The Rolling Stones: Their Satanic Majesties Request - 1967
So, here we have The Rolling Stones most non-Rolling Stones album - a leap on to the "psychedelic" bandwagon with blatant echoes of The Beatles' recently-released Sgt Pepper (in June of the same year), musically, conceptually and artistically - the cover - in groovy blue instead of groovy red - was embarrassingly Pepper - influenced.
Quite what possessed The Stones to come up with something like this is unclear, maybe they just thought "everybody's doing it, man" and went ahead, not wondering how it may appear. After all, groups like Pink Floyd, Traffic, The Kinks and Cream were all going weird. Why, even The Beach Boys were messing around with animal noises and multi-tracked, multi-instrumented "experimental" music. This was just The Stones' contribution to the contemporary vibe. Fair enough, I suppose, it was 1967, but it still stands alone as one big mistake in so many ways. The Rolling Stones are just not suited to this sort of thing are they, in any way, and to be fair to this album, there had been hints on Between The Buttons that led to some of the material we were subjected to here. All that hippy philosophy and communal generosity of spirit did not sit easily with a band who preferred to be affectedly rude, perverse and very much out on a limb as opposed to being part of some perceived "movement".
The album provides the most obvious bridging point in The Stones' career. Gone was the 60s pop, the frantic blues covers and blues-influenced pop that so characterised the mid-60s. In was experimentation and ideas allowed to run away with themselves, particularly as producer Andrew Loog Oldham had left, and The Stones reacted like kids chucking paper around when the teacher has had to leave the room. Yes, it is intriguing and, at times, there are some genuine inspirational moments in there, hidden away. However, maybe we should just take Keith Richards' word for it, that -
"basically, Satanic Majesties was a load of crap".
Sing This All Together has a communal "we're all part of the show" (typical of the era), somewhat silly singalong introduction. However, at about two minutes in, it has some interesting eastern-sounding percussion bits on it. Despite the supposed animosity (mostly press conceived) between The Beatles and The Stones, John Lennon and Paul McCartney appear on backing vocals, in an All You Need Is Love conglomerate.
Actually, Citadel is not a bad track at all, one of the album's best, featuring some chunky guitar riffing in addition to the obligatory swirling "psychedelic" keyboard sound and a distant Jagger vocal urging us to visit him in his citadel which exemplifies its mystifying lyrics. Who were Candy and Taffy, I wonder?
Oddly and rarely, In Another Land features Bill Wyman on vocals. This was not surprising, maybe, as he wrote the song (finally breaking the Jagger-Richards monopoly) and only he and Charlie Watts of the regular Stones appeared (fully, apart from later backing vocals) on it. Steve Marriott of The Small Faces played guitar and Nicky Hopkins played piano. It has one of those medieval-sounding keyboard pieces. It has echo, reverb vocals and a general 1967 "hippy rock" sound that often sounds more like Pink Floyd or Cream or Traffic with hints of The Kinks than it does The Beatles, although the drum sound is very Ringo. I have to say that the snoring at the end has always put me a little on edge. It's bloody loud!
2000 Man is not too dissimilar to a lot of the material on Between The Buttons - the jangly guitar and the rhythmic, sometimes unaccompanied drum sound and some lyrics typical of the era. Again, something about it all that has touches of what The Kinks were doing at the same time. Quite a bit of studio trickery was involved in its production too. It all sounds a bit tinny, however.
Sing This All Together (See What Happens) is a lengthy serving of utter nonsense that has a woodwind introduction that is pure 1967 Beatles but then we get a rather seductive guitar-drum-weird sounds part and some horn parts. Not good, you might think, but it all has considerable, surprising appeal. Some excellent bluesy guitar a couple of minutes in, some more funny noises and it all just continues like some blurry drug-addled party. However, an eight minute jam with a few good bits and some unusual instruments, such as The Beach Boys' favourite - the theramin - makes for a testing listen, to be honest. As I said, it has its attraction, but it really just doesn't sound much like The Stones as anyone knew them. I should imagine many people at the time thought 'so this is what taking drugs does to you' and decided against it. It has a fair claim for the title of "worst Stones song of all time".
She's A Rainbow is a brilliant, addictive piece of pure 1967 in the same vein as Love's She Comes In Colours. It has an unforgettable keyboard hook and an affecting Jagger vocal. It just sums up the zeitgeist, man. I love it and always have done.
On The Lantern we had some genuinely impressive bits - very Beatles-ish psychedelic, with that Starr-inspired drum sound again. However, it was not all derivative, there is some excellent guitar and piano and Jagger's vocal is one of his best on what was not a great album for him.
Gomper was the album's Within You Without You - the tabla drum sound, Eastern quasi-religious ambience and dreamy lyrics. Some great guitar sounds also make for an interesting listening experience but, let's face it, it is so Harrison it's untrue. To be fair to Brian Jones, though, he had been into Eastern instruments long before Harrison.
Finally, On With The Show was a blatant tap-in to Lennon's circus imagery of Being For The Benefit Of Mr Kite!, almost embarrassingly so. It also uses those "posh" English voice samples that had crept in to Something Happened To Me Yesterday on Between The Buttons.
No need for all this silliness is there?. The Stones needed a sea change, quickly. They needed to move onward and upwards while revisiting their roots. In 1968 they would do just that, and some.
The two non-album tracks that appeared as a single were the Moroccan-influenced dirge We Love You (featuring John Lennon and Paul McCartney on backing vocals) and the hippy-ish Dandelion, which seemed a bit of a throwback in 1967. Thankfully, stronger stuff was just around the corner.
