Rolling Stones

Flowers - London 1967

Tracks: 1. Ruby Tuesday / 2. Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby, Standing In The Shadow? / 3. Let's Spend The Night Together / 4. Lady Jane / 5. Out Of Time / 6. My Girl / 7. Back Street Girl / 8. Please Go Home / 9. Mother's Little Helpe / 10. Take It Or Leave It / 11. Ride On Baby / 12. Sittin' On A Fence

Comments:

"Flowers" is a compilation album that was originally released in the U.S. in 1967. It could well be included among the Rolling Stones original albums as well since only two tracks were previously released on LP in the States - the singles "Ruby Tuesday" and "Let's Spend the Night Together", which were both on "Between the Buttons" . Conversely, these two tracks were not on any European album, and bearing in mind that three tracks were entirely new and that "Have You Seen Your Mother" was not found on any album either, "Flowers" was definitely also interesting for European fans .

The album might seem a bit messy - the song-order probably could have been better but it does contain a lot of pearls. "Ruby Tuesday" are supposedly one of the most beautiful the group has ever recorded, and both "Backstreet Girl" and "Lady Jane" are very delicate ballads.

"Out of Time" could have been a hit for the Rolling Stones, but it was instead for Chris Farlow. "Mother's Little Helper" has both the twinkle in his eye and a good dose of social realism - while it is also a nice melody.

As with the three "new" songs the group's version of "My Girl" is definitely my favorite version of this number. "Ride On Baby" has very fine melodic verses, the chorus, unfortunately does not quite live up to this, but after all, a good number. "Sitting on a Fence" is both lyrically and melodically a very good number, which also has a very nice guitar melody-line - strange that the mistake towards the end ws not corrected. This song was in a much weaker version a minor hit for the duo "Twice as Much".

"Take it or Leave it" from "Aftermath was incidentally also a minor hit for The Searchers - so the strength of the song writing is obvious.

The Stones' own two hits "Let's Spend the Night Together" and "Have You Seen Your Mother" are not among the group's best, yet hits. The only slightly weak number is "Please Go Home"

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