Review: Vinyl Reissues of 4 Rolling Stones LPs

When the Rolling Stones' sixties albums made their first appearance on digitally remastered CDs in the mid-eighties, ABKCO made the fairly controversial decision to issue them in their American iterations rather than the UK originals. At the same time, the label also issued these American versions on vinyl.

That was 37 years ago. Since then, the UK albums have become the standard in the US during the current vinyl resurgence, although most of the American albums were included on ABKCO's Rolling Stones in Mono box set from 2016. Long story short, ABKCO recently began reissuing each of the American albums in the U.S. as standalone vinyl releases for the first time since 1986. Some of these LPs, such as Aftermath, Between the Buttons, and Flowers, have not been issued in the states on stereo vinyl in any way since 1986. The campaign also includes a few UK records that have never been given standard (i.e.: non-RSD or non-box set) releases in the States before.

Although the American albums may seem like abominations to folks across the pond who are used to hearing "Mother's Little Helper" kick off Aftermath, hearing an Aftermath that begins with "Paint It Black" or a Between the Buttons that starts with "Let's Spend the Night Together" will certainly stir some seriously fond memories for many a Yank. And these records have appeal aside from nostalgia. Aftermath became a more concise record in the U.S., not necessarily preferable to its more expansive UK counterpart, but punchier and better programmed. "Paint It Black" is a more dynamic opening cut than "Mother's Little Helper", and the epic "Goin' Home" is a more dramatic closer than the mediocre "What to Do" was on the UK one. 

And for those who couldn't live without "Mother's Little Helper", it did reappear with two of the other tracks pruned from the UK Aftermath on the Summer of '67 compilation Flowers. Along with "Mother's Little Helper", "Take It Or Leave It", and "Out of Time" (which lost two minutes in its transatlantic trip), were a few singles, two leftovers from Between the Buttons, and several outtakes available nowhere else. The decision to include a dated and limp cover of The Temptations' "My Girl" wasn't Andrew Oldham's wisest, nor was the repetition of three tracks that had already appeared on American LPs when there was plenty of uncompiled material to choose from (how about "Sad Day" or "Who's Driving Your Plane?" or "Long Long While"?). However, the elegant Aftermath outtakes "Sittin' on a Fence" and "Ride On Baby" were both tremendous, as good as any tracks that made the final line-up of Aftermath and better than quite a few.

Flowers and the American Aftermath are among the first LPs ABKCO is releasing in this new campaign. Both are in stereo, though "Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby, Standing in the Shadow?", which was released in fake stereo on the original Flowers, appears in mono on this latest release, and we should all be grateful for that since fake stereo is terrible. Sadly, the other mother issued in fake stereo on the original album is in its lousy original stereo mix on the new reissue of Flowers. ABKCO's 2002 SACD used the mono mix, which would have been the preferable choice here too, both because mono is closer in spirit to the original's fake stereo and because the mono mix is the ideal way to hear "Mother's Little Helper."

The current slate also includes the releases of both the U.S. and UK versions of the Big Hits (High Tide and Green Grass) compilations from 1966, but since these were originally only released in mono or fake stereo, ABKCO has smartly decided to go the all-mono route even though several tracks ("It's All Over Now", "Satisfaction", "Lady Jane", "Paint It Black", "Heart of Stone") do exist in proper stereo. While the UK comp offers more songs released over a wider span of time, I prefer the more focused track line-up of the U.S. version, which doesn't waste time with a failed Mersey-beat cover of Chuck Berry's "Come On" and leaves the more progressive stuff like "Paint It Black" and "Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby" to Big Hits volume two (nevertheless, it's probably stupid to complain too much about any comp that includes two of the Stones' finest singles). 

Both reissues include that compressed alternate mix of "19th Nervous Breakdown" with louder vocals and less distorted lead guitar that ABKCO has standardized since its first appearance on The Rolling Stones in Mono. Both feature the fab full-color booklet of photos that was originally intended to be included in Aftermath when it was still going by the charming title Could You Walk on Water. The printing is very dark compared to that of the booklets in the original releases.

All four pieces of vinyl are nicely pressed. The vinyl is uniformly flat with well-centered spindle holes. ABKCO's recent Stones vinyl reissues have tended to be mastered on the quiet side, and this remains true of Aftermath and the Big Hits discs, though Flowers compares well with my original copy on London Records. Quiet mastering tends to allow the sound of the stylus grinding on the vinyl to come through the speakers more, but if you have a mono switch on your system, it really takes care of that issue on the two mono compilations. They sound great on my system. The vinyl itself is generally very quiet across all four records; aside from a few light ticks on the UK Big Hits, there's no noise or inner groove distortion to speak of.