The Rolling Stones, Big Hits (High Tide And Green Grass) (Decca)
The American version of this collection came as early as March 28, 1966, sporting a front cover photo that was relegated to the back of the British edition, and containing 12 cuts against the British 14. Both versions included a pasted booklet with colour photos of the band. The British version has a significantly cooler sleeve and is certainly the best purchase, not least because it’s got “Paint It, Black” and “Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby, Standing In The Shadow?” on it, and thus making the album a complete journey through the group’s first four years as recording artists.
Just like the other three, The Beatles (Revolver), Bob Dylan (Blonde On Blonde) and The Beach Boys (Pet Sounds), the Stones (Aftermath) released one of the greatest albums of all time in 1966, and just like the other three they had no sequel ready for Christmas – so their respective record companies in the UK all released compilations (Dylan’s Greatest Hits arrived the week after Christmas, a somewhat strange strategy).
I remember very well how disappointed I was with The Beatles’ contribution, “A Collection Of Beatles Oldies But Goldies!”, especially after seeing this Stones package. The Beatles-album arrived in a contemptible single-sleeve with a stupid colour drawing on the front. The Stones album however, was sheer luxury, a colourful gatefold with a booklet. It also had the more enticing content as the Stones, even more than The Beatles, kept their singles off the regular albums. 12 of the 14 tracks had never been on a British LP before. The fraction on the Beatles-collection was 8 over 16.
Some more nerd facts: The American version of “Big Hits”, even with its lesser tracks, is a more accurate collection in the sense that it contains all 11 of their American hit singles (at the time of release), including “Play With Fire,” a B-side that also hit the Hot 100. The 12th track, “Good Times, Bad Times”, was a B-side that didn’t chart, but a nice bonus anyway. In other words, the American version is a complete hit-collection. Nerds do like that.
The British version admittedly has more songs, including their most recent hits (Paint It, Black and Have You Seen Your Mother…). But it skips “I Wanna Be Your Man,” the group’s second hit-single (a striking habit on most Stones-collections), and it is definitely not for lack of space as the group had only clocked up 11 hits in the UK at the time.
To complicate matters even further they also had three hit EP’s behind them – all registered on the singles charts, but none of them are represented on “Big Hits (High Tide And Green Grass)”. So four of the 14 tracks weren’t “big hits” in England at all: A B-side (As Tears Go By), a US hit (Heart Of Stone) and two album tracks (Time Is On My Side and Lady Jane). I could have accepted “Time Is On My Side” if they had chosen the American single-version, but they rather lifted the familiar recording off “Rolling Stones No. 2”.
Both album tracks could have been replaced by key EP-recordings like “Poison Ivy” and “If You Need Me”. Actually, if they had collected all singles (A- and B-sides) and EP’s this could have been a marvellous double-album. That would have been my choice. But Decca didn’t ask for my opinion (they never did, strangely enough), so be it. Anyway, it still beats the Beatles-collection hands down.
Enough from the nerd in me. “Big Hits (High Tide And Green Grass)” plays so well it’s almost unbearable. Indeed, I would argue spontaneously and without doing any research, this is by far the best “Greatest Hits”-album ever released in the 60s.
It captures most of the peaks from their phase as a cover band – the earliest recordings show a delightful immature savagery in their dealings with other people’s work (Come On and Not Fade Away), then they started to match the originals (It’s All Over Now and Time Is On My Side) and finally eclipsing them, claiming the songs as their own, the icing of the cake being the magnificent and spectacular “Little Red Rooster “, the most perfect three minutes of electric blues performed by a British band ever, and I just love that beautiful slide-playing of Brian Jones.
Phase 2, 1965-66, is when Jagger/Richards came into their own as writers, establishing a partnership that would become a brand almost as strong as Lennon/McCartney, and Brian Jones turned into a full time swingin’ London fashion dandy and part-time musical magician (the latter something the Stones’ 1966-67 output would benefit from enormously until the drugs took control and reduced him to a sobbing whisper).
“The Last Time” was the first Jagger/Richards-original to grace the A-side of a Stones-single, a reverberating monster-classic that kissed the sky and filled Beatles-fans like me with envy. They followed it up with sequels “Satisfaction” and “Get Off Of My Cloud”, a trio of classics that surely gave The Beatles a run for their money.
The Stones took the electric blues and blew it wide open, incorporating all their favourite contemporary sources, rhythm’n’blues, soul, Motown, creating something the world had not heard before, it was aggressive, it was virile, boosted by insanely clever, insistent guitar-riffs and choruses that made you wanna buy rubber. Competitors The Animals and The Pretty Things disappeared in the rear-view mirror.
In 1966 the metamorphosis was completed. “19th Nervous Breakdown” and its nerve-wrecking bass run, “Paint It Black”, a song about death, no less, but sounding absurdly uplifting thanks to that wonderful, little sitar-theme and the cunningly untidy time signature, and finally, the absolute fabulous attack on your senses called “Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby, Standing In The Shadow?”
The Rolling Stones were just as much ahead of the game as The Beatles, The Beach Boys and Bob Dylan in 1966. It was an incredibly fun year. This is where pop music took off and became a candy store for the brain. And yes, there was sex and drugs involved.
“Big Hits (High Tide And Green Grass)” is a monument, a perfect summary and a crunchy great collection of songs packed in a super sleeve that kept Stones fans gloating for seven months until The Beatles released “Sgt. Pepper”. Then they finally shut up.
Released: November 4, 1966
Produced by: Andrew Loog Oldham
Contents: Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby, Standing in the Shadow?/Paint It Black/It’s All Over Now/The Last Time/Heart of Stone/Not Fade Away/Come On/(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction/Get Off of My Cloud/As Tears Go By/19th Nervous Breakdown/Lady Jane/Time Is on My Side/Little Red Rooster
The Rolling Stones:
Mick Jagger – harmonica, lead vocals, percussion
Brian Jones – rhythm guitar, slide guitar, harmonica, percussion, appalachian dulcimer, sitar, organ, backing vocals, keyboard
Keith Richards – lead guitar, backing vocals
Charlie Watts – drums and percussion
Bill Wyman – bass guitar, keyboards, percussion, backing vocals
Additional personnel:
Jack Nitzsche – percussion, keyboards
Phil Spector – percussion
Ian Stewart – keyboards
