Between the Buttons (UK)

Once known as hard-core blues/R&B traditionalists, the Stones plunged deeper into the waters of original songwriting on BETWEEN THE BUTTONS, leading to a golden age of classic albums including LET IT BLEED, BEGGAR'S BANQUET and EXILE ON MAIN STREET. BUTTONS was also the last album produced by then-manager/svengali Andrew Loog Oldham. More importantly, the obscure songs on this tight package show the Stones coming into their own as composers.



Between the melodic balladry of "Back Street Girl" and Mick Jagger's Dylanesque inflections on "She Smiled Sweetly," BUTTONS found the Stones in a strata far beyond covering Chuck Berry and Buddy Holly. Although none of these developments ranks with the Beatles' contemporaneous sonic experiments, the Fabs' bad-boy counterparts showed differing degrees of whimsy and sass, i.e. Ian Stewart's barrelhouse piano and Brian Jones' kazoo playing on "Cool, Calm & Collected" or the Dixieland-flavored "Something Happened To Me Yesterday."