Any Brian Jones love here?

and scary...

 

that's comforting. : )

 

Tell that to the top reviewer at All Music:

"The principal riff of "Paint It Black" (almost all classic Rolling Stones songs are highlighted by a killer riff) was played on a sitar by Brian Jones and qualifies as perhaps the most effective use of the Indian instrument in a rock song. The exotic twang was a perfect match for the dark, mysterious Eastern-Indian melody, which sounded a little like a soundtrack to an Indian movie hijacked into hyperdrive."

and

"We Love You": "Such typically post-Sgt. Peppers flourishes as Mellotron string parts, flutes, and brass punctuation, all played by resident musical prodigy Brian Jones."

 

Purely subjective, and hyperbolic nonsense. And even more hyperbolic to assign it to "top reviewer, as if All Music is even a credible source.

 

Most of the tapes in the music room at Cotchford disappeared soon after Brian drowned there (maybe even before they started burning his clothes). I've often wondered if there were any Degree Of Murder sessions in among them? Last I heard of there was no known master tapes and fans have been circulating what music they could pull off a copy of the film.

I thought I had heard a tape of Brian singing an original a song My Little One at a session with Jimi Hendrix, but I guess it was Noel Redding after all.

 

I said the top reviewer AT All Music. But, hey, I'm used to being attacked for quoting widely quoted sources.

These threads are all subjective, which I guess you never noticed before.

 

Brian's 'nice little melodies' and riffs made many a Stones song, and is what most later Jagger-Richards numbers lacked, and there were some good ones but many start to become almost indistinguishable from each other. IMO. YMMV.

Who taught Jagger a lot about how to blow harp and Richards a few things about the guitar (and hedonism 101)? He was ahead of them both at the start, except maybe about appreciating Chuck Berry.

 

But what's really silly is you were using it to bolster an argument, in regard to his instrumental virtuosity, in comparison to an artist on the level of Hendrix.
Jones is merely plucking a simple, rudimentary melody, chasing a trend already established. Absolutely nothing innovative about it.

 

I have nothing but respect for Brian Jones. A truly unique musician and obviously a very important figure in regards to the history of The Rolling Stones.

That said, I don’t believe he was at all the best, most interesting, or most important part of the band aside from during the first couple years. I always maintained the belief that, under Brian’s leadership, they made for a good blues cover band. Under the leadership of Jagger and Richards, they became arguably the greatest rock band of all time.

I think Brian deserves nothing but praise for what he did and brought to the band, but I don’t believe that praise should come at the expense of Mick and Keith, as is often the case. After all, many of Brian’s best moments were adding exotic instrumets and sounds to primarily Jagger/Richards material; I can’t imagine him adding sitar or mellotron to Muddy Waters or Jimmy Reed covers.

 

I will tell that reviewer at Allmusic that those colorations were good but we are hardly talking about the same level of musicianship and imagination that produced works such as "Machine Gun" or "1983, A Merman I Should Turn To Be".
Brian's work on "We Love You" was terrific but I don't think the sitar on "Paint It Black" (one of my favourite Stones' songs) is really jaw dropping (which was my point). I mean: "doing doing doing doing....".

 

A Decca album with great Brian Jones contributions I find is
Thru The Past Darkly original octangal Lp is still pretty cheap.

 

No idea what happened to the Degree Of Murder tapes. I contacted ABKCO earlier in the year to ask whether they would consider releasing a Degree Of Murder set and they were kind enough to reply a few days later stating that they did not have any of the tapes relating to this film. I would imagine the next best bet would be the film company, producers or director. I don't think the film has had or is likely to have a re-release that would justify the kind of research needed in this area by a company such as Criterion. It's not like it's at the level of an Orson Welles film but I would very much like to hear the soundtrack tapes as they are the only substantial independent-of-the-Stones example we have of Brian's talents.

 

I may be wrong but isn't there only the one Mellotron part played by Brian on We Love You - isn't it just one of the Mixed Brass settings on the 'Tron. I don't hear any strings or flutes. He does the fab stuttering part during the main body of the song and the little "Arabian / Floyd Turkish Delight" lines near the end doesn't he with a couple of little runs during the middle bit ?
Anyone else hearing string and flute parts or just the "top reviewer at All Music" ?

 

Those tapes may lie in a box somewhere in europe, but anyway, I don't think it would do Jones justice to release them.
It was typical sixties whimpey film music. Nothing unique about it. On the other hand, The Stones were kind enough to release the recordings he made of eastern music on Rolling Stones Records.

 

Okay, I guess you're right, and the music critics at All Music are wrong.

Yeah, I questioned that too when I read it, but I just posted the whole quote as it appears AllMusic's review of "We Love You". The "top reviewer" part of my post refers to Richie Unterberger's review of "Paint It Black", sorry for the confusion.

 

I guess I like whimpey film music then, Pink Floyd's 'More' being a favorite. Given the big names who performed on the Degree Of Murder sessions there are a lot of people interested besides Jones' fans. What I have heard taken from the finished film makes me want to hear more.

 

In Rolling Stone issue #1171, Jimmy Page talks about working on the soundtrack."Brian knew what he was doing. It was quite beautiful. Some of it was made up at the time; some of it was stuff I was augmenting with him. I was definitely playing with the violin bow. Brian had this guitar that had a volume pedal-he could get gunshots with it. There was a Mellotron there. He was moving forward with ideas."

The musicians were:
Brian Jones: sitar, organ, acoustic guitar, recorder, Mellotron, dulcimer, harmonica
Jimmy Page: guitars
Nicky Hopkins: piano
Kenney Jones: drums
Glyn Johns: engineering
Peter Gosling: vocals (on one song)
Mike Leander: orchestra

 

RSD instant purchase from me.
Hey! But I'm a advocate for the threads subject matter.

 

This is said with the highest possible respect for Brian Jones' musical diversity, but it's very obvious judged from the soundtrack, that he is not a composer. Pink Floyd's More is in different league by main songwriters.

 

Wimpy? Definitely not a composer? The soundtrack is a catalog of various music genres (rock, country, eastern sitar, blues) performed convincingly, with Jimmy Page and Nicky Hopkins yet. The soundtrack has always been praised, even Keith called the rock part "pretty good".

It's ridiculous to call Brian "a big jerk"; he was looked up to throughout the 60s rock community on both sides of the Atlantic. His friends included the Beatles, Dylan, the Kinks, Eric Burdon, Pete Townshend, the Small Faces, the Byrds, Sonny and Cher, John Phillips, Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix, the list is endless... except the two guys who expected him to help create their music without credit.

 

Hear, hear! (Also, not excusing it but we really don't want to get into our favorite performers' treatment of women, do we? I'm sure we all know that some board faves are ahem...)

 

It's just one continuous take of a mellotron played by Brian using the mixed brass sound.

 

Ignorance.

Unfortunately there's no mellotron in the music heard in the film.

 

Jack Nitzsche told that story and it relates to the November 1968 sessions for what became LIB.

 

Is it not in Jean -Luc Godard's "one+one"?