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Between the Buttons by the Rolling Stones (Vinyl record album review)

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Record basics

  • Album name: Between the Buttons
  • Group name: the Rolling Stones
  • Year: 1967
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Decca Records
  • Collection: Brenner / Gessner
  • Who owned it: I think my father
  • Buy it on Amazon: $29.99

Between the Buttons by the Rolling Stones

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I’m pretty sure that I’ve never heard of Between the Buttons, which is weird, because it seems to have a couple of the best and most recognizable Rolling Stones songs of their entire career.

Here are other Rolling Stones records that I’ve reviewed recently:

What I expected

1960s blues-influenced pop rock.

What it was actually like

One of my big questions when I put this record on was whether it was going to be a case of two world class singles (that both weren’t even on the UK album release) and a bunch of filler crap, or whether Let’s Spend the Night Together and Ruby Tuesday would be representative of the whole record.

Unfortunately, they weren’t, and my hunch was right.

To address those two first, I think Let’s Spend the Night Together is a very good song, but Ruby Tuesday has to be one of my all time favorites. Here is the famous performance on the Ed Sullivan show, when he made them change the lyric to “let’s spend some time together” and they lolled so hard – Ed Sullivan was such a square!

Also, how did Mick Jagger get to be such a bad dancer? Drugs alone couldn’t do that, right?

And let’s not forget that Melanie covered Ruby Tuesday on Candles in the Rain, but it wasn’t spectacular.

Anyway, those were the only strong tracks on Between the Buttons and now I can understand why I hadn’t heard of it.

Connection was a bit anachronistic, sounding much more like early 1960s music, and it was ok. She Smiled Sweetly reminded me of listening to a Velvet Underground demo tape from 1964.

Cool, Calm & Collected definitely stood out as a ragtime song with a kazoo on a Stones record – that decision was a fascinating mix of corny and courageous.

My Obsession sounded like just the outline of a song, as if they were jamming and came up with it, but never actually worked on it. Complicated, on the other hand, was more fully formed and coherent, but still more on the boring side.

Miss Amanda Jones was a blues rock song that had more of an electric sound that most of the others, and I thought it was decent.

Something Happened to Me Yesterday had a strong Oompa Loompa influence, but also it sounded kind of like a joke, and at times like Bob Dylan might have been the joke’s punchline.

The others – Yesterday’s Papers, All Sold Out, Who’s Been Sleeping Here? – were just forgettable.

With the exception of the two hit songs, my impression of Between the Buttons was that it may have been thrown together over a long weekend to have an LP to release in support of their singles.

Grade

3/5: interesting, but not for me

Marrying Maiden by It’s a Beautiful Day (Vinyl record album review)

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Record basics

  • Album name: Marrying Maiden
  • Group name: It’s a Beautiful Day
  • Year: 1970
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Columbia Records
  • Collection: Brenner / Gessner
  • Distinguishing characteristics: “G” written on top left of album, indicating that my father owned it
  • Buy it on Amazon: $10.00

Marrying Maiden by It's a Beautiful Day

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I have no idea what this is, and actually originally had this as a record called “It’s a Beautiful Day” by the band “Marrying Maiden,” until realizing that I’d gotten confused.

What I expected

Maybe folk rock?

What it was actually like

This wasn’t folk rock. What was it? It was a little bit of everything, and a lot of strange combinations of things:

  • Don And Dewey was sort of like psychedelic classical swing, an instrumental song that was jazzy, with electric guitar, organ, violin and harmonica. It definitely was not like anything I’ve ever heard before, and was definitely fun.
  • The Dolphins was more of a conventional country rock or folk rock style song with country style violin solo and lead vocals, and choral style backing vocals.
  • Essence Of Now sounded like a Cream song.
  • Hoedown was… like a hoedown: instrumental and very bluegrassy, with banjo that sounded like Scruggs style, electric guitar instead of Dobro, and harmonica.
  • Soapstone Mountain started out like a Who song, but continued like a Cream song.
  • Waiting For The Song started with an Indian-like drone, but with monotonal chanting like church music. It may just have been a prelude to the next song, Let A Woman Flow, which was more easy listening style, almost elevator music, with some Spanish lyrics.
  • It Comes Right Down To You was old timey, with sort of a swing sound, but also sounded a lot like New Riders of the Purple Sage (I’ve previously reviewed three of their records: Home, Home on the Road, Powerglide and Gypsy Cowboy), which would make sense because I know that Jerry Garcia was involved NRPS and it seems that he participated in It’s A Beautiful Day as well.
  • Good Lovin’ was a blues rock song driven by electric guitar, with harmonica.
  • Galileo started out as a mumbly spoken word song, then turned into a kind of march, and then transformed back into more mumbly spoken word.
  • Do You Remember The Sun? was more orchestral, with an organ and choral style vocals, and could have been a Beatles outtake.

What can I possibly make of all this? Parts of it were great, and other parts of it were weird and interesting. Somehow it all did seem to fit together, even if I can’t entirely figure out why or how.

Grade

4/5: would listen again

Sailor by The Steve Miller Band (Vinyl record album review)

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Record basics

  • Album name: Sailor
  • Group name: The Steve Miller Band
  • Year: 1968
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Capitol Records
  • Collection: Brenner / Gessner
  • Who owned it: probably my father
  • Buy it on Amazon: $31.51

Sailor by The Steve Miller Band

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I’ve never listened to this record, and the only other Steve Miller Band record I’ve heard is Greatest Hits 1974-78.

What I expected

Electric blues?

What it was actually like

Sailor got off to a really slow start, and the beginning sounded like a Moody Blues record, or possibly like outtakes from the White Album, so I wasn’t very enthusiastic at first. Quicksilver Girl was also weird.

Things picked up considerably with My Friend, however, which was much more of a rock song, and Living in the U.S.A. was an outstanding R&B (maybe even “maximum R&B”?) song, as was Dime-a-Dance Romance.

Gangster of Love seemed like it was going to be good, despite the mumbly vocals, but then it faded out right when it was getting started!

Overdrive was an amazing Bob Dylan parody.

Lucky Man had some weird sound effects, but was pretty bluesy, and You’re So Fine was truest to the electric blues style.

Grade

3/5: interesting, but not for me

The Turning Point by John Mayall (Vinyl record album review)

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Record basics

  • Album name: The Turning Point
  • Artist name: John Mayall
  • Year: 1969
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Polydor Records Ltd.
  • Collection: Brenner / Gessner
  • Who owned it: my father
  • Buy it on Amazon: $9.48

The Turning Point by John Mayall

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I’ve heard of John Mayall, but I don’t think I know any of his songs, and don’t think I’ve ever heard this record.

What I expected

Electric blues.

What it was actually like

This was a live record, and it was pretty great. Blues was indeed the dominant musical style, though about a third of it was more jazzy, and I didn’t enjoy the jazz parts as much.

From the beginning, however, The Turning Point was strong. The Laws Must Change was a beautiful blues rock song with harmonica and flute, and even passed my flute test:

… I’m maybe slightly more forgiving of flute being used in rock music [than saxophone], if only because it’s so uncommon, but there’s a simple standard that I would apply: are you Jethro Tull? Are you better than Jethro Tull, or engaged in a serious attempt to do something that Jethro Tull hasn’t done or can’t do? If you answer no to all of those questions, then you probably should leave the flute out of your rock song.

The flute definitely did what another guitar couldn’t have done, and I loved it (and the crowd loved it, too).

And that continued to the end: Room to Move was more like a dance song with a harmonica solo, and it also employed excellent use of the flute.

So Hard To Share, California and Thoughts About Roxanne were all more jazzy and tended to be more about the saxophone. From the above, my saxophone test:

… I want to stress that rock musicians really need to avoid using saxophone in their music. If you’re Charlie Parker, I want to hear your saxophone part, but in rock I just don’t think there’s a lot of use for it.

The bass lines were strong across the record, and I didn’t mind the jams that much, but as always, tended to wish that they had been replaced by actual songs.

Grade

5/5: love it

Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band by the Beatles (Vinyl record album review)

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Record basics

  • Album name: Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
  • Group name: the Beatles
  • Year: 1967
  • Number of discs: one
  • Label: Capitol Records
  • Collection: Selman
  • Buy it on Amazon: $33.80

Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band by the Beatles

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I think Sgt. Pepper is probably the music I’ve heard most in my entire life, because it was a favorite of my parents and then my own favorite. I’ve described it as a desert island album, as the Beatles’ greatest achievement, and sometimes as my top record of all time.

Other Beatles records I’ve reviewed:

What I expected

Sgt. Pepper.

What it was actually like

It’s incredibly difficult to write reviews of these songs, because I feel like I’ve known every note and every lyric of all of them since before I was even born, like they’re almost a part of me, and because of the way that they’ve always seemed to run together to me as one rather than as distinct tracks, reinforced by the “concept album” structure of Sgt. Pepper.

Long ago, I read about the idea that in the distant future, Beatles songs will be the nursery rhymes of their day, and every time I’ve come back to that idea over the years, it’s always been Sgt. Pepper‘s songs that I imagine five year olds singing as they jump rope.

Listening to it this time, my favorites are With a Little Help from My Friends and Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!. I’m not sure that I’ve ever identified the latter as a favorite before, but I’ve always enjoyed it because of its weirdness and because I think it’s representative of the record overall. I wrote about the former a little bit when I reviewed the Woodstock soundtrack, but I’d add to that how easy it is to listen to this as being totally innocent and quite entirely about friendship of the sort that kids have (before they know what “getting high” means).

If one thing that both of those songs share is their sense of joy, wonder and happiness, She’s Leaving Home has always struck me as the archetypal sad song, sadder than any love song ever could be, because people may fall out of (romantic) love but find it again, while that’s not possible for the love a parent has for a child.

Within You Without You is one that I didn’t even remotely get when I was a child or a teenager, but it’s really endeared itself to me as an adult. It was not only my first exposure to classical Hindustani music, but the first time I was introduced to any Indian culture of any kind, and as a longtime admirer of Indian civilization (and fan of Ravi Shankar), I hear it all the time, even when it’s not playing.

I think it’s only fair to mention the elephant in the room on Sgt. Pepper, which is When I’m Sixty-Four, one of the worst examples of “Faul’s granny shit” that was even lame enough for my third grade teacher to get my class to sing it for her.

Everyone should listen to Sgt. Pepper. Listen to it when you’re five years old and keep listening to it when you’re 50 years old, listen to it when you’re happy and when you’re sad, when you’re stone cold sober and with the assistance of a certain medicinal herb. Listen to covers of it, like this one by Easy Star that I first heard on the beach by Frischman Street, shortly after moving to Tel Aviv, on a Friday afternoon in summer 2006, as the sun was setting and Shabbat was about to begin.

Grade

5/5: love it