The Rolling Stones

The Stones 65-67.

Gered Mankowitz. Vision On, 2002.

Gered and I decided that the shoot would have to be done with the arriving dawn as the Stones finished the night's recording. At 5am we had fried eggs, fried bread and hot, strong tea and smoke and, in my Phantom V and Keith's drop-dead-drophead Bentley, drove as fast as possible from Olympic in Barnes to Primrose Hill in northwest London...We made the drive in just under twenty minutes. To keep the group alert (and, hopefully, amused) I had my driver ease the Phantom V into the park and as far up to the top of Primrose Hill as he could go.

In the foreword to this collection of Mankowitz's photographs Andrew Loog Oldham, co-manager and producer of the Rolling Stones from 1963 to1967, recalls the 1966 photo session for the cover of the album Between the Buttons, then being recorded at Olympic Sound Studios in Barnes.

Just down the hill from where we had parked we spied another morning visitor. A long-haired, bearded, overcoat-clad hippie stood on one foot, the other crossed ballet-style, sole pressed to the inside of his knee, playing his flute to welcome the new morning. He amazed and chuffed us all by being totally immune to our arrival at the top of his manor in the long black-windowed Rolls. He played away in the Baskerville-ish, smoky, near-morning light (p.2-3).