I ran into an acquaintance from the Halls of Rock recently who had been following the recently completed Rock Town Hall World Cup of Rock ‘n Roll. “You know the most striking thing I learned?” he confided, “The Beatles are heavier than The Rolling Stones.”
“That’s interesting,” I replied, not surprised that he would come to that conclusion and, based on my own prejudices, almost immediately swayed by his conclusion.
He continued. “I love Charlie Watts – don’t get me wrong – but he’s a light,” he said, sliding up a few notes as he reached the t in light, “drummer. And the Stones don’t have McCartney on bass.”
Then, before we parted ways, we discussed how much the Stones’ heaviosity must be based on their image. Depending on how we define heavy in this context, this Townsman may have a point.
I haven’t been able to shake these comments since that chance encounter.
No one would ever mistake The Stones for Black Sabbath.
I think I need more data. And a better definition of ‘heavy.’
Yeah, I think a better definition of heavy is needed here. The Stones don’t have any obvious children’s songs in their catalog, though. So that’s a plus.
We were discussing the ability to sound heavy on record, not each band’s overall heaviosity quotient. The Stones sound heavy – heavy drums, heavy bass, scorching guitar – on some of Beggars Banquent and most of Let It Bleed, but beyond those albums I don’t think they match the heaviosity The Beatles were able to hit on “Helter Skelter,” “Everybody’s Got Something to Hide Except Me and My Monkey,” “Revolution,” “It’s All Too Much,” “Good Morning,” and many more heavy Beatles songs.
Paperback Writer
Day Tripper
I Am The Walrus
Sgt Pepper(the song)
Don’t Let Me Down
Dig A Pony
I Want You(she’s so heavy)
All Super Heavy
Sway
Slave
Time Is On My Side
Heart of Stone
Honky Tonk Woman
Kinda Heavy
I think Beatles are Heavier.
but i think The Melvins are Heaviest
2000 Man, that depends on how heavy you think Maxwell’s hammer is.
My man shawnkilroy gets what this Townsman and I were talking about (he was not the Townsman I ran into, if you’re wondering).
I think “Citadel” is the heaviest vintage Stones song. The soul aspects of the Stones (horns, female backing vox, etc…) tend to make their music sound less heavy than it could have been. There are very few songs I’d mistake for hard rock. “Stray Cat Blues” rivals “Citadel,” I guess, and “Street Fighting Man” does have the heaviest acoustic gitar sound ever, but after that I get stuck.
The Beatles definitely had more genuinely “hard rock” songs. Wings even had some songs that could be considered hard rock.
Hey Mockarr,
Maxwell’s Silver Hammer was almost heavy enough to sink that album it was on.
Despite the fact that it would probably be excised from the Exile on Main Street EP, Ventilator Blues has some real heavy goin’ on.
I would suggest that “Ticket To Ride” is pretty damn heavy, and the bass on the single “Ballad of John and Yoko” / “Old Brown Shoe” is spectacularly so.
The Stones are heavy on “Monkey Man” (is that Keith on bass?). But in general, I think the assessment of the Beatles as heavier, while initially counter-intuitive, is nonetheless correct.
To be clear, the Townsman in question and I were not discussing “heavy” as in “hard rock” but in terms of heavy rhythms. Even on a poppy song like “You Won’t See Me” The Beatles’ sound heavier on record than should be expected for the type of song. Compare that song with a great, barely rocking, Motown-influenced Stones song like the exquisite “Under My Thumb,” and you’ll hear The Beatles’ inherent heaviosity.
I suspect, based on reading a gazillion Beatle books, that they were greatly aided in the heavyosity department by Geoff Emerick, George Martin, et al. My recollection is that from Rubber Soul, at least, onward (and I would backdate it to Ticket To Ride) the Beatles pushed their producer and engineers to add more bottom to their recordings and the technicians were talented enough to come through. The Stones had Andrew Loog Oldham. Okay, okay, I oversimplify, but you know what I mean.
For this discussion, I’d like to think of heavyness in terms of comparing them from a live perspective -especially in the drums – that The Beatles would come off much more powerfully than the Stones. The Beatles hit you at your core more than the SStones do
And I do think it is ironic that the Beatles are heavier/more powerful but yet dismmissed by many as “pop” while the Rolling Stones are always considered Rock & Roll
Citadel had crossed my mind too. Some other candidates for Stones heaviosity:
Miss Amanda Jones
All Sold Out
Please Go Home
Bitch
If You Can’t Rock Me
Dancing with Mr. D
Jumping Jack Flash
Monkey Man
Satisfaction
Soul Survivor
Undercover of the Night
I still don’t think we have consensus on what ‘heavy’ means. Mod says it’s rhythm, and misterioso says it’s bottom.
I’ve always thought that Helter Skelter (as Mr. Mod points out) was super heavy. In fact, it’s kind of the blueprint for a lot of Heavy Metal that came after its release, no?
“Helter Skelter” is perenially near the top of the list when Beatles’ fans list their least favorite Beatles song. That says something, doesn’t it?
By the way, I would suggest that when you study hard rock through the years, more bands seem to have been (in terms of songwriting) influenced by the Beatles than the Stones.
Ian MacDonald in Revolution in the Head dumps all over Helter Skelter, too. Revolution in the Head is a thought-provoking and sometimes very insightful book. At other times it is just plain wrong. This would be one of the latter. Helter Skelter is fantastic, no less so after 40+ years, including really lame covers by, at least, Pat Benatar, Motley Crue, and U2.
I would rather listen to Motley Crue’s Helter Skelter, than the Beatles’ version.
It works better.
Just as i would rather hear Mr. Tambourine Man sang by the Byrds, than Dylan.
Same goes for The Bangles’ Hazy Shade of Winter over the S&G original.
different thread i guess.
I think a lot of what seems to be the “heavy” perception can be attributed to the fact that in The Beatles, one of the principal songwriters played bass and because of the success of his songs, he had a lot of say in how loud everyone got to hear him. One of the principal songwriters in The Stones is a really stubborn guitar player that has his own ideas how a band should sound, and since he was pretty successful, he got his way and the guitars are most prominent.
Not that I seem to have any idea what anyone else is thinking (see the clamoring for Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands and I Dreamed I Saw St. Augustine instead of Chuck Berry in the World Cup), and my Brother in Law the Zep Head says I “don’t like that heavy shit,” but I think The Stones have done their fair share of heavy. Midnight Rambler seems pretty heavy. Actually I think most of Let It Bleed seems pretty heavy. Get Your Ya Ya’s Out seems like a pretty heavy live album.
My BIL that like Zep is wrong, I think. I like Black Sabbath a lot, but they’re not just always heavy. They can do something a little less thick, like Evil Woman or Supernaut and I think those are even more interesting than some of their famous heavy things.
But I don’t really think The Beatles or The Stones are all that heavy.
It’s good to know that a few others here know what I mean about the heaviosity of Let It Bleed. I get so much pleasure out of that album because it’s the only Mick Taylor-era Stones album that has what I feel are the great qualities of British recording technology. Come to think of it, is that and Beggars Banquet, the sound of which I also like, their only late-’60s/’70s albums recorded in England?
McCartney is definitely the difference maker, thanks what he was doing on bass. He also gave the band a back-up throat-ripping singer for when John’s voice was shot, which had to be a boost for heaviosity. I’d say the coda to “I Want You” is, perhaps not coincidentally, the Beatles’ heaviest moment, over Helter Skelter.
Does this mean McCartney now holds the titles of the Most Avant Garde and the Heaviest Beatle? We should get a book going on the latter.
On the Stones side of things, I agree that the lack of prominent bass is the big factor in their less-heavy-than-the-Beatles-ness, and that Let It Bleed is their heaviest album (and my favorite). Good call on “Ventilator Blues” being underrated in its heavitude, geo. That one is a winner.
Several years ago, I was visiting the San Fransisco Museum of Modern Art and they were showing a late 60s video of a performance art piece, very stark, very dark. The musical backdrop to it was side one of ABBEY ROAD, which of course, was probably playing everywhere at the time. What struck me in this context was just how dark and evil the album sounded, mostly due to the prominence of McCartney’s bass, but also the overall production sound of it and Lennon’s vocal style at the time. Lyrically, it may not seem heavy, but in terms of the atmosphere it’s every bit as distrubing as LET IT BLEED or STICKY FINGERS, which always felt to me like the best musical depiction of the unpleasant side of the 60s (as also depicted in the GIMME SHELTER movie or the writing of Joan Didion.)