First Album Reviews: ‘England’s Newest Hit Makers’ — The Rolling Stones
A look at the band’s debut album from 1964
Although I’ve always liked The Rolling Stones, I can’t say that I’ve ever loved them. Don’t get me wrong, though — I love a lot of their songs. I’ve just never considered them to be one of my favorite bands. I’ve never seen them in concert or owned any of their albums.
In fact, when I recently listened to their debut album, it was the first time I’ve ever listened to an album by The Rolling Stones in its entirety.
England’s Newest Hit Makers was the title for the May 1964 American release of the band’s debut album, which had been released a month earlier in the UK, with a slightly different track list, as the eponymously titled The Rolling Stones.
When I looked at the 12 songs included on the album, I recognized only four of the titles: “Not Fade Away,” “Route 66,” “Can I Get A Witness,” and “Walking The Dog.” All of them are remakes. In fact, there are only three songs on the album that are not remakes: “Now I’ve Got A Witness,” “Little By Little,” and “Tell Me.”
This was a very common practice in the 1960s. Records labels seemed to not trust new artists to record albums that didn’t include multiple songs that had already been made famous by others. I guess it was some sort of “insurance policy” for them to include songs that they knew the public already knew and (hopefully) loved.
In the case of The Rolling Stones’ debut album, it proved to be a wise way to go. Not only did the Stones do a fantastic job covering the songs, but they also had great financial success doing so. Their version of Buddy Holly’s “Not Fade Away” was released as a single and was a very huge hit for them in both the UK and America.
I think England’s Newest Hit Makers is a very solid album. Here are five of my favorites from it:
Not Fade Away
Even though I was familiar with the titles of the remakes I mentioned above, “Not Fade Away” was the only one of them I had ever actually heard before, as performed by The Rolling Stones.
I’ve always loved it. I actually prefer it over Buddy Holly’s original version from 1957.
I Just Want To Make Love To You
This great rock and rolling tune was first recorded 10 years earlier by the legendary Muddy Waters. I don’t know his version, but I love how The Stones did it.
Now I’ve Got A Witness
The credited songwriter of this instrumental is Nanker Phelge — who was not a real person. The name was actually a collective pseudonym that the members of The Rolling Stones used for several songs they wrote together as a band during their early days. I think they sound fantastic jamming together on this one. I especially love the harmonica playing on it by Brian Jones.
Tell Me
Even though two of the songs on the album are credited to the above-mentioned Nanker Phelge, this is the only song on the album credited specifically to Mick Jagger and Keith Richards.
I like this song A LOT!
It sort of reminds me a little bit of “Go Now” by The Moody Blues. The songs don’t necessarily sound alike, but they’ve both got that great “mid-60s vibe” that many awesome songs had back then — mellow but still great rock and roll songs.
Walking The Dog
This song was originally a hit for its writer Rufus Thomas in 1963. I never heard that version of it until after I heard the remake that Aerosmith did of it on their debut album. Of the three versions I’ve heard of “Walking The Dog,” I like this one by The Rolling Stones the most.
Here’s the complete album on Spotify:
I like England’s Newest Hit Makers much more than I expected to. I’m a little torn about how I want to rate it, though. Part of me wants to give it three stars, but part of me wants to give it four stars.
I’ll compromise a bit and give it…drumroll, please…3 and 1/2 stars!
This album is #3 of a new series I’m writing in which I review debut albums. If you’d like to read the first two reviews (and future ones, depending on when you’re reading this), they can be found here:
I’m also writing a series about 100 New-To-Me albums in 2022. My review of England’s Newest Hit Makers is #38 on my list for the year. My complete Master List of New-To-Me albums (so far) can be found here:
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