The first litter, "Hot Rocks", brought some of the biggest hits of the sixties Stones. Not all: LP 2 (47:13) provides undisputed one of the best compilations of the period '68 -'71, which was lacking nothing, and many find the Ya-Ya's-live version of Midnight Rambler eh better than the studio version , (On Brown Sugar and Wild Horses had DECCA the rights, because the shots in early December '69, were created one week before Altamont and thus legally still in the Decca / London-phase fell).
LP 1 (38:27) but skipped the years '63 and '64 and went very well with '67 to quite neglected. Heart of Stone was okay and Play with Fire is a beautiful B-side, but both were neither better nor more important than the A-side of The Last Time. Little Red Rooster was also quite a hit, and We love you and She's a Rainbow also missing, as well Have you seen your Mother, Baby, Standing In The Shadow? (Were the missing songs to the UK spending the previous two official best-of-LPs, "Big Hits (High Tide and Green Grass)" ('66) and "Through the Past, Darkly" ('69) to find) ,
I can understand that to have those who met the Stones with "Hot Rocks", so used to them that they do not want to miss; pursuant to those criticisms I feel LP 1, however incomplete, therefore only four stars. How much better it was, then was 1975, the definitive Stones sampler from this stage, "Rolled Gold", now topped by the advanced "Rolled Gold +" titled CD.
Mastering corresponds throughout the class remasters of 2002. At the end of the eighties CD was only in "narrow-track stereo" and Honky Tonk Women equal to all in mono (but only after the first few blows to the cowbell!) To hear Man Street Fighting, and unlike there Time is on my side, Heart of Stone and Paint it black appear here in their stereo mixes (Mother's Little Helper again unfortunately "only" in mono); and when listening with headphones shows that here a stereo mix was made of Satisfaction "lighter": while singing and rhythm track as usual sound in mono, meander in the background piano and acoustic guitar somehow spatially to the whole thing around. If this mix is not even on the 2002 re-released compilation "High Tide & Green Grass" appears (I do not own), he alone is reason enough for Stones collectors to purchase this CD!
"More Hot Rocks" then added almost all the missing titles; But most gratifying is above "Rolled Gold +" - compiled CD.
