The Rolling Stones Look What We've Done

As Brian Jones' time with the Stones (and with the rest of this world) was drawing to a close, the band was becoming both more progressive in its conception and more adept in its musicianship. Though the studio recordings from this golden period are impeccable, nowhere is the band's growth more evident than on GOT LIVE IF YOU WANT IT. Recorded by Glyn Johns at London's Royal Albert Hall, this album shows the Stones as a powerful live unit, now capable of subtle emotional shadings as well as rock & roll raveups…

A live document of the Brian Jones-era Rolling Stones sounds enticing, but the actual product is a letdown, owing to a mixture of factors, some beyond the producers' control and other very much their doing. The sound on the original LP was lousy – which was par for the course on most mid-'60s live rock albums – and the remasterings have only improved it marginally, and for that matter not all of it's live; a couple of old studio R&B covers were augmented by screaming fans that had obviously been overdubbed…

Heavily bootlegged over the years, the Rolling Stones' BBC sessions from the '60s didn't see official release until 2017, when Universal put out On Air as both a single-disc and double-disc set. The Stones first entered a BBC studio in October 1963 when they were peddling their debut single, "Come On," and their last session arrived in September 1965, just after releasing "Get Off of My Cloud" as the sequel to the smash "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction." During these three years, the Stones racked up several number one hits in the U.K., but Mick Jagger and Keith Richards didn't start writing in earnest until 1965, which means On Air winds up drawing a portrait of the Stones as a working covers band…

ROLLING STONES Greatest Albums In The Sixties (2008 Japanese Universal promotional-only 6" x 8" 8-page fold-out booklet, advertising the incredible 17-disc SHM-CD/paper sleeve box set; contains detailed info and tracklisting for each included album [with full colour image], plus full colour images of the additional empty paper sleeves included in the set, reproducing the group's original 60s Japanese albums - a unique collectible!)