This has to be Brian playing that plucked chord solo, as it doesn't sound at all like Keith Richards from that time (or any other time). If I'm not mistaken, this would make it Brian's only standard, non-slide guitar solo ever. It was pretty good and makes me wonder why Brian didn't play anymore solos after that.

I've always thought that had to be Brian too.

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From4tilLate
I've always thought that had to be Brian too.

Yeah, I've always thought it was Brian as he liked to pluck chords ala Time Is On My Side, If You Need Me, etc. The interesting question is why would it prove to be his first and last standard guitar solo? It was a really nice solo and one would think there would have been many more to follow. Perhaps there was an agreement between Brian and Keith about guitar duties, with Brian handling slide solos and Keith standard guitar ones.

I think there might have been such an agreement in the begining. But Keith was the stronger guitar player of the two so naturally he took the role as a lead guitarist.

i think that is keith richards playing that solo.

It's Keith

Brian does not play guitar on Tell Me, he plays the tambourine. Keith plays the electric guitar and the acoustic 12-string.

Mathijs

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Mathijs
Brian does not play guitar on Tell Me, he plays the tambourine. Keith plays the electric guitar and the acoustic 12-string.

Mathijs

let's get it right--it's the slide tambourine he's playing.

Sliding Brian and his bottleneck pipes alive at the Joujouka stadium playing selections from their latest smash LP:
"Mellotron and flute party"

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Mathijs
Brian does not play guitar on Tell Me, he plays the tambourine. Keith plays the electric guitar and the acoustic 12-string.

Mathijs

What are you sources?

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neptune

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Mathijs
Brian does not play guitar on Tell Me, he plays the tambourine. Keith plays the electric guitar and the acoustic 12-string.

Mathijs

What are you sources?

1. My ears. The acoustic is just very much Keith. Compare it to Good Times, Bad Times from the same sesssion for example.
2. [www.nzentgraf.de]
3. [www.timeisonourside.com]
4. Mick and Keith:

Tell Me, which was pulled out as a single in America,... was a dub. Half those records were dubs on that first album, that Mick and I and Charlie and I'd put a bass on or maybe Bill was there and he'd put a bass on. Let's put it down while we remember it and the next thing we know is, Oh look, track 8 is that dub we did a couple months ago. That's how little control we had.

- Keith Richards, 1971

I (played the acoustic). I was a proud owner of a 12-string at the time. Actually, I had two: a Harmony and a Guild. The Guild was very nice.

- Keith Richards, 1977

Keith was playing 12-string and singing harmonies into the same microphone as the 12-string. We recorded it in this tiny studio in the West End of London called Regent Sound, which was a demo studio. I think the whole of that album was recorded in there. But it's very different from doing those R&B covers or Marvin Gaye covers and all that. There's a definite feel about it. It's a very POP song, as opposed to all the blues covers and the Motown covers, which everyone did at the time.

- Mick Jagger, 1995

I'm talking about the electric guitar, Mathijs. Yes, Keith plays the acoustic, but the electric (+ electric solo)? As you've just shown with all the quotes, nowhere does Keith admit to playing the electric guitar on this song. If he did, one would think he would have stated that he played ALL the guitar parts. He just states that he played the 12-string acoustic. Mick verifies that with his own recollection of the recording. So, who played the electric guitar and the solo? The electric sounds like many of Brian's Chuck Berry rhythm chops on dozens of tracks (ie. Route 66, Around and Around, Confessin the Blues, Carol,etc.). The solo, as I've noted before, sounds like nothing Keith ever did. If anything, the solo sounds more like what Brian played on If You Need Me, TIOMS, just plucked chords.

One more thing that convinces me that Brian played the solo on Tell Me is this: the released version for radio play didn't contain the solo. It was cut out to shorten the song. ALO was behind that decision for commercial purposes obviously, but I believe it would have been different if Keith played the solo. ALO, I think, would not have cut out that solo if Keith, his boy, had played it. But since Brian, who ALO loathed, played it, the solo was taken out.

I ordinarily trust Mathijs implicitly but wasn't the first record cut live to two-track? How could it NOT be Brian on the lead guitar?

Doesn't it say Brian played the electric in Bill's Stone Alone?

I have no problem accepting Brian may have played the electric on Tell Me, it's hardly the most difficult of parts and the solo itself is merely picking out the chords.

Would the tambourine have been done by Charlie?

talking about stones' early solos....
, who played the solo on "Heart of stone" ?
it is very good considering the inexperience of the stones at the time..?
some hired hand ?

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6853
talking about stones' early solos....
, who played the solo on "Heart of stone" ?
it is very good considering the inexperience of the stones at the time..?
some hired hand ?

Keith spoke about this in a Guitar Player mag special issue on Jimmy Page. The song was originally done as a demo to pitch to other artists. The stones weren't the backing musicians, but Mick was on vocals and Jimmy Page played guitar. The lead is Jimmy's composition and Keith was knocked out by it and faithfully learned it note-for-note, playing it that way when the Stones themselves recorded it later.

The solo on the released version of HOS was played by Keith. The version meant for sale (later released on Metamorphosis) to other artists was played by Jimmy Page.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2009-12-20 00:04 by DandelionPowderman.

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neptune
I'm talking about the electric guitar, Mathijs. Yes, Keith plays the acoustic, but the electric (+ electric solo)? As you've just shown with all the quotes, nowhere does Keith admit to playing the electric guitar on this song. If he did, one would think he would have stated that he played ALL the guitar parts. He just states that he played the 12-string acoustic. Mick verifies that with his own recollection of the recording. So, who played the electric guitar and the solo? The electric sounds like many of Brian's Chuck Berry rhythm chops on dozens of tracks (ie. Route 66, Around and Around, Confessin the Blues, Carol,etc.). The solo, as I've noted before, sounds like nothing Keith ever did. If anything, the solo sounds more like what Brian played on If You Need Me, TIOMS, just plucked chords.

You have a point here, nowhere it is stated whom plays the electric. Listening back to it there aren't many markers indicating Keith nor Jones, but I agree the picking (and the dry tone) would fit Brian better than Keith.

Mathijs

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neptune
One more thing that convinces me that Brian played the solo on Tell Me is this: the released version for radio play didn't contain the solo. It was cut out to shorten the song. ALO was behind that decision for commercial purposes obviously, but I believe it would have been different if Keith played the solo. ALO, I think, would not have cut out that solo if Keith, his boy, had played it. But since Brian, who ALO loathed, played it, the solo was taken out.

I sincerly doubt that by late 63 and early 64 these kind of powergames where in to play, and that any of the Stones had any power over their music and songs. By '67 or '68 yes, but not before. As Keith states, they even released it without him knowing it, which happened to a lot of music at that time. And I am not aware of any attempt by Oldham to remove Jones from music or sessions. He hated the guy, yes, but he knew very well that the Jones was a very important part to the Stones.

Mathijs

i am not any closer..


ok i hava got a EP (?) i.e. small record one song on each side, hos and what a shame in a paper sleave. my que still is who played the solo on HOS ?

christmas greetings
6853

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Neptune
This has to be Brian playing that plucked chord solo, as it doesn't sound at all like Keith Richards from that time (or any other time).

Absolutely. It's totally different to Keith's solos like on Time Is On My Side, It's All Over Now, Heart Of Stone, to name just a few. More based on the harmonic structure and much better in time keeping, especially compared to TIOMS, and, yes, less wilder. To put it a bit sarcastic, Keith more or less used to play the same solo on all these and other songs.

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tonterapi
Keith was the stronger guitar player of the two

Not by conventional standards like timekeeping, playing in tune, playing fluently, playing diverse. He certainly was the player who was more passionate about the instrument, and over the years, from 1968 on, he developed his own, unique playing style.

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tonterapi
so naturally he took the role as a lead guitarist.

Just the opposite: because of Keith's severe rhythmic insecurities Brian's role as rhythm guitarist was crucial. Just take Off The Hook from the TAMI show (late 1964): while Keith is (as almost at every concert at least on one song) messing up his solo (really not the hardest one in the world), Brian provides the sharp rhythm without compromise: not only effective, but essential. Not the hardest part as well, but in contrast to Keith Brian gets it done - an important difference in performing. Imagine this would have been played without Brian: it would have been disastrous (just like the first concert without Brian as a bandmember, the Hyde Park show). This might explain why Keith has this trauma about Brian missing gigs, just as it happened later on that same Oct./Nov. 1964 tour of the US for exactly four dates.
But not just on shows, even on recordings the importance of Brian's rhythm is evident: on I Just Wanna Make Love To You he plays another lead instrument, harmonica, and it all gets pretty shaky (not Brian, he plays flawless as always, the band and especially Keith is). On You Can't Catch Me, with Keith playing a surprisingly simular part to IJWMLTY and Brian providing a dead solid rhythm guitar, it works fantastic. It doesn't work on TIOMS (especially on the first, the Chess version) when Brian did sort of a plucking leadguitar himself, it works perfectly on It's All Over Now and other tracks. Don't forget, at this stage Bill and especially Charlie had still some problems being tight (ehmm, Good Times, Bad Times, a year later I'm Free) and I seriously believe that the Stones at that stage would have been just not good enough for the business without Brian's heavily needed musical professionalism. (Just as an off topic here: right, Brian was not a virtuoso, but dead solid on any instrument. His genius was the ability to combine different sounds in a way no one else would ever do: always surprising, though often simple sounding in the end. Another quality was just that: to make things sound simple, alhough they weren't. Check the The Last Time riff: much more complex than the riffs for Satisfacion or Get Off Of My Cloud, but almost as effective. A good chance to hear some music Brian plays more than half the sounds on - and conducted the rest of it - is here:

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Mathijs
Brian does not play guitar on Tell Me, he plays the tambourine. Keith plays the electric guitar and the acoustic 12-string.

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Neptune
What are you sources?

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Mathijs
My ears.

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Mathijs
You have a point here, nowhere it is stated whom plays the electric. Listening back to it there aren't many markers indicating Keith nor Jones, but I agree the picking (and the dry tone) would fit Brian better than Keith.

I was confronted with Mathijs ears and other ideas of his before, so the poor outcome of the bold statement it was Keith on electic guitar on TM couldn't surprise me much. Once he claimed his guitar students could learn Brian's slide on Little Red Rooster on their very first day, at another time he claimed a picture from the Aftermath sessions of Keith playing acoustic guitar would prove Keith plays it on Satisfation. I realized Mathijs lives in a complete fact-free world, and he proved it again with impressive ease!

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Neptune
One more thing that convinces me that Brian played the solo on Tell Me is this: the released version for radio play didn't contain the solo. It was cut out to shorten the song. ALO was behind that decision for commercial purposes obviously, but I believe it would have been different if Keith played the solo. ALO, I think, would not have cut out that solo if Keith, his boy, had played it. But since Brian, who ALO loathed, played it, the solo was taken out.

As much as I think you are spot on on the other things here, I believe this is a bit paranoid. I don't think there was any other reason for dropping the solo than the length of the song that had to be reduced for the single release. Don't forget, the Stones' previous US-singles more or less failed and TM wasn't as strong as the Animals' House Of Th Rising Sun, so the Stones had good reasons to keep this track under three minutes.

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From4tilLate
wasn't the first record cut live to two-track?

All sources I know say so. Maybe they had three tracks (while cutting the tracks of a two-track machine to one track of a second two-track machine, the second track of the latter could be used for further recordings. Abbey Road definitely had at least two two-tracks at least in one of its studios in 1962/63 and was already equipped with four track machines in early 1964; if Regent Sound had two tape machines: I don't know, but I guess not). However, I seriously doubt the Stones overdubbed any guitar for their first album. If they overdubbed anything, then probably vocals, percussions or harmonicas. My take.

His Majesty:

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His Majesty
Doesn't it say Brian played the electric in Bill's Stone Alone?

No.

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His Majesty
I have no problem accepting Brian may have played the electric on Tell Me, it's hardly the most difficult of parts and the solo itself is merely picking out the chords.

I don't know where the idea comes from that Brian could only play "hardly the most difficult of parts". Certainly not from reality. Leadparts like on Mona or The Last Time (the riff) are technically much harder to play than anything Keith played at the time. The other thing that speaks for Brian is that he, in contrast to Keith, usually was able to play the parts he picked. This is well documented on many studio or live recordings. Nevertheless,if you present me a solid list of Brian messing up parts, you are welcome. If not you should seriously consider to be more careful in your judgement.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 2009-12-28 07:06 by Mock Jogger.

<I seriously believe that the Stones at that stage would have been just not good enough for the business without Brian's heavily needed musical professionalism.>

Brian's wasn't about musical professionalism at all. He explored new instruments and used them in a brilliant minimalistic way. His guitar playing was quite shaky, but he had a good sense of timing. It's called knowing your limitations, not musical professionalism, imo. That's why all of the Stones are so good, and the reason why they are the world's greatest rock'n'roll band...

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Mock Jogger

I don't know where the idea comes from that Brian could only play "hardly the most difficult of parts". Certainly not from reality. Leadparts like on Mona or The Last Time (the riff) are technically much harder to play than anything Keith played at the time.

If you would have played guitar you would have known what an utter crap this remark, and most of your post, is.

Mathijs



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2009-12-28 21:41 by Mathijs.

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Mock Jogger

Leadparts like on Mona or The Last Time (the riff) are technically much harder to play than anything Keith played at the time.

Utter nonsense!

Regarding Regent Sound, circa 1963/64 they had(at the very least) a 2 track Revox.

About Keith calling Tell Me "a dub":
Maybe he heard the very first pressing of the LP that had the early take of Tell Me?

I`ll join those who think Keith plays acoustic and Brian electric on the finished version.

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DandelionPowderman
His guitar playing was quite shaky, but he had a good sense of timing. It's called knowing your limitations, not musical professionalism, imo.

Can you please explain how Brian's guitar playing is shaky? Can you provide any specific examples to back up your claim?

Mock Jagger, I have to agree with almost everything you said, particularly the part about Brian's live playing. In almost all live footage of Brian playing guitar, he doesn't make many mistakes. He makes LRR on Ed Sullivan look way too easy- he's smiling and posing for the cameras while playing at the same time! During the '65 NME performance of the Last Time, Brian's playing the signature riff perfectly, all the while having a conversation with Bill. I think the problem is this perception among many people here that Brian's parts were simple. And in making that judgement, Brian's guitar abilities are generally dismissed by many on this site as 'mediocre' or 'shaky'. The mistake in making such judgements, I believe, is basing them on the criterion of playing guitar in 2009. In 1964 and 1965, guitar playing in rock, blues, and folk was rather simple. Even Eric Clapton and Jeff Beck's playing in the Yardbirds up until 1965 was simple in comparison to today's standards. Thus, I think such judgements about Brian's playing are unfair and 'shaky' at best . . .