The Rolling Stones have my vote.

Poll question: The Beatles vs. The Rolling Stones (who's the better band?)

Poll result (14 votes) The Beatles (9 votes) Vote The Rolling Stones (5 votes) Vote

??

Just checking...

. . .is because the board would be dead without them.

Sad to say.

~Austin

"God is a concept by which we measure our pain."
— John Lennon
http://austintayeshus.blogspot.com
http://www.last.fm/user/Austintayeshus
http://twitter.com/Austintayeshus

I honestly don't think I've seen these two bands compared to each other before — EVER.

Kudos.

~Austin

"God is a concept by which we measure our pain."
— John Lennon
http://austintayeshus.blogspot.com
http://www.last.fm/user/Austintayeshus
http://twitter.com/Austintayeshus

were better writers and had the songs, the stones had about 7-10 cuts i dug and they been wack and overrated now for 30 plus years so the Beatles win.

give me the Bee Gees over both those bands though personally

What the blood claaat ???

I think you HAVE to say The Beatles.

And, while I enjoy listening to the Stones more, they were shamelessly derivative.
The Beatles were more inventive over a shorter period of time. I just have a hard
time listening to The Beatles too often, the albums are too iconic for easy listening.

neither are as good as Dylan.

Were they derivative early on? Sure. However, so were the Beatles.

Would anyone mistake Stones acclaimed late-60's stuff for the blues and rock'n'roll that inspired them? No and neither does it sound like many other 60's blues-rock bands; whereas most bands in that vein went more abstract or pompous or diverse or "heavy" in order to progress, Stones managed to maintain the downstripped rock'n'roll feel while still pushing the music away from the 50's and towards a 70's blues/roots-rock sound and that make them very influential to the likes of Creedence, ZZ top, Allman Brothers, AC/DC, the Faces and (insert name of whatever band playing rock'n'roll after them)...

I suspect the whole dervative thing come from the fact that many people consider blues-based music derivative by default which is unfair IMO (also, add the race-aspect and you raise another obstacle); a tonal language does not make you derivative. If it did, you can dismiss pretty much anything besides avant-garde music as derivative. "Diatonic scales? Derivative" "4/4? Derivative!" "Parallell fifths? Stockhausen will not get impressed".

Anyway, in the context of down-stripped, no bullshit blues-based rock, Rolling Stones had about as much influence and impact as a band can possibly have in terms of defining that style for future generations.

I also never agreed with the cliche that Beatles could do everything the Stones could but not vice-versa. To me, it's pretty much the opposite, Stones were perfectly competent at everything from "raga-rock" like "Paint it Black" (which beats all two-three Beatles songs in that vein) to pure pop like "Under my thumb" or "As tears go by". Meanwhile, I'm not very impressed by Beatles attempts at rocking out after the mid-60's with the exception of "Come together". A song like "Get back" sounds limp old fart rock as fuck to me and nowhere near as sleazy or cool as the Stones did.

I'm also not sure Beatles were "objectively" more important either, at least not in terms of defining how "typical" rock-music would sound and look for that matter.

Anyway, I take Stones over Beatles anyday even if I think the latter were perhaps more consistent in the 60's, at least until 68...

BUT, there's this: While I wouldn't call the Stones "derivative" I would consider calling them "repetitive" from time to time, at least more so than The Beatles. They have A LOT of three chord rockers that are kind of similar to one another, and their style didn't really ever change that much, especially post-Satanic Majesty. Obviously every band is guilty of this to a certain extent, but I think the Stones are a lot more guilty of it than the Beatles. I'd say every Beatles album from Rubber Soul on has a distinct sound.

Granted, a huge part of this is that the Beatles didn't stick around long enough to get to the point of being repetitious.

>I'm also not sure Beatles were "objectively" more important
>either, at least not in terms of defining how "typical"
>rock-music would sound and look for that matter.

It depends what you mean here. I think the Beatles were obviously more important with respect to recording techniques and sonic experimentation. A song like Strawberry Fields Forever STILL sounds ahead of it's time sonically. They stayed pushing those kinds of boundaries.

On the other hand, if you were talking about "importance" as it relates to influencing other bands, I think it becomes a lot less clear. The Stones had style that was more visceral and easier to emulate (a kind of classic "rock band" sound), so I think when bands were setting up shop in garages and bassments, they were probably learning Stones songs before the Beatles.

...it's just not a big problem to me; I always liked the idea of a band as a brand or franchise or something. Shit, AC/DC in their prime is a personal favorite. Of course, the brand-thing is hard to sustain for too long but most bands should break up much earlier than they do anyway and I don't hold weaker albums against the b(r)and, I just stop caring after a certain point and just focus on the records I dig. Stones is at least supposedly still a solid live-act (I wouldn't know) so I guess that's one reason for them to hang around...

Really I'm into both kinds of bands - restless and ever-changing, but also the brands that keep their essential sound mostly the same. If they're good at it and can crank out a hundred small-but-catchy variations on the theme, why not? Besides AC/DC (a favorite of mine) I also really like Dismember (kept it mostly the same for many years and albums), Wu-Tang (generally at their best when hewing closest to their original formula - the more they moved away from that, during their middle period, the less I wanted to listen), Parliament (obviously Clinton was moving forward slowly over time, but Parliament itself was pretty much a brand and stayed consistent over all of its albums), and a bunch of others.

I also think some bands/artists that had a distinct brand for a short period should have done more work in that vein while they had the chance and were inspired. Sometimes they either break up early, or are constrained by industry stuff, or feel obligated to keep experimenting even if they did by far their best work in their original style. In a lot of those instances, I'd prefer they run the risk of doing one or two less-inspired albums, if it means I get to hear more of one of my favorite artists in their stylistic and artistic prime.

but the Stones were and are a much, much better band on the whole

the rolling stones even said in a documentary that I saw that they were influenced by the beatles and that with one of their albums, they were copying sgt peppers lonely hearts club band lp, so there is your answer.

EDIT: oops... just realized who I was replying to

because the beatles created ideas that the rolling stones copied and bite off, thats why.

"Everyone" did their "Sgt Pepper..."-type album in 67-68:Love did "Forever Changes", Zombies did "Odyssey and Oracle", Hollies did, Pretty Things did "SF Sorrow", the Who did "Sell out" (yes, it qualifies IMO), Tim Buckley did "Goodbye and Hello" etc. and yet, only Rolling Stones get the "They ripped off Sgt Peppers"-diss for an album that doesn't even sound that much like "...Pepper" (Not saying those other albums sound like Pepper too much either BTW).

While the critical reception of "Sgt Peppers..." had a lot to do with those albums becoming the norm for a short while, the fact is that these ideas were in the "air" at the time and some of those records were even started on before "SGt Pepper" came out. Also Beatles themselves were of course inspired by "Pet Sounds" and Frank Zappa's "Freak Out"-album. And Donovan had made "flowery" and "twee" albums like "Sunshine Superman" and "mellow Yellow" before the release of "Sgt Pepper..." as well...

Anyway, several of those records are considered classics today and people don't hold the fact that they may have been inspired by "Sgt. Pepper..." against them. The Stones-album in that vein is not too good but not bad either-several really nice psych tracks on there IMO like "She's a rainbow" and "2000 light years from home".

And I always prefered Stones ridiculed "We Love You"-single over "All you need is love" despite the latter being the obvious influence as well...

I don't remember it verbatim, but something like, "We weren't the innovators of our generation. We were the spokesmen."

Personally, I find Sgt. Pepper and Satanic Majesty to both be really overrated albums. Also, both bands released much better albums immediately before and immediately after their "flowery" albums.

~Austin

"God is a concept by which we measure our pain."
— John Lennon
http://austintayeshus.blogspot.com
http://www.last.fm/user/Austintayeshus
http://twitter.com/Austintayeshus

I like a lot of "flowery" albums but that is one of my least favorites of the "big" ones from that era-"Revolver" on the other hand is absolutely ace but it's more proto-flowery.

As for "Their Satanic...", I didn't know it was highly rated to begin with so I can't call it overrated really. Then again, it might be one of those albums where "everyone" has started to point out that it's not that bad (its status was that of a total disaster for many years) and actually pretty good and that has arguably made it overrated. If anything, it's something of a cliche to call it "underrated" today. For me, if viewed as a "Sgt Pepper..."-ripoff disaster, I think it's underrated, if viewed as a good Stones-album, I think it's overrated...

What the blood claaat ???

but I'd rather listen to the Stones any day of the week and twice on Sunday. I also think it's less of a blowout than is often implied - while the Beatles have an amazing catalog of songs, the Stones also have a shit-ton of great ones, including a couple that I think are pretty much the apex of rock 'n roll.

.