Here's something that I posted before but seems to keep disappearing. It's a brilliant breakdown of the individual tracks from The Rolling Stones seminal "Gimme Shelter," one of my all-time favorite songs just in terms of shear passion.
I've posted isolated tracks from this song before but the difference in this video is that most of the individual elements are broken out and soloed in combinations during the song.
The video labels some of the parts incorrectly, but that really doesn't matter as it's fun to hear any of the parts by themselves. Here are some things to listen for:
1. The vocals really have a lot of reverb on them, although it all disappears in the final mix (which you never hear in its entirety on this video).
2. Keith Richard's lead guitar plays through most of the song. You don't hear it in the final mix because it's either lowered or muted. He's also playing out of the pocket in the intro, not that it ever bothered anyone.
3. As the elements are soloed, listen for both the harp (harmonica) and the piano, which are somewhat buried in the final mix.
4. Merry Clayton's solo bridge vocal is still spine-tinglingly excellent all these years later. The fact that her voice breaks just adds to the passion (but it's something we probably wouldn't leave in the track today, unfortunately).
One of the more iconic songs of the last century is "Satisfaction" by The Rolling Stones. Every guitar player learns the famous Keith Richards lick when learning how to play, and every garage band plays the song sometime during their career.
The problem is that it's never played quite right since the arrangement is difficult to hear through a distorted final mix.
Today's isolated track is a real treat in that it features the very clean instrumental-only track of "Satisfaction" where you'll hear some things you probably never noticed before.
The instrumentation includes Keith Richards on electric guitar, Brian Jones on acoustic, Bill Wyman on bass, Charlie Watts on drums, and arranger Jack Nitzsche on piano and tambourine. Here's what to listen for:
1. The acoustic rhythm guitar really pushes the song along. In the final mix it blends into the track but the song would have a much different feel if it wasn't there.
2. Speaking of blending in, the piano also fills out the rhythm section and is pretty imperceptible on the final mix. You can hear it best on the verses.
3. Listen to what happens during the drum breakdown. Charlie Watts continues to play the same beat as he did in the rest of the song while the signature rhythm hook is played by the tambourine (which is also played during the rest of the song). The number of cover bands that get this right is about zero, although maybe the way we think we hear it is the way it should have been played in the first place.
4. Listen to high tight the band is. The timing is excellent, a trait that would get sloppier as the years went on.
Here's a brilliant breakdown of the individual tracks from The Rolling Stones seminal "Gimme Shelter." I've posted isolated tracks from this song before, but they usually end up getting taken down by the record label, so check this one out while you can.
The difference in this video is that most of the individual elements are broken out and are soloed in combinations during the song. The video labels some of the parts incorrectly, but that really doesn't matter as it's fun to hear any of the parts by themselves. Here are some things to listen for:
1. The vocals really have a lot of reverb on them, although it all disappears in the final mix (which you never hear on this video).
2. Keith Richard's lead guitar plays through most of the song. You don't hear it in the final mix because it's either lowered or muted. He's also playing out of the pocket in the intro, not that it ever bothered anyone.
3. As the elements are soloed, listen for both the harp (harmonica) and the piano, which are somewhat buried in the final mix.
Here's a great piece of history in a behind the scenes look at Mick Jagger and Keith Richards of the Rolling Stone's (along with piano player Ian Stewart) mixing "Little Queenie," a single they released from their 1969 live album Get Your Ya Ya's Out.
You'll see a good example of the way mixing was done before automation, with multiple hands on the board, each with a different move to do. The engineer is the esteemed Glyn Johns, but you also see his brother Andy at the console (which looks like a Helios) as well.
Check out the sound that the tape made as it rewinds, something that was later fixed on next generation machines. It's 8 track, of course.
Here's an short interesting video interview excerpt with Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards where he gives advice about playing in time. I'm not so sure I'm down with the advice, since the Stones and Keith aren't the tightest players in the first place, and Keef doesn't exactly explain himself well, but this is the first video I've seen where he comes off as genuine, without any of the usual snarky attitude. He is right about playing with a great drummer though.
1. On the night of the infamous 1967 Redlands drug bust, Keef was so far gone on LSD that when the police arrived at his Sussex country mansion, he mistook them for uniformed dwarves, welcoming them in with open arms. 3. He once nearly burned down the Playboy Mansion (in his words: "basically it's a whorehouse"). At a party in the 1970s, he and sax player Bobby Keys accidentally set fire to a bathroom while playing "smörgåsbord" with their doctor's drugs. When staff finally broke down the door to put out the fire, a drugged-up Keef, oblivious to the flames, asked: "How dare you burst in on our private affair?" 6. Jumping Jack Flash was actually Keef's gardener at Redlands, Jack Dyer. The inspiration for the song came when the stomping of Jack's rubber boots woke Jagger from a hazy drug-induced sleep. The front man then appended the word "Flash" to the nickname Jumping Jack, the two riffed on the gardener's rural childhood, and a hit was born.
Here's a song that we've visited before but never as a full song analysis. It's The Rolling Stones seminal "Gimme Shelter," the opening track from the 1969 release "Let It Bleed" which was a huge world-wide hit at the time.
The song was originally recorded at Olympic Studio in London with drummer Charlie Watts, bassist Bill Wyman, producer Jimmy Miller on guiro (a hand-held Latin percussion instrument), pianist Nicky Hopkins, and guitarist Keith Richards on the basic track where Richards sang a scratch vocal track. The song was later finished at Sunset Sound in Hollywood with the addition of Mick Jagger's lead vocals and harmonica and Merry Clayton's soaring harmony vocals. Stone's guitarist Brian Jones, who was still in the band at this point, was absent from the sessions.
The addition of Clayton was a spur-of-the-moment idea from producer Miller, who called in Clayton, who was still in curlers in the middle of the night. Upon returning home, she suffered a miscarriage due to her strenuous vocal performance.
"Gimme Shelter" was never released as a single, but it's been a big part of the Stones set in concert and has been used in dozens of movies and television shows, as well as covered by a host of artists.
The movie at the end has most of the parts isolated so that you can hear what they're playing and what they sound like, followed by the album mix version.
The Song
"Gimme Shelter" is interesting from a songwriting standpoint in that it mostly revolves around a single 3 chord pattern that repeats over and over, except for the verse, which stays on the first chord of the pattern. The form looks like this:
Intro, Verse, Chorus, Interlude, Verse Chorus, Solo (Verse and Chorus), Bridge (Chorus), Verse, Chorus, Chorus, Outro
The solo is over a verse and chorus, with the harmonica taking the verse and the lead guitar taking the chorus. The bridge is actually just a change in the energy thanks to the solo vocal by Clayton, which is also over a chorus.
The Arrangement
The arrangement of "Gimme Shelter" seems like there wasn't much thought given to it except for the intro in terms of song dynamics, but it still works out well.
The intro begins with a tremolo rhythm guitar followed by two tom hits (boy, do they sound good), after which Watts plays the hat against the guiro on the 2nd time through the patter. That's where the doubled "Ooo's" enter, as does the lead guitar playing fills. The 3rd time the pattern plays, the kick and bass enter very softly, then the bass enters playing the pedal of the key of the song (C#) at full volume over the 4rth repeat of the pattern. On the 5th time around, the piano enters, also playing a pedal note on both the left and right hands, while the bass alters it's pattern just a bit, sliding up from the flat 7th. The 6th time is when Watts enters with the beat and the bass begins to follow the chord pattern.
On the verse, a second rhythm guitar enters, but without the tremolo, and the piano drops out or is decreased in level so it's barely perceptible. The first and second verses and choruses are basically the same, with Clayton's harmony and Richard's lead guitar fills entering in the choruses.
Maracas enter at the harmonica part of the solo at about 2:00, while a guitar solo plays underneath. It's then featured during the chorus part of the solo. The chorus continues with Clayton's solo vocal part entering. Later in the song, a 3rd vocal harmony (presumably sung by Richards) also enters on the chorus.
At the end of the solo, the harmonica comes back for brief interlude, then the piano enters for the last verse and Clayton adds harmony to the end of Jagger's vocal phrases. The outro after the vocals features dueling solos between harmonica and lead guitar.
* The Foundation: bass, drums
* The Rhythm: guiro, maracas, rhythm guitar, piano
* The Pad: none
* The Lead: lead vocals, lead guitar
* The Fills: lead guitar
The Sound
As you'd expect, the sound of the drums is very 60's, as it's surrounded by a lot of room ambience as the kit was probably miked with only a couple of mics. If you listen to the isolated drum track, you can hear the rhythm guitar leakage, which leads you to believe that the basic tracks might have been only drums, rhythm guitar, percussion and vocals.
One thing that jumps out is how thick and long the reverb on the vocal track is. The verb is delayed so it stays out of way of the lead vocal a bit, but there's a lot more of it than there seems to be on the final mix. Also, notice how low the vocals sit in the mix.
Another thing that's interesting to hear is how distorted everything is, especially Merry Clayton's solo when she begins to belt it out.
The Production
You always hear stories about what a light hitter drummer Charlie Watts is (he's been known to go years between snare drum heads), but that's not true in this song and he leans into it with some muscle. His performance is very solid with great tempo, especially during the fills. Many drummers have great time except when it comes to fills, but that's not the case here.
The percussion provides movement to the arrangement that's subtle but very real and really pushes the song along. This is a Jimmy Miller trademark and it's used a lot by the Stones during this period.
There are a number of "mistakes" that probably wouldn't have been kept had the song been made today, like the last note of the lead guitar fill right as the vocal enters in the first verse (it's a bit late), or Merry Clayton's voice cracking during her vocal solo in the bridge. Actually, the crack really makes it seem a lot more human and paints the emotion better, but I bet most producer's today would never let it go by and have it fixed.
Another thing to listen for is how loose the bass and drums are. Back in the days when the song was made, bands never concentrated on being tight the way we do today, going instead for feel. "Tightness" as we know it today is a concept that's been refined over time since then. As you listen to the isolated tracks, notice that the bass and drums don't always line up, but they never loose the feel.
Clayton's vocal solo in the bridge is a great example of natural dynamics in a song where the performance itself is the dynamic factor. Her vocal is set up to stand out following the guitar solo, and it probably wouldn't have seemed as intense had it been after a vocal chorus, which illustrates perfectly how important the arrangement is in the production of a song.
Here's something that I posted before but seems to keep disappearing. It's a brilliant breakdown of the individual tracks from The Rolling Stones seminal "Gimme Shelter," one of my all-time favorite songs just in terms of shear passion.
which was a huge world-wide hit at the time.