ROLLING STONES @ 50

This year marks the 50^th anniversary of ‘the world’s greatest rock’n’roll band’, The Rolling Stones.  It was in 1962 that Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Bill Wyman, Charlie Watts and Brian Jones got together as The Stones...and they’re still going strong (although Brian Jones died in July of 1969 at the age of 27 and Bill Wyman retired from the group in 1993).  The Stones first hit Billboards’ Hot 100 chart in 1964 with their version of the Buddy Holly song, “Not Fade Away”.  Since then, they’ve charted 60+ singles.  Not all of them were huge hits, but they charted nonetheless.

Although we did ask questions about the Stones 50^th anniversary a few months back, this time we’ll give you a lyric line or two and you have to supply the song title.  Every song was a Top 10 hit and you’ve probably sung them in your car or around your house or apartment dozens of times.  You’ll get a lot of “Satisfaction” if you answer all these questions correctly.    

QUESTIONS:

1.  What Rolling Stones song do the following lyrics come from?  “I was drowned, I was washed up and left for dead.  I fell down to my feet and I saw they bled.”                                                                                                             

2.  The lyrics to this 1966 Stones song went like this:  “Well it seems to me that you have seen too much in too few years .  And though you’ve tried, you just can’t hide, your eyes are edged with tears.”  What’s the title of this 11^th charted Stones single (HINT:  Numbers can be fun).   

  

3.  This song comes from the Stones 1981 album, “Tattoo You”.  It didn’t make number one in North America, but was the runner up for 3 weeks.  The lyrics are:  “You make a grown man cry.  Ride like the wind at double speed.  I’ll take you places that you’ve never, never seen.”

4.  If you can’t get the answer to this one, you might have to turn in your Rolling Stones fan club card.  The opening lyrics are:  “I met a gin soaked, bar-room queen in Memphis.  She tried to take me upstairs for a ride”.  And the song title is...?  

5.  This Stones hit made it to # 3 in 1980.  The name of this song is also the title of the Stones album.  The lyrics are:  “Don’t you know promises were never made to keep.  Just like the night dissolve off into sleep.  I’ll be your saviour, steadfast and true...”  The title is in the very next line, so what’s the name of the song?

ANSWERS

1.  That would be “Jumpin’ Jack Flash”, a # 3 song on Billboards Hot 100 chart in 1968.   Whoopi Goldberg starred in a movie titled, “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” in 1986 - the plot revolved around a bank employee who gets caught up in a spy ring.  I don’t think Mick Jagger and Keith Richards had this scenario in mind when they wrote the song.  But hey, they got a ton of cash for letting the producers use the title and their song in the movie.  Britain’s Q magazine, in its 2005 list of “100 Greatest Guitar Tracks”, placed “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” at # 2.              

2.  The song in question was “19^th Nervous Breakdown”.  Mick Jagger and Keith Richards wrote it during the Stones 4^th tour of the United States in 1965 and recorded it in the RCA studios in Hollywood in December of that year.  On a “Saturday Night Live” program earlier this year, guest host Mick Jagger sang this song, accompanied by The Foo Fighters.  If anyone remembers the short lived TV series from 2010, “Miami Medical”, then they might remember that “19^th Nervous Breakdown” was used as the theme song.  That series only last for 13 episodes, so chances are nobody remembers it at all.       

3.  “Arthur’s Theme (Best That You Can Do)” by Christopher Cross and Daryl Hall & John Oates hit, “Private Eyes” kept “Start Me Up” from the # 1 spot on Billboard’s Hot 100 singles chart in the late fall of 1981, although the song did hit the top spot in Australia.  The Stones had recorded the song many different times.  During the “Some Girls” sessions in 1978, the song was called “Never Stop”.  The next year, while the Stones were recording the “Emotional Rescue” album, it was known as “Start It Up”.  It was eventually finished, renamed “Start Me Up” and released on 1981’s “Tattoo You” album, which itself, was # 1 on the Album chart for 9 weeks from September 19^th until November 14^th.            

4.  You know it.  You love it.  You turn up the radio every time that opening cowbell comes on.  “Honky Tonk Women” triumphed at # 1 for four weeks in 1969.  The hit version was only released as a single and first showed up on an album on the “Through The Past, Darkly (Big Hits Volume 2)” released later in 1969.  According to Rolling Stone magazine, the song is # 116 in its 2004 list of the “500 Greatest Songs of All Time”.  Stones producer Jimmy Miller played the cowbell, by the way.   A country-fied version called “Country Honk” appeared on the Stones album, “Let It Bleed” released in December of 1969.  The opening lyrics to that version are:  “I’m sittin’ in a bar, tipplin’ a jar in Jackson.”   

5.  The next lyric line was “I’ll come to your emotional rescue”.  The title “Emotional Rescue” was also used as the title for the album, which was # 1 on Billboards’ Album album chart for 7 straight weeks during the summer of 1980.  The single was truly an international hit, having been recorded in Nassau, Paris and New York City.  It was a disco influenced hit, partially because Mick Jagger spent a lot of time at the legendary Studio 54 in New York and absorbed the sound and feel of those disco songs they were playing there during the late 1970’s.