brief solo.

In addition, "Short and Curlies" was started at the Goats Head Soup sessions and ended up appearing on the It's Only Rock n' Roll LP.

Goats Head Soup was subsequently released on 31 August, with the catalogue number COC 59101,[17] and also shot to the top of charts worldwide.

[citation needed] The album cover was designed by Ray Lawrence and photographed by David Bailey, a friend of Jagger's who had worked with the Rolling Stones since 1964.

Jagger was reluctant to be shot enveloped by a pink chiffon veil, which Bailey said was meant to look like "Katharine Hepburn in The African Queen".

[21] On the other hand, Nick Kent of the NME found the record lacking in originality, stating, "on Goat's Head Soup the Stones have really nothing to say, but somehow say it so well that the results transcend the redundancy of the project in the first place".

Although she found it "more carefully put together" than Exile on Main St., she felt Goats Head Soup came across as a collection of songs rather than a cohesive project.

[25] Writing for Zoo World, Arthur Levy considered the record on par with Sticky Fingers and Exile on Main St., adding that the three albums "are now the seeds of a new oeuvre".

This is where the Stones' image began to eclipse their accomplishments, as Mick ascended to jet-setting celebrity and Keith slowly sunk deeper into addiction, and it's possible hearing them moving in both directions on Goats Head Soup, at times in the same song.

[39] Reviewing the 2020 reissue, Gallucci commented that although the Stones did not "bottom out" until 1976's Black and Blue, Goats Head Soup is where their decline began.

Although he found that the new mix enhances the album, he stated: "It's still sludgy, it still drags at points and it still occasionally comes off as lazy coasting by a band that felt it didn't have to try anymore now that it was on top of the world.

[41] Jem Aswad of Variety similarly felt that the 1973 album ended their "near-peerless streak" that began with Beggers Banquet.

[42] Conversely, Alan Light of Esquire called Goats Head Soup a bad album, saying that it ended "one of the greatest runs in rock & roll history".

"[43] Michael Elliott of PopMatters agreed, writing that Goats Head Soup ended "the greatest four-album run in rock 'n' roll".

[44] Reflecting years later, David Cavanagh of Uncut noted that reactions to the album – and "Angie" as its lead single – from fans and critics were "characterised by disappointment", reasoning this was especially due to the momentum the band had built from Beggars Banquet (1968) to Exile on Main St. (1972).

He also added that the qualms revolved around "the downbeat pensiveness of an album that sometimes seems lost in a fug of regret", as well as other apparent anti-climactic features, such as its "more mainstream, keyboard-heavy production", "low quota of rockers" and "[a] not so-obviously assertive Keith.

The 1994 remaster was initially released in a Collector's Edition CD, which replicated in miniature many elements of the original gatefold album packaging.