My friend Stuart bought a great condition double vinyl album Rolled Gold: The Very Best Of The Rolling Stones. He owned one other Stones album - also a double vinyl in good nick - in 1972's Exile On Main Street.
Although the former was released on the Decca label, it had the appearance of a K-Tel or Ronco production line compilation with a truly awful cover and typeface. It was no surprise to learn in later years that Decca was the Stones' former label by 1975 and had released the album without the band's authorisation as a cash in on their continued success. And it paid off with the general public, reaching #7 in the chart.
And you can see why. The collection highlights 28 songs from 1963 to 1969, over 90 minutes of all killer, no filler, to be honest. Exile On Main Street was an 18 song, one hour plus behemoth that took a while to grow on me but made a couple of deep impressions from the outset.
I originally thought that I'd compiled this as one of a bunch of tapes to take with me traveling overseas in 1990. However, the opening one-two of We Love You and She's A Rainbow must have been inspired by the cover versions of each by JBC (Jazz Butcher Collective) and World Of Twist, the latter not appearing until November 1990 by which time I was on the other side of the world. My revised dating would therefore place this mixtape around late 1991, when I was back home and perhaps stocking up on car stereo staples.
When it came to home taping, the biggest challenge was that The Rolling Stones would end up sharing a C90 cassette with The Jimi Hendrix Experience on the flipside. So, how do you condense two and a half hours of music into 45 minutes?
I'm quite pleased with the end result. Obviously, it's bursting with big hits, but I like the non-chronological flow of the selection, the opening quartet of songs and the couple of inclusions from Exile...
Describing closing song Midnight Rambler as a reprise roughly translates as I had a couple of minutes left at the end of the tape, there is a convenient break and final section to the song itself and I just faded out towards the end before the spool ran out. I've retained this DIY edit for today's selection.
in 2007, an expanded edition of Rolled Gold was released and I finally had a copy of my own on CD. A testament to the quality of Jagger and Richards' songs that the additional dozen songs on the reissue included I'm Free, No Expectations, You Can't Always Get What You Want, Brown Sugar and Wild Horses.
1) We Love You (1967)
2) She's A Rainbow (1967)
3) Get Off Of My Cloud (1965)
4) Let's Spend The Night Together (Single Version) (1967)
5) Ruby Tuesday (1967)
6) Let It Loose (1972)
7) Paint It, Black (Single Version) (1966)
8) I Just Want To See His Face (1972)
9) Jumpin' Jack Flash (1968)
10) Sympathy For The Devil (Album Version) (1968)
11) Gimme Shelter (Album Version) (1969)
12) Midnight Rambler (Reprise) (1969)
1972: Exile On Main Street: 6, 8
1975: Rolled Gold: The Very Best Of The Rolling Stones: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 9, 10, 11, 12
As a bonus, you can find The Jimi Hendrix Experience side here.
A pretty much faultless selection. When the Stones were good, they were very very good indeed. My current Jagger/Richards earworms are 'Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby, Standing In The Shadow?' and its magnificent b-side 'Who's Driving Your Plane?'
ReplyDeleteThanks, TS, that's very much appreciated. Have You Seen Your Mother... is also on Rolled Gold but I've never heard Who's Driving Your Plane? before. A quick visit to the Tube of You has solved that - it's a cracker of a B-side!
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