The Rolling Stones are playing Abu Dhabi this weekend. Yes. Those Rolling Stones. Mick Jagger and the rest of the geriatric crew. Who landed on the island today and posed for this photo, posted on their Facebook page.

And you would be amazed at the fuss.

Abu Dhabi is the first stop on the 14 On Fire tour. And the fact that these guys are still touring — hell, that they are still alive — is fairly amazing. And impressive.

Mick Jagger is 70 years old.

As is Keith Richards.

Charlie Watts, the drummer, is 72. (That’s him, third from the left in the photo, above. The white-haired old gent who looks like he might be professor emeritus in Middle English; all he needs are patches on the elbows of his coat and a pipe. But, really, he might be the oldest non-Emirati in the UAE, at this moment.)

Ronnie Wood (second from left) is the child of this crew, at age 66.

These guys are ancient.

And no one seems to care.

They have sold 30,000 tickets, all of the tickets that were printed, mind, for their show in Abu Dhabi on Friday night.

They then go to New Zealand, where 50,000 people will see them in Auckland.

Meantime, The National’s features section is doing a five-day countdown of stories on the visit, including a story and slide show on old rockers still doing their thing … and a piece this morning on 14 classic tracks the Stones might play on their 14 on Fire tour stop here.

(And how many times have the Stones played any of those, in concert? 10,000 times? More?)

Mick Jagger famously said, in 1976, when he was 33, that he couldn’t imagine doing “Satisfaction” when he was 45.

Odds are pretty good he will do it in Abu Dhabi on Friday, when he is 25 years beyond age 45.

And how big a deal is this? We can hardly staff the sports desk, on Friday, because so many members of the staff are going to the concert. Had one more guy declared he was going … well, someone would have had to stay behind. And none of these guys is older than 35.

I don’t know if it says something about the Stones that they can still cause this sort of ruckus .. or about more modern acts — which don’t seem to have the universal appeal of these rockin’ geriatrics.