Because Brian has been dead for over 40 years now we'll never know what really went down but one thing that was plain to see that is plain to see that mickschix alluded to above is Brian was painful to watch in the R&R Circus and did not contribute much to thatendeavor. The whole thing is sad really. This band has certainly had a tumultuous and fascinating ride and the demise of Brian is one of the saddest parts of the story and most of what happened to him seemed to be brought on by himself. Bill and Charlie who don't usually have much to say have stated he was great in one way and such an a-hole in another. I don't think he gets his due nowadays and let's remember Mick, Keith and Brian all had or have their own deomons.

yes, sad events & doesn't get his due.

This songwriting envy thing was/is in a lot of bands.

CCR and John Fogerty's songs which eventually broke up the band which started with John's brother leaving.

Eagles and the Henley/Frey songs and Felder and maybe Leadon etc.

(Felder tells everyone how Hotel California came from him but basically he just ripped off and altered an old Tull tune, not much songwriting in that.)

Even the Police and Stings songs,

Brian was just another one.

If Mick and Keith hadn't had the guts to pursue songwriting then the Stones and Brian would have just settled down into a mostly forgotton Blues cover band.

Without the songs, the Stones would not be the Stones everybody knows.

Brian played some great little things on some of the Mick/Keith songs and was one of the driving forces at the start when they were a Blues cover band.

Brian wasn't coming up and submitting song ideas.

The Beatles would not be the Beatles that everyone knows without John and Paul's songwriting and Harrison was even a bit pissed off at the songs and the songwriters.
Eventually Harrison wrote a few good ones but John and Paul's songs made the Beatles what they were.

Check out the song writing process.

Some people can write songs and others can't.





[flick-thru.com]

In March 1967 they were getting towards the end of the Sergeant Pepper album. They were halfway through a song for Ringo, a Ringo sort of song, which they’d begun the day before.

At two o’clock in the afternoon John arrived at Paul’s house in St John’s Wood. They both went up to Paul’s workroom at the top of the house. It is a narrow, rectangular room, full of stereophonic equipment and amplifiers. There is a large triptych of Jane Asher on the wall and a large silver piece of sculpture by Paolozzi, shaped like a fireplace with Dalek heads on top.

John started playing his guitar and Paul started banging on the piano. For a couple of hours, they both banged away. Each of them seemed to be in a trance till the other came up with something good and he would pluck it out of a mass of noises and try it himself.

They’d already got the tune the previous afternoon, a gentle lilting tune, and its name, ‘A Little Help From My Friends’. Now they were trying to polish up the melody and think of some words to go with it.

‘Are you afraid when you turn out the light,’ sang John. Paul sang it after him and nodded. John said they could use that idea for all the verses, if they could think of some more questions on those lines.

‘Do you believe in love at first sight,’ sang John. ‘No,’ he said, stopping singing . ‘It hasn’t got the right number of syllables. What do you think? Can we split it up and have a pause to give it an extra syllable?’

John then sang the line, breaking it in the middle: ‘Do you believe – ugh – in love at first sight.’

‘How about,’ said Paul, ‘Do you believe in a love at first sight.’

John sang it over and accepted it. In singing it, he added the next line, ‘Yes, I’m certain it happens all the time.’

They both then sang the two lines to themselves, la-la-ing all the other lines. Apart from this, all they’d got was the chorus. ‘I’ll get by with a little help from my friends.’ John found himself singing ‘Would you believe,’ which he thought was better.

Then they changed the order round, singing the two lines ‘Would you believe in a love at first sight Yes, I’m certain it happens all the time’, before going on to ‘Are you afraid when you turn out the light’, but they still had to la-la the fourth line, which they couldn’t think of.

It was now about five o’clock. Cynthia, John’s wife arrived, wearing sunglasses, accompanied by Terry Doran, one of their (and Brian Epstein’s) old Liverpool friends. John and Paul kept on playing. Cyn picked up a paperback book and started reading. Terry produced a magazine about horoscopes.

John and Paul were singing their three lines over and over again, searching for a fourth.

‘What’s a rhyme for time?’ said John. ‘Yes, I’m certain it happens all the time. It’s got to rhyme with that line.’

‘How about, “I just feel fine”,’ suggested Cyn.

‘No,’ said John. ‘You never use the word just. It’s meaningless. It’s a fill-in word.’

John sang ‘I know it’s mine’ but nobody took much notice. It didn’t make much sense, coming after ‘Are you afraid when you turn out the light’. Somebody said it sounded obscene.

Terry asked what my birthday was. I said 7 January. Paul stopped playing, although it had looked as if he was completely concentrating on the song, and said, ‘Heh, that’s our kids birthday as well.’ He listened while Terry read out the horoscope. Then he went back to doodling on the piano.

In the middle of the doodling, Paul suddenly started to play ‘Can’t Buy Me Love’. John joined in, singing it very loudly, laughing and shouting. Then Paul began another song on the piano, ‘Tequila’. They both joined in again, shouting and laughing even louder. Terry and Cyn went on reading.

‘Remember in Germany,’ said John. ‘We used to shout out anything.’

They played the song again. This time John shouted out different things in each pause in the music. ‘Knickers’ and ‘Duke of Edinburgh’ and ‘tit’ and ‘@#$%&’.

They both stopped all the shouting and larking around, as suddenly as they’d begun it. They went back, very quietly, to the song they were supposed to be working on. ‘What do you see when you turn out the light,’ sang John, trying slightly new words to their existing line, missing out ‘afraid’. Then he followed it with another line, ‘I can’t tell you, but I know it’s mine.’ By slightly rewording it, he’d made it fit in.

Paul said yes, that would do. He wrote down the finished four lines on a sheet of exercise paper propped up in front of him on his piano. They now had one whole verse, as well as the chorus. Paul got up and wandered round the room. John moved to the piano.

‘How about a piece of amazing cake from Basingstoke,’ said Paul, taking down a piece of rock-hard cake from a shelf. ‘It’ll do for a trifle,’ said John. Paul made a face. Terry and Cynthia were still quietly reading.

Paul got a sitar from a corner and sat down and started to tune it, shushing John to keep quiet for a minute. John sat still at the piano, looking blankly out of the window.

Outside in the front courtyard of Paul’s house, the eyes and foreheads of six girls could just be seen peering over the front wall. Then the girls dropped, exhausted, on to the pavement beyond. A few minutes later they appeared again, hanging on till their strength gave way. John Peered vacantly into space through his round, wire spectacles. Then he began to play a hymn on the piano, singing words that he made up as he went along.

‘Backs to the wall, if you want to see His Face.’

Then he seemed to jump in the air and started banging out a hearty rugby song. ‘Let’s write a rugby song, eh.’ No one listened to him.

Paul had got his sitar tuned and was playing some notes on it, the same ones over and over again. He got up again and wandered round the room. John picked up the sitar this time, but he couldn’t get comfortable with it. Paul told him that he had to sit on the floor with his legs crossed and place it in the bowl of his foot. Paul said that George did it that way, it felt uncomfortable at first, but after a few centuries you got used to it. John tried it, then gave up and placed it against a chair.

‘Heh,’ said John to Terry, ‘did you get to the place?’

‘Yeh, I got you three coats, like George’s.’

‘Great,’ said John, very excited. ‘Where are they then?’

‘I paid by cheque and they wouldn’t let me have them till tomorrow.’

‘Oh,’ said John. ‘Couldn’t you have said who they were for? You should have said they were for Godfrey Winn. I want them now.’

‘They’ll be OK tomorrow,’ said Paul. ‘There’s some more stuff to get tomorrow. Don’t worry.’

Paul then went back to his guitar and started to sing and play a very slow, beautiful song about a foolish man sitting on the hill. John listened to it quietly, staring blankly out the window, almost as if he wasn’t listening. Paul sang it many times, la-la-ing words he hadn’t thought of yet. When at last he finished, John said he’d better write the words down or he’d forget them. Paul said it was OK. He wouldn’t forget them. It was the first time Paul had played it for John. There was no discussion.

It was getting near seven o’clock, almost time to go round the corner to the EMI recording studios. They decided to ring Ringo, to tell him his song was finished – which it wasn’t – and that they would record it that evening. John picked up the phone. After a lot of playing around, he finally got through, but it was engaged. ‘If I hold on, does that mean I eventually get through?’

‘No, you have to hang up,’ said Paul.



Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 2013-03-06 09:23 by howled.

Parts of Brian's soundtrack are essentially songs just waiting for words. If someone had put words to those melodies and chord changes those would then have been songs which Brian and the lyricist had written.

Ie: Jagger(lyrics) - Jones(music - main melody and chord changes) - arranged by The Rolling Stones(the instrumental backing).

We have parts of his soundtrack as proof of his own melodic music writing, but we know he also sometimes wrote words as Linda Lawrence and Alexis Korner, even Anita Pallenberg have told us so.

Brian wrote songs, he simply didn't present them to The Rolling Stones. This however does not mean Brian had no influence or contribution on any of the songs which Mick and Keith presented. Those being presented in varying forms ranging from nothing more than a basic riff and refrain to fully written songs.

Another, but and example... The demo version of Yesterday's Papoers has a more stiff and awkward melody from the finished released song, for all we know Bill, Charlie or Brian might have suggested changes to that melody to help make it flow more. If they did such a thing they then have contributed to the writing of that song whether they recieve credit for it or not.

Once Klein is onboard and Nanker Phelge has been killed off the business set up was such that it appears that it would have been hard going to recieve credit for any suggestions to Mick and Keith presented songs. Basically, once they presented an idea even if it was very sparse idea the credits were going to be Jagger Richard regardless of others input.

The main and most constant flow of songs and ideas for songs came from Mick and Keith, but I think it is some what silly to assume the others never had any influence or contribution to the actual song writing once those songs in their varying forms were presented at rehearsals and recording sessions.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2013-03-06 19:53 by His Majesty.

Quote
slew
I don't think he gets his due nowadays

Well stated!

Quote
His Majesty
Parts of Brian's soundtrack are essentially songs just waiting for words. If someone had put words to those melodies and chord changes those would then have been songs which Brian and the lyricist had written.

Ie: Jagger(lyrics) - Jones(music - main melody and chord changes) - arranged by The Rolling Stones(the instrumental backing).

We have parts of his soundtrack as proof of his own melodic music writing, but we know he also sometimes wrote words as Linda Lawrence and Alexis Korner, even Anita Pallenberg have told us so.

Brian wrote songs, he simply didn't present them to The Rolling Stones. This however does not mean Brian had no influence or contribution on any of the songs which Mick and Keith presented. Those being presented in varying forms ranging from nothing more than a basic riff and refrain to fully written songs.

Another, but and example... The demo version of Yesterday's Papoers has a more stiff and awkward melody from the finished released song, for all we know Bill, Charlie or Brian might have suggested changes to that melody to help make it flow more. If they did such a thing they then have contributed to the writing of that song whether they recieve credit for it or not.

Once Klein is onboard and Nanker Phelge has been killed off the business set up was such that it appears that it would have been hard going to recieve credit for any suggestions to Mick and Keith presented songs. Basically, once they presented an idea even if it was very sparse idea the credits were going to be Jagger Richard regardless of others input.

The main and most constant flow of songs and ideas for songs came from Mick and Keith, but I think it is some what silly to assume the others never had any influence or contribution to the actual song writing once those songs in their varying forms were presented at rehearsals and recording sessions.

Keith said he tried writing with Brian but it just didn't work.

Brian couldn't even seem to come up with an album filler song.

When Bill does have a song, it's just not a great song but more of an album filler.

Sympathy, Brown Sugar etc are just Mick's songs.

Brian and Bill just could not seem to write a commercial song for the Stones and couldn't even seem to manage decent album fillers.

Charlie just didn't write anything.

When a riff and outline of a song was being worked on in the studio, some things were added by Brian and Bill and Charlie but without the riff and outline of the song there would probably be nothing happening and the riff and outline of the song was mostly coming from Mick and Keith.

The Last Time might be Brian's riff but the verses where he plays the riff aren't.

In the Goddard film, anyone can see Sympathy going from an acoustic folk thing to a samba probably due to suggestions from Charlie etc but Charlie, Bill and Brian didn't write the song or the outline of the song.

I think Ringo made the darning socks suggestion for Eleanor Rigby and I think George had some input on the Ahhhh! Look At All The Lonely People bit but basically the song was originated by Paul.

Without Paul, there would be no Eleanor Rigby.

Ringo and Georges contribution might have been 5% or whatever, so how do they split the songwriting royalties with 5% to Ringo and George and 15% to John and 80% to Paul just for one song when the next song might just be John 60% and Paul 40%.

If every song is treated like that then it breaks the simpler Lennon/McCartney thing and most of the song ideas were coming from John and Paul anyway.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2013-03-07 07:13 by howled.

Quote
howled
This songwriting envy thing was/is in a lot of bands.

CCR and John Fogerty's songs which eventually broke up the band which started with John's brother leaving.

Eagles and the Henley/Frey songs and Felder and maybe Leadon etc.

(Felder tells everyone how Hotel California came from him but basically he just ripped off and altered an old Tull tune, not much songwriting in that.)

Even the Police and Stings songs,

Brian was just another one.

If Mick and Keith hadn't had the guts to pursue songwriting then the Stones and Brian would have just settled down into a mostly forgotton Blues cover band.

Without the songs, the Stones would not be the Stones everybody knows.

Brian played some great little things on some of the Mick/Keith songs and was one of the driving forces at the start when they were a Blues cover band.

Brian wasn't coming up and submitting song ideas.

The Beatles would not be the Beatles that everyone knows without John and Paul's songwriting and Harrison was even a bit pissed off at the songs and the songwriters.
Eventually Harrison wrote a few good ones but John and Paul's songs made the Beatles what they were.

Check out the song writing process.

Some people can write songs and others can't.





[flick-thru.com]

In March 1967 they were getting towards the end of the Sergeant Pepper album. They were halfway through a song for Ringo, a Ringo sort of song, which they’d begun the day before.

At two o’clock in the afternoon John arrived at Paul’s house in St John’s Wood. They both went up to Paul’s workroom at the top of the house. It is a narrow, rectangular room, full of stereophonic equipment and amplifiers. There is a large triptych of Jane Asher on the wall and a large silver piece of sculpture by Paolozzi, shaped like a fireplace with Dalek heads on top.

John started playing his guitar and Paul started banging on the piano. For a couple of hours, they both banged away. Each of them seemed to be in a trance till the other came up with something good and he would pluck it out of a mass of noises and try it himself.

They’d already got the tune the previous afternoon, a gentle lilting tune, and its name, ‘A Little Help From My Friends’. Now they were trying to polish up the melody and think of some words to go with it.

‘Are you afraid when you turn out the light,’ sang John. Paul sang it after him and nodded. John said they could use that idea for all the verses, if they could think of some more questions on those lines.

‘Do you believe in love at first sight,’ sang John. ‘No,’ he said, stopping singing . ‘It hasn’t got the right number of syllables. What do you think? Can we split it up and have a pause to give it an extra syllable?’

John then sang the line, breaking it in the middle: ‘Do you believe – ugh – in love at first sight.’

‘How about,’ said Paul, ‘Do you believe in a love at first sight.’

John sang it over and accepted it. In singing it, he added the next line, ‘Yes, I’m certain it happens all the time.’

They both then sang the two lines to themselves, la-la-ing all the other lines. Apart from this, all they’d got was the chorus. ‘I’ll get by with a little help from my friends.’ John found himself singing ‘Would you believe,’ which he thought was better.

Then they changed the order round, singing the two lines ‘Would you believe in a love at first sight Yes, I’m certain it happens all the time’, before going on to ‘Are you afraid when you turn out the light’, but they still had to la-la the fourth line, which they couldn’t think of.

It was now about five o’clock. Cynthia, John’s wife arrived, wearing sunglasses, accompanied by Terry Doran, one of their (and Brian Epstein’s) old Liverpool friends. John and Paul kept on playing. Cyn picked up a paperback book and started reading. Terry produced a magazine about horoscopes.

John and Paul were singing their three lines over and over again, searching for a fourth.

‘What’s a rhyme for time?’ said John. ‘Yes, I’m certain it happens all the time. It’s got to rhyme with that line.’

‘How about, “I just feel fine”,’ suggested Cyn.

‘No,’ said John. ‘You never use the word just. It’s meaningless. It’s a fill-in word.’

John sang ‘I know it’s mine’ but nobody took much notice. It didn’t make much sense, coming after ‘Are you afraid when you turn out the light’. Somebody said it sounded obscene.

Terry asked what my birthday was. I said 7 January. Paul stopped playing, although it had looked as if he was completely concentrating on the song, and said, ‘Heh, that’s our kids birthday as well.’ He listened while Terry read out the horoscope. Then he went back to doodling on the piano.

In the middle of the doodling, Paul suddenly started to play ‘Can’t Buy Me Love’. John joined in, singing it very loudly, laughing and shouting. Then Paul began another song on the piano, ‘Tequila’. They both joined in again, shouting and laughing even louder. Terry and Cyn went on reading.

‘Remember in Germany,’ said John. ‘We used to shout out anything.’

They played the song again. This time John shouted out different things in each pause in the music. ‘Knickers’ and ‘Duke of Edinburgh’ and ‘tit’ and ‘@#$%&’.

They both stopped all the shouting and larking around, as suddenly as they’d begun it. They went back, very quietly, to the song they were supposed to be working on. ‘What do you see when you turn out the light,’ sang John, trying slightly new words to their existing line, missing out ‘afraid’. Then he followed it with another line, ‘I can’t tell you, but I know it’s mine.’ By slightly rewording it, he’d made it fit in.

Paul said yes, that would do. He wrote down the finished four lines on a sheet of exercise paper propped up in front of him on his piano. They now had one whole verse, as well as the chorus. Paul got up and wandered round the room. John moved to the piano.

‘How about a piece of amazing cake from Basingstoke,’ said Paul, taking down a piece of rock-hard cake from a shelf. ‘It’ll do for a trifle,’ said John. Paul made a face. Terry and Cynthia were still quietly reading.

Paul got a sitar from a corner and sat down and started to tune it, shushing John to keep quiet for a minute. John sat still at the piano, looking blankly out of the window.

Outside in the front courtyard of Paul’s house, the eyes and foreheads of six girls could just be seen peering over the front wall. Then the girls dropped, exhausted, on to the pavement beyond. A few minutes later they appeared again, hanging on till their strength gave way. John Peered vacantly into space through his round, wire spectacles. Then he began to play a hymn on the piano, singing words that he made up as he went along.

‘Backs to the wall, if you want to see His Face.’

Then he seemed to jump in the air and started banging out a hearty rugby song. ‘Let’s write a rugby song, eh.’ No one listened to him.

Paul had got his sitar tuned and was playing some notes on it, the same ones over and over again. He got up again and wandered round the room. John picked up the sitar this time, but he couldn’t get comfortable with it. Paul told him that he had to sit on the floor with his legs crossed and place it in the bowl of his foot. Paul said that George did it that way, it felt uncomfortable at first, but after a few centuries you got used to it. John tried it, then gave up and placed it against a chair.

‘Heh,’ said John to Terry, ‘did you get to the place?’

‘Yeh, I got you three coats, like George’s.’

‘Great,’ said John, very excited. ‘Where are they then?’

‘I paid by cheque and they wouldn’t let me have them till tomorrow.’

‘Oh,’ said John. ‘Couldn’t you have said who they were for? You should have said they were for Godfrey Winn. I want them now.’

‘They’ll be OK tomorrow,’ said Paul. ‘There’s some more stuff to get tomorrow. Don’t worry.’

Paul then went back to his guitar and started to sing and play a very slow, beautiful song about a foolish man sitting on the hill. John listened to it quietly, staring blankly out the window, almost as if he wasn’t listening. Paul sang it many times, la-la-ing words he hadn’t thought of yet. When at last he finished, John said he’d better write the words down or he’d forget them. Paul said it was OK. He wouldn’t forget them. It was the first time Paul had played it for John. There was no discussion.

It was getting near seven o’clock, almost time to go round the corner to the EMI recording studios. They decided to ring Ringo, to tell him his song was finished – which it wasn’t – and that they would record it that evening. John picked up the phone. After a lot of playing around, he finally got through, but it was engaged. ‘If I hold on, does that mean I eventually get through?’

‘No, you have to hang up,’ said Paul.

Some can create top all-time rock bands, others can't.

Quote
howled


Keith said he tried writing with Brian but it just didn't work.

Brian couldn't even seem to come up with an album filler song... Brian just could not seem to write a commercial song for the Stones.

That first part is about trying to write Everly Brothers type songs at Edith Grove.

We don't know what he wrote song wise, but we have been told he did write. Better to say Brian just couldn't present his songs commercial or otherwise to The Rolling Stones.

He could write songs or at the very least melodic lines and chord sequences which with lyrical input would have been songs.

Generally,

Writing film or instrumental music and writing commercial songs are similar in some ways and not in other ways.

Commercial songs mostly need a hook or hooks and to be concise and mostly be something that the average person can remember and/or sing along to or something like that.

(I'm using the "average person" term as a person who does not know or care about how music is made.)

Someone can write music but not be able to put it in a commercial form.

If a musician is writing mainly for an audience of another group of musicians then this commercial form doesn't need to happen as much.

It's when the music is directed towards average people that it needs to be in a so called commercial form because these people are not musicians but they might like a tune and a dance.

Getting music into a commercial form takes a certain talent and a focus that not many have.

Commercial songs are very difficult to write or they used to be before the standard of commercial songs started to decline.

Keith has also said that Brian would write things but he did not have the focus to write things in a commercial way.

Brian seems to have been in the majority, which is that there are a lot of musicians around that might even be able to write music but can't seem to write music in a commercial way.

Keith and Mick do have that ability to write and put it all together in a commercial way for the average Stones fan (sometimes at least) and that's why the Stones have fans and why Bowie has fans and why U2 has fans etc.

They are not writing/playing Chamber music but writing and playing commercial music for average people.

Playing/writing for the people.

Sounds pretty easy, but it's pretty hard to do for a lot of people who try to do it.

There are millions of musicians but only thousands of successful commercial song writers and out of them there are only hundreds of accepted great commercial songwriters like McCartney etc.



Edited 9 time(s). Last edit at 2013-03-07 11:51 by howled.

Generalizations are fine, but they are generalizations. Forget the commercial pop formula thing, it's not the be all and end all of song writing.

A song in it's most basic form is a melody with lyrics. The only song writing ingredient that Brian hasn't shown to us through stones or his own music is the ability to write lyrics.

The issues surrounding Brian and song writing come not from an inability to write pieces and/or ideas for songs, atleast the musical side of them. The quality and commercial viability of those ideas which Keith etc mention remain unknown to us, but the theme from A Degree Of Murder could easily be made in to a song.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2013-03-07 13:32 by His Majesty.

In the end, the songs or melodies have to be good enough to put on a Stones album, judged by the Stones themselves.

If Brian wrote a melody and gave it to Mick, then Mick could have the words set pretty quick I'd say.

If the melody just doesn't suit the Stones because it's too generic or whatever then Mick and Keith might have better ones to put on the album.

The Stones would have accepted quite a lot of different styles when Brian was apparently writing some music, because of the Beatles and other things.

They had Lady Jane, 2,000 Light Years etc etc.

The only question is what could Brian's melodies actually be used for, and were they strong enough to do something with?

Melodies in a film soundtrack or general sort of things allow much more wandering and can be more generic.

Melodies in a song, are usually more precise and need to have less wandering otherwise the song is just another generic wandering song.

Mick and Keith and McCartney have all wrote generic wandering songs but not so many at their peak in the 60s/early 70s.

Brian could have submitted something that Mick or Keith could throw a few lyrics on but he didn't even seem to do that, or he did a few times and probably Mick didn't like them.

I remember that Mick said Brian's songs were not that great and were about flowers and things like that, so Mick must have heard some of Brian's efforts.

If someone in a band has good songs then usually they will be used no matter who wrote them.

John Fogerty got so pissed off with the other members moaning about how his songs dominated that he made room for their songs and the result was that their songs were pretty weak and John did write the better songs.

"Door to Door" was just a generic rocker and it's alright but if John had a better song why not use it, well egos, and human nature for one thing.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 2013-03-07 13:39 by howled.

Quote
howled
In the end, the songs or melodies have to be good enough to put on a Stones album, judged by the Stones themselves.

This is just about whether he wrote songs or ideas for songs, their suitability for the stones, subjective quality etc etc is a different thing.

The melody from the A Degree of Murder doesn't wander, it's actually quite a clever melody over a simple chord sequence. Stick a stones backing and some sixties lyrics on it and it wouldn't be all that different to their output from Aftermath - Their Satanic Majesties Request. Such things never happened though cos he never or rarely presented his ideas, but that is different from not being able to write any.

There's many a shit Jagger Richards song that probably should never have gotten past the presentation at a recording session stage.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2013-03-07 13:51 by His Majesty.

Quote
howled
In the end, the songs or melodies have to be good enough to put on a Stones album, judged by the Stones themselves.

If Brian wrote a melody and gave it to Mick, then Mick could have the words set pretty quick I'd say.

But I think in 1964/65 things were a lot different then say 1966 and beyond. Albums at that time usually had maybe 1 or 2 great songs (hits) and the rest were fillers. I'm sure Brian could have at least written some fillers but why did that not happen is the question?

Why was he not part of a/the writing team? It's always Mick/Keith vs Brian. Why was Mick and Keith paired up in 64/65 and not Mick and Brian? Not sure in those early years that Brian would have to write something first and then give it to Mick, why couldn't they write at the same time, throwing ideas at each other, then Keith could add some colo(u)r to the finished product in the studio.

Is it really because Andrew somehow confinced Mick and Keith that no matter what, stay clear of any partnership with Brian? Put him down at all costs! Somehow Brian pissed off Andrew and maybe Mick and Keith early on and as a result, this was their way of returning the so called favor. Maybe it was because Brian received more money in 1963 that turned out to be the culprit..

And so by 1966 with a few major hits, the Stones were then a big business and they had their operation fine tuned, that at that point, Brian just gave up. After all Charlie didn't write and didn't care who did and just went with the flow of things. And we know Bill's story...

Quote
howled
Brian wasn't coming up and submitting song ideas.

Check out the song writing process.

We don't know anything about Brian coming up and submitting song ideas. I find it very possible that he showed up with a melody or chord sequence that was made into a song. Spanish Tony and Marianne Faithful has claimed that Brian and Keith wrote songs together. I wonder what happened with those?

Rai Uno 1967

Quote

Reporter: Who is the author of your songs?
Mick: No one of us in particular, and all of us at the same time. We usually sign Jagger and Richards but Brian is the one that knows music best and, in short, one cannot be distinguished by the other. We are all necessary.

The song writing process? You mean getting credit for something even if you had nothing to do with it like Ruby Tuesday, Memo From Turner, Yesterday and Give Peace a Chance?

Quote
2000 LYFH
Somehow Brian pissed off Andrew and maybe Mick and Keith early on and as a result, this was their way of returning the so called favor. Maybe it was because Brian received more money in 1963 that turned out to be the culprit..

And so by 1966 with a few major hits, the Stones were then a big business and they had their operation fine tuned, that at that point, Brian just gave up. After all Charlie didn't write and didn't care who did and just went with the flow of things. And we know Bill's story...

Brian didn't share Andrew's vision about what the Stones was or should be about. Andrew has said that Brian wanted music to be "real" and didn't consider pop music to be that. Mick on the other hand, being the buisnessman he is, knew that Andrew's vision was better if they wanted to reach the top. So him and Keith got on better with Andrew as they didn't question his ideas. Brian had already made the mistake by call himself a leader and given himself more money because of it. Not wise with another alpha male in the band. This together with the fact that he now opposed something that would give the band a chance to be somthing bigger than a blues band and that he was the odd man out are my guesses why they decided to give him a huge FU and go on.

I think it's funny when people say that Brian's downfall in the band was because he couldn't write songs or write songs as good as Mick and Keith. That's denying the facts of what went on and had been going on inside the band already by that time and the fact that Brian wasn't interested in going pop. He said himself in an interview in the mid 60's that he had written some blues tunes. Surprised? No, that's what he wanted to play. The glimmers didn't and with the aid of Andrew the band went pop. I'm not saying that Brian wrote wonderful blues songs. Just that there's a difference between "he couldn't write at all" and "he couldn't write the kind of songs we needed". At least Brian's soundtrack shows that he could write music that could be turned into songs - no doubt. But I don't know if he was aware of it himself.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2013-03-07 21:46 by tonterapi.

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punkfloyd
Apologies if this has been asked before, but I'm not sure I could pick out Brian Jones on any songs during his era. On what songs can I hear him play a riff or something? Doesn't he do the slide on No Expecations?

Screw Brian. glad keith and Mick sent him to the bottom of the pool.

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tonterapi

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howled
Brian wasn't coming up and submitting song ideas.

Check out the song writing process.

We don't know anything about Brian coming up and submitting song ideas. I find it very possible that he showed up with a melody or chord sequence that was made into a song. Spanish Tony and Marianne Faithful has claimed that Brian and Keith wrote songs together. I wonder what happened with those?

Rai Uno 1967

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Reporter: Who is the author of your songs?
Mick: No one of us in particular, and all of us at the same time. We usually sign Jagger and Richards but Brian is the one that knows music best and, in short, one cannot be distinguished by the other. We are all necessary.

The song writing process? You mean getting credit for something even if you had nothing to do with it like Ruby Tuesday, Memo From Turner, Yesterday and Give Peace a Chance?

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2000 LYFH
Somehow Brian pissed off Andrew and maybe Mick and Keith early on and as a result, this was their way of returning the so called favor. Maybe it was because Brian received more money in 1963 that turned out to be the culprit..

And so by 1966 with a few major hits, the Stones were then a big business and they had their operation fine tuned, that at that point, Brian just gave up. After all Charlie didn't write and didn't care who did and just went with the flow of things. And we know Bill's story...

Brian didn't share Andrew's vision about what the Stones was or should be about. Andrew has said that Brian wanted music to be "real" and didn't consider pop music to be that. Mick on the other hand, being the buisnessman he is, knew that Andrew's vision was better if they wanted to reach the top. So him and Keith got on better with Andrew as they didn't question his ideas. Brian had already made the mistake by call himself a leader and given himself more money because of it. Not wise with another alpha male in the band. This together with the fact that he now opposed something that would give the band a chance to be somthing bigger than a blues band and that he was the odd man out are my guesses why they decided to give him a huge FU and go on.

I think it's funny when people say that Brian's downfall in the band was because he couldn't write songs or write songs as good as Mick and Keith. That's denying the facts of what went on and had been going on inside the band already by that time and the fact that Brian wasn't interested in going pop. He said himself in an interview in the mid 60's that he had written some blues tunes. Surprised? No, that's what he wanted to play. The glimmers didn't and with the aid of Andrew the band went pop. I'm not saying that Brian wrote wonderful blues songs. Just that there's a difference between "he couldn't write at all" and "he couldn't write the kind of songs we needed". At least Brian's soundtrack shows that he could write music that could be turned into songs - no doubt. But I don't know if he was aware of it himself.

I think he was in POP music, especially the Beatles

__________________________

Brian was in to lots of different types of music. Old, new, serious and light.

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2000 LYFH

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howled
In the end, the songs or melodies have to be good enough to put on a Stones album, judged by the Stones themselves.

If Brian wrote a melody and gave it to Mick, then Mick could have the words set pretty quick I'd say.

But I think in 1964/65 things were a lot different then say 1966 and beyond. Albums at that time usually had maybe 1 or 2 great songs (hits) and the rest were fillers. I'm sure Brian could have at least written some fillers but why did that not happen is the question?

Why was he not part of a/the writing team? It's always Mick/Keith vs Brian. Why was Mick and Keith paired up in 64/65 and not Mick and Brian? Not sure in those early years that Brian would have to write something first and then give it to Mick, why couldn't they write at the same time, throwing ideas at each other, then Keith could add some colo(u)r to the finished product in the studio.

Is it really because Andrew somehow confinced Mick and Keith that no matter what, stay clear of any partnership with Brian? Put him down at all costs! Somehow Brian pissed off Andrew and maybe Mick and Keith early on and as a result, this was their way of returning the so called favor. Maybe it was because Brian received more money in 1963 that turned out to be the culprit..

And so by 1966 with a few major hits, the Stones were then a big business and they had their operation fine tuned, that at that point, Brian just gave up. After all Charlie didn't write and didn't care who did and just went with the flow of things. And we know Bill's story...

Sounds like there was too much animosity plus competition to be Boss for Brian & Mick to really be able to collaborate well.

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GADAWG

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punkfloyd
Apologies if this has been asked before, but I'm not sure I could pick out Brian Jones on any songs during his era. On what songs can I hear him play a riff or something? Doesn't he do the slide on No Expecations?

Screw Brian. glad keith and Mick sent him to the bottom of the pool.

How convenient for Keith and Mick to first secure their get-ahead vehicle, the Rolling Stones!

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Reporter: Who is the author of your songs?
Mick: No one of us in particular, and all of us at the same time. We usually sign Jagger and Richards but Brian is the one that knows music best and, in short, one cannot be distinguished by the other. We are all necessary.

Mick could have been talking generally about the songs and arranging etc.

Mick and Keith have also said that Brian just didn't come along with any initial song ideas.

It's the initial part of the song that is the most important.

The starting off of the song.

Has anyone heard Bill's solo stuff?

There are no Brian songs or demos that have been discovered, as far as I know.

Just the film soundtrack and a few other bits and pieces.

Assuming that Brian and Bill could do this or that when there is no real evidence for it, are just assumptions.

After Brian, the songs keep coming,

Brown Sugar

Tumbling Dice

Honky Tonk Women

Angie

etc

So where are they coming from?

From Mick and Keith, as they were when Brian was in the band.

Just a change in style to more of a Country/Rock/Blues thing from the Beatles 60s styles.

There is no Paint It Black without Keith's riff.

It started off as a Jewish wedding sort of riff.

The verse melody follows Keith's riff and then there is the more R&B bit "I see the girls walk by etc"

Mick wrote the lyrics.

Brian plays Keith's riff on the Sitar.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 2013-03-08 08:27 by howled.

If Marianne is to be believed then Brian may have been the most important spark for Ruby Tuesday, atleast musically.

Saying that Brian and the others contributed to the actual songs, we are probably talking little ideas and suggestions here and there etc, is not to say or take anything away from the fact that Mick and Keith were THE song writing team in The Rolling Stones. They worked and worked at it sometimes coming up with great sonmgs which stand tall even without the stones arrangments. Of course the songs keep coming, but so do some rumblings about song writing credits.

...

Andrew gave Brian a shot at writing circa 1963/64 and teamed him up with Gene Pitney, demos were recorded. In Andrews view it wasn't a succsesful pairing and said the results were terrible.

Bill's solo songs will of course be different from the combined output of Mick and Keith's songs with groovy Rolling Stones arrangements.

Brian and Bill both wrote music is the main point, competativly comparing the solo efforts against the combined stones results is a bit daft because the stones were of course better as a unit than as solo artists and the co-created arragements most certainly give gravitas to what is sometimes not very good actual Jagger Richards songs.

...

Strip things to their core and the melody for A degree of Murder theme and verse melody of Ruby Tuesday have similarities of feel etc. One melody got the full stones treatment the other didn't. Both are great melodies, both work as either an instrumental or vocal melody. With that theme Brian shows he could write a good effective melody that could work in a song.

Brian's A Degree Of Murder theme is a love song he wrote without words.

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His Majesty
If Marianne is to be believed then Brian may have been the most important spark for Ruby Tuesday, atleast musically.

Saying that Brian and the others contributed to the actual songs, we are probably talking little ideas and suggestions here and there etc, is not to say or take anything away from the fact that Mick and Keith were THE song writing team in The Rolling Stones. They worked and worked at it sometimes coming up with great sonmgs which stand tall even without the stones arrangments. Of course the songs keep coming, but so do some rumblings about song writing credits.

...

Andrew gave Brian a shot at writing circa 1963/64 and teamed him up with Gene Pitney, demos were recorded. In Andrews view it wasn't a succsesful pairing and said the results were terrible.

Bill's solo songs will of course be different from the combined output of Mick and Keith's songs with groovy Rolling Stones arrangements.

Brian and Bill both wrote music is the main point, competativly comparing the solo efforts against the combined stones results is a bit daft because the stones were of course better as a unit than as solo artists and the co-created arragements most certainly give gravitas to what is sometimes not very good actual Jagger Richards songs.

...

Strip things to their core and the melody for A degree of Murder theme and verse melody of Ruby Tuesday have similarities of feel etc. One melody got the full stones treatment the other didn't. Both are great melodies, both work as either an instrumental or vocal melody. With that theme Brian shows he could write a good effective melody that could work in a song.

Brian's A Degree Of Murder theme is a love song he wrote without words.

I can get what you are saying.

I'm not actually comparing Bill's songs to the Stones, but just as general songs.

The Brian melody is a wandering minstrel instrumental job or something like that.

Putting lyrics to that might not result in much because it's very instrumental in it's nature.

Ruby Tuesday has elements like that from Brian but the song structure is very Pop/Rock.

It's the Pop/Rock song structure that Brian and Bill could not seem to effectively do in any great way, the way that Keith and Mick could.

Songwriting is a very strange thing because it's very hard to work out why these lyrics work with this melody over this chord at this time in an effective way (or maybe not so effective).

If someone sits down to write a song, chances are that it will be a pile of crap.

Someone can notice and even study what is used in other songs and their songs might improve a bit but still be a pile of crap.

It seems like some people can do it in a successful way and others can't and that it's very instinctive.

Plenty can write a song or music but it will probably be judged as mediocre or a pile of crap.

Paul McCartney can only work out that it must be a gift, because he doesn't quite know how he does it.

[drownedinsound.com]

[drownedinsound.com]

What are the chances of someone in outback Australia writing Brown Sugar.

Not very high, I don't think.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 2013-03-08 12:02 by howled.

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howled

Ruby Tuesday has elements like that from Brian but the song structure is very Pop/Rock.

Possibly a sign of the collaborative effort Marianne suggests then and one which, by his own admission, didn't involve Mick Jagger.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2013-03-08 12:10 by His Majesty.

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howled

Quote
Reporter: Who is the author of your songs?
Mick: No one of us in particular, and all of us at the same time. We usually sign Jagger and Richards but Brian is the one that knows music best and, in short, one cannot be distinguished by the other. We are all necessary.

Mick could have been talking generally about the songs and arranging etc.

Mick and Keith have also said that Brian just didn't come along with any initial song ideas.

It's the initial part of the song that is the most important.

The starting off of the song.

Has anyone heard Bill's solo stuff?

There are no Brian songs or demos that have been discovered, as far as I know.

Just the film soundtrack and a few other bits and pieces.

Assuming that Brian and Bill could do this or that when there is no real evidence for it, are just assumptions.

After Brian, the songs keep coming,

Brown Sugar

Tumbling Dice

Honky Tonk Women

Angie

etc

So where are they coming from?

From Mick and Keith, as they were when Brian was in the band.

Just a change in style to more of a Country/Rock/Blues thing from the Beatles 60s styles.

There is no Paint It Black without Keith's riff.

It started off as a Jewish wedding sort of riff.

The verse melody follows Keith's riff and then there is the more R&B bit "I see the girls walk by etc"

Mick wrote the lyrics.

Brian plays Keith's riff on the Sitar.

Then it needs to be noted as such:

Paint It Black (Inspiration by Jewish wedding sort of riff)

like this tune:

Hey Negrita (Inspiration by Ron Wood)

"Reporter: Who is the author of your songs?
Mick: No one of us in particular, and all of us at the same time. We usually sign Jagger and Richards, but Brian is the one that knows music best and, in short, one cannot be distinguished by the other. We are all necessary."

This quote is nice, but I think the reality is that Mick is just being the usual diplomatic promoter of the band. What he says is probably based on some degree of truth though.

At that point they were still pretty much a fully functioning, touring, writing and recording the pop hits band and were indeed all necessary to bring Rolling Stones music to the masses.

At the time stating something publicly like "Keith and I write all of the songs, sometimes Brian and Bill contribute a little to that, but really their real strengths lay in the instrumental arrangement side of things!" is probably much closer to the truth, but it just wouldn't be good for band moral or look good to outside world.

Or, for once, maybe Mick was being totally honest!

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howled

Quote
Reporter: Who is the author of your songs?
Mick: No one of us in particular, and all of us at the same time. We usually sign Jagger and Richards but Brian is the one that knows music best and, in short, one cannot be distinguished by the other. We are all necessary.

Mick could have been talking generally about the songs and arranging etc.

Mick and Keith have also said that Brian just didn't come along with any initial song ideas.

It's the initial part of the song that is the most important.

The starting off of the song.

Has anyone heard Bill's solo stuff?

There are no Brian songs or demos that have been discovered, as far as I know.

Just the film soundtrack and a few other bits and pieces.

Assuming that Brian and Bill could do this or that when there is no real evidence for it, are just assumptions.

Yes, Mick could have meant that. All we have is the question and a very interesting answer.

What Mick and Keith says about Brian is not objective and should be taken with a grain of salt. Winners write history.

What's the most important part of a song depends on the song, who writes it and how it's written. There are no general "how to" when it comes to creating something like that.
No, there are no Brian demos for easy access sadly. Some people claim that there exist tapes with Brian's music in the hands of elitist collectors who don't have any interest in sharing it. But I don't know if there's any truth in that.
Despite this it's still pretty easy to listen to Brian's soundtrack and hear traces of his musical influence in the Stones. I never said Brian wrote whole songs for the band or questioned that Mick and Keith were and are the composers of the majority of the material. Just that I find it possible that Brian brought in bits and pieces that were used and I also find it possible that he composed songs or part of songs that were either dismissed by or never even shown to the band.

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NICOS
I think he was in POP music, especially the Beatles

What I meant was that he wanted to Stones to play classic blues stuff in 64. But he did indeed listen to pop and other kinds of music.

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His Majesty
If Marianne is to be believed then Brian may have been the most important spark for Ruby Tuesday, atleast musically.

Saying that Brian and the others contributed to the actual songs, we are probably talking little ideas and suggestions here and there etc, is not to say or take anything away from the fact that Mick and Keith were THE song writing team in The Rolling Stones. They worked and worked at it sometimes coming up with great sonmgs which stand tall even without the stones arrangments. Of course the songs keep coming, but so do some rumblings about song writing credits.

...

Brian and Bill both wrote music is the main point, competativly comparing the solo efforts against the combined stones results is a bit daft because the stones were of course better as a unit than as solo artists and the co-created arragements most certainly give gravitas to what is sometimes not very good actual Jagger Richards songs

Quote
His Majesty
At the time stating something publicly like "Keith and I write all of the songs, sometimes Brian and Bill contribute a little to that, but really their real strengths lay in the instrumental arrangement side of things!" is probably much closer to the truth, but it just wouldn't be good for band moral or look good to outside world.

Or, for once, maybe Mick was being totally honest!

Didn't they record a few Brian Jones-penned tracks circa 1963-64? I seem to recall reading this in Martin Elliott's book. If I remember correctly, a snippet of one of Brian's tunes turned up on an acetate. His is the contribution ruined by female backing-vocals. This is sketchy on my part, I know. Anyone any idea as to what I'm on about, here?

You can hear him here! Almost sounds like he should have had a song writing credit on this one too...

Great new tribute song to BJ, it rocks.




You're My Brian Jones

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2000 LYFH
You can hear him here! Almost sounds like he should have had a song writing credit on this one too...

sorry , but keith steals the show here with his guitar picking.