How the Rolling Stones Used Varispeed to Match Double-Tracked Harmonium to Bass on 'Something Happened to Me Yesterday'

The woozy, carnival-like lurch of “Something Happened to Me Yesterday” comes from a clever varispeed trick. The Stones double-tracked Brian Jones’s harmonium, then used varispeed to detune each take slightly before layering them. That gave the instrument a warped, chorus-like wobble. The bigger trick: they also varispeeded the bass track to match the harmonium’s combined pitch, so it all locked together instead of sounding like a mess.

The song was recorded in December 1966 at RCA Studios in Hollywood, with Dave Hassinger engineering. Andrew Loog Oldham pushed for these kinds of experimental overdubs to make Between the Buttons feel like a psychedelic music-hall record. The result is a track that sounds drunk on its own machinery — the bass and harmonium sway