The Rolling Stones: Between The Buttons - 1967
The Stones seem almost polite and shy-ish on much of the album's material, the total opposite of their recent bad-boy image - Back Street Girl certainly expresses no bullish Get Off My Cloud defiance, Stupid Girl misogyny or Let's Spend The Night Together lust. Jagger's beautiful vocal here, sung over Brian Jones piano-accordion is typical of this. Like Lady Jane, it is almost Elizabethan in its instrumentation, cadence and ambience. It would be a while before The Stones would be so nice again. There's always something lurking between the surface with The Stones, though and the singer's motives concerning his "common" girl are questionable, however, warning her not to try and get too much into his life, or indeed come near his wife.
The upbeat drug-related number Connection (careful lads, or you'll get arrested) is one of the rockiest numbers. One of the only ones with any sort of faint grit, or bluesiness. However, it ends far too quickly. I should imagine it was largely written by Keith. It was surprisingly resurrected for live performances in the mid 90s (the Stripped shows) and sounded great. It is soon back to the mild-mannered stuff though, with the non-lead guitar, organ-backed slowie, She Smiled Sweetly. Jagger's saccharine vocal in praise of his similarly sugary girl is not one of his best, particularly his "sweedly" enunciation. Nice bass from Bill Wyman though.
Cool, Calm And Collected is one of those quintessentially British, music-hall style rollicking singalongs best left to Paul McCartney and The Kinks (by whom this is so influenced). It certainly doesn't suit The Stones. Ray Davies could get away with that silly "posh" voice, such as on Dedicated Follower Of Fashion, but sung by Mick Jagger it just sounds bloody ludicrous. One of the album's low points. It goes on far too long, too.All Sold Out - Ah, this was more like it, more typical of mid-60s Stones material. At last, a bit of Keith Richards buzzy guitar, some pounding Watts drums and a cynical lyric about being stabbed in the back or cheated upon. About time too. It is the nearest we get to any of the sadly-lacking Stones grit on the album. As for Please Go Home, some more bluesy guitar is to be found on another impressive track with a Not Fade Away-Mona Bo Diddley rhythm. Apparently a "theramin" instrument was used on this to make weird noises. The Beach Boys had memorably used one on Good Vibrations not long before. The Stones did not really need to use gimmicky instruments like this, just use Keith's guitar, for God's sake.
Who's Been Sleeping Here? is also a good track with a good vocal, nice bass and drums on what is a mid-pace rocker with even a bit of harmonica returning. Shades of Dylan's electric guitar-organ sound on here as well, together with oblique, mystifying lyrics about cavaliers and the like. It wouldn't have sounded out of place on Highway 61 Revisited. Although it is "The Stones do Dylan" it is not without its edgy appeal, particularly in comparison to much of the album.
That old Charlie Watts drum sound is back on another more typically Stones-sounding number, Complicated. It's ok, sounding like a cousin to All Sold Out, but basically it sounds like a reject from Aftermath, as much of this album's material did. Lyrically, it bemoans a girl who wants her own way - the cheek of it!
Jagger seems to be having difficulty seducing a classier woman than usual, and this continues on the next song....the jaunty Miss Amanda Jones expresses Jagger's fascination with "society" girls, as voiced before on Complicated, Lady Jane and Play With Fire. Some Chuck Berry guitar prevails, thankfully, for the first time on the album. Keith Richards was criminally underused throughout, it has to be said. This was the album's best rocker, by far.
An odd closer, Something Happened To Me Today was a Kinks meet The Beatles in a music hall unfortunate prelude to The Stones' derivative era - whistling, a tuba, some New Orleans jazz brass and those "posh" affected voices that would blight parts of Satanic Majesties. The Stones should never be doing stuff like this. Ever.
On Satanic Majesties, The Stones aped The Beatles, on this album they aped The Kinks in a few places. They were The Rolling Stones. They didn't need to ape anyone.
Not included on the album from its sessions was the lyrically odd Have You Seen Your Mother Baby, Standing in The Shadow?, which saw The Stones featuring a brass section for the first time.
Its 'b' side was the impressive blues rock of Who's Driving Your Plane? It was a single with two question marked titles. There's a bit of trivia for you.
Another fine stand-alone single/b side combination was Ruby Tuesday and Let's Spend The Night Together, neither of which need any introduction, do they?
The US version of the album included these two tracks at the expense of Back Street Girl and Please Go Home.
Let's Spend The Night Together
This was a very controversial song at the time, prudish US radio and TV shows asking the lyric be changed to "let's spend some time together". How things soon changed. That very summer everyone was sharing the same bed, man. The song is a frantic, attitude-bearing rock number that was covered superbly, in my opinion, by David Bowie on his 1973 Aladdin Sane album. He gives it a wired-up, electric sexuality that outdoes even Jagger, amazingly.
Ruby Tuesday
A wonderfully tuneful, hooky and totally infectious Stones ballad here, one of my favourites of the "slow Stones" songs. It has lovely, evocative verses and imagery along with an irresistible chorus. As with quite a few Stones songs, it has been covered by others, perhaps in an arguably superior style. Two of these are Rod Stewart on his 1993 Lead Vocalist album and Melanie Safka, whose early seventies throaty "goodbye Roo-bay Toos-day" rendition has always done it for me, big time. I love it. The Stones' version still retains a simple innocence though.
