One of my all time favorites. So happy they did it on the Licks Tour. Was beginning to think I'd never see it played live. This song has that deep down dirty feel to it. A very important ingredient in Stones music for me.

This is one of the tunes which made me realize the Stones were not just pop stars but could crank out good, nasty rock and roll. Keith and Mick at the top of their game, heading in a direction which would be their best legacy.

One of the few Stones tunes that I like the live (Ya Ya's) version better than the studio (B version. Mick Taylor just absolutely rips on the Ya Ya's version. Ron Wood has never come close on his live versions.

Charlie on the other hand is wonderful on this live version, just a pleasure to watch and hear.

[www.youtube.com]


peace

The 'secret' is that the Ya-Yas version counterbalances and is a counter-point to the BB version. The BB version is street-tough, dark, and menacing. The Ya-Yas version is a sad and tragic bird's-eye-view of a terrible societal situation. Teenage runaways, you almost want to cry when he sings "13-years-old."

What's also incredible is the way they rearranged the live version in 69. I find it's a real "guitar trip/semi-trance." If you listen hard enough you can even sense a kind of "Gimme Shelter" feel lurking in the background.

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Silver Dagger

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DandelionPowderman

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Silver Dagger

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Greenblues

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Silver Dagger
One of the most remarkable and controversial songs in the Stones canon.

It’s also one that owes nothing to any musical path that the band had taken before – not blues nor r’n’b or pop or the spangly psychedelia that was the current rage and had informed their previous album.

This was bold new ground, the dawning of the rock era and a very edgy sound that perfectly complemented its daring and challenging subject matter, but more about that later.

The song blazes open with Mick's sexually charged feline-like squeal sung in a lewd falsetto before descending to a debauched growl and a boast of “yeah I got some tail”. That’s some opening gambit and this dizzy up and down effect is echoed throughout the song with glissando slide guitars adding to the sense of unease and menace.

(...)

That see-sawing effect reminds me a little bit of The Beatles’ Helter Skelter – a song which actually did go on to inspire unspeakable evil.

Where did the music come from? I’ve read somewhere that Jagger was inspired after hearing The Velvet Underground’s Heroin which has a similar intro. But as the song peaks it becomes almost shamanic and trance inducing. Was Brian was responsible for this with his interest in Moroccan pan music, I wonder?

I can also hear elements of the experimental London underground sound being created by Pink Floyd around this time, especially the last 90 seconds of the song which has Mick ad libbing some unintelligible words as it reaches its climax with tribal drumming and a deranged cacophony. It’s heady stuff and very powerful.

(...)

Stray Cat Blues is a true one off, a real rarity and a great example of the band's experimental side.

Well put, Silver Dagger! To me the vicous, primitive sound of this track, especially the guitars, is even more impressing and suggestive than the depraved lyrics. To me the VU-Connection makes sense, not so much regarding "Heroin" (exept for the intro), but the White Light/White Heat album. There*s also some "drone" element in the loud, shrieking guitars of Stray Cat Blues, I guess, just as in Street Fighting Man (you pointed out the possible Moroccan influence), which is also present in certain Velvet tracks. Anyway, I think this is a most interesting moment in Stones history... even more interesting in a way than, say, the Exile Period.

I don't think the Stones get their fair credit for helping to introduce world music/droning experimental sounds to a wider pop audience.

The Beatles and The Kinks are often cited as leading the way with the songs Norwegian Wood, Tomorrow Never Knows and See My Friends. The Stones charged into this area wholeheartedly with wild tracks such as Gomper, Sing This All Together (See What Happens) and Stray Cat Blues. In fact let's not forget the importance of Sympathy For The Devil as helping to introduce samba rhythms to a mainstream rock audience.

And before that: Paint It, Black

And let's not forget Mother's Little Helper. I think they must have lived near a kebab shop as there was certainly a strong Turkish influence in their music!

the first kebab shop opened in the UK was in 1966 in London, Mother's Little helper was recorded in 1965 in Hollywood, and I think Brian used the Indian sitar.

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runaway
... Mother's Little helper was recorded in 1965 in Hollywood, and I think Brian used the Indian sitar.

"(The strange guitar sound is) a 12-string with a slide on it. It's played slightly Oriental-ish. The track just needed something to make it twang."
- Keith in 2002, quoted here: [www.timeisonourside.com]

As for Stray Cat: This is the track that I bought Beggars for.
It was the most gloriously raunchy thing I had ever heard - still is, probably.
I mean just listen to that white-hot filthiness - I love the Rolling Stones

You should add that Keith played the 12-string, dear with sssoul

Do you think Mick regretted that he used an 13 year old in the song....although we never know how old she really was as she probably suggested to show here ID.......but on the other hand maybe Mick just didn't wanted to know her real age at all.

Afterall he changed it to 16 years in the live performances...........

__________________________

In the studio track she's 15. It was in concert that he lowered it (for a while) to 13.

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DandelionPowderman
You should add that Keith played the 12-string, dear with sssoul

I wanted to break it to runaway gently, Dandy dear.

Plus which! While we're talking about great sonic predecessors to this track,
let's not forget The Lantern, Citadel and 2000 Man, where we can hear Keith developing Stray Cat's snarl



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2014-11-10 22:54 by with sssoul.

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with sssoul
In the studio track she's 15. It was in concert that he lowered it (for a while) to 13.

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DandelionPowderman
You should add that Keith played the 12-string, dear with sssoul

I wanted to break it to runaway gently, Dandy dear.

Plus which! While we're talking about great sonic predecessors to this track,
let's not forget The Lantern, Citadel and 2000 Man, where we can hear Keith developing Stray Cat's snarl

In the studio track she's 15. It was in concert that he lowered it (for a while) to 13.

Your right with sssoul, listening to much to the live recordings must have fooled me.....

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with sssoul

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runaway
... Mother's Little helper was recorded in 1965 in Hollywood, and I think Brian used the Indian sitar.

"(The strange guitar sound is) a 12-string with a slide on it. It's played slightly Oriental-ish. The track just needed something to make it twang."
- Keith in 2002, quoted here: [www.timeisonourside.com]

As for Stray Cat: This is the track that I bought Beggars for.
It was the most gloriously raunchy thing I had ever heard - still is, probably.
I mean just listen to that white-hot filthiness - I love the Rolling Stones

Mother's Little Helper " BJ Gtr, Sitar- Nico Zentgraf".
Beggars Banquet was probebly my first Stones album at the time and Stray Cat is a sexy track-amezing album.

Soundgarden did a great cover....................





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Funny enough, I did not understand the English for years, yet it still had (and has) the same effect of me. It is not the words. It is the music. The studio version (and Licks version) intro is simple but magic, and the whole feel of it is dark, even if you don't understand the words. One of their best.

Back in the late 60's early 70's I didn't had the lyrics, although I did understand the song...but I always thought he'd sang "I don't want your Idea" instead if ID, for me it made sense because he didn't want to no what she thought. ;o)

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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2014-11-11 01:29 by NICOS.

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__________________________




Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2014-11-11 01:29 by NICOS.

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liddas

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drewmaster

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liddas
It's incredible how such a messy bass works!



C

Agreed. But was it Bill or Keith on bass? René lists it as Keith and elsewhere I've seen it listed as Bill.

Drew

Keith all the way. Absolutely no doubt.

C

So Nico Zentgraf got it wrong? From his website:

681206A 6th December: THE ROLLING STONES. LP ‘Beggars Banquet’ (Decca SKL 4955). Producer: Jimmy Miller. Line-up ‘Stray Cat Blues’: MJ (voc)/KR (gtr)/BJ (mellotron)/BW (bass)/CW (dr)/Nicky Hopkins (p)/Rocky Dijon (congas)

Drew



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2014-11-11 03:55 by drewmaster.

Hmmm... I was mentally ready for "Street Fighting Man" (like Rene supposedly as well..), but this can't be much close enough...

With the obvious "Sympathy For The Devil" and mentioned "Street Fighting Man", the third dark masterpiece song of BEGGARS BANQUET, being one big reason alone why the whole album showed such an incredible artistic maturation. Probably not as popular and having such classical status in their canon as those two mentioned, but "Stray Cat Blues" has probably lost least of them anything of its danger and threat along the years. Both musically and lyrically (an in that order) it captures the Stones at their very dirtiest, meanest, rawest, darest and filthiest. Maybe because it is such an extreme statement, it is doomed to remain a secret album highlight - 'radio-friendly' is not a term to describe it (now even less than in 1968). Someone mentioned that it is 'pre-grunge' - probably so, but to my ears the whole grunge genre of the 90's sounds sweet pop music compared to it....

Wonderful discussion here so far of its origin and probable influences, and I don't have anything to add, really. We can hear there the free-going experimental spirit of SATANIC MAJESTIES but directed to very different kind of direction, probably inspired to an extend, say, The Velvet Underground, British underground, some oriental influences, and marinated with their natural home language of blues they had just re-discovered - the result going way beyond any recognized form of pop music by then, making pure art out of cacophony. A genius piece of work. One of their most wonderful studio recordings ever. The most darest one, for sure.

- Doxa



Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 2014-11-12 10:58 by Doxa.

Great great great song....powerful and menacing.

I love how you get three rocking verses, each hitting a little harder than the one before it, then a great shouting chorus, and just when you might expect some release - a guitar lead, a bridge - BAM! You get another verse, even more impossibly rocking than before. I love that relentlessness. It's like some Dylan songs that just gain in intensity verse after verse, and when you expect some relief, you don't get it.

I much prefer the Beggars version because the Ya Yas version just doesn't rock relentlessly that way. If you want to call it head-banging appeal, I wouldn't disagree.

Outstanding track on the greatest album ever made.

Mick's performance of this at the Wiltern in Los Angeles is probably his most stand out moment I have seen him live. I really suspect he wanted to show the VIPs who's who & what's what. I'm pretty sure the VIP balcony (b/c the rest of us got in line at midnight & made it front row center) all went home, quit their jobs & became members of a traveling circus. Why keep trying after seeing Mick that night?

Keef did hand me 2 picks that night Best show of my life...and I'm no novice.

Incredible track ... and the guitar style became a staple for Guns & Roses, it was imitated in several of their songs (they were admittedly huge Stones fans).

Simply outstanding song. CLASSIC. BOTH THE BB version and YA YAS versions are top shelf for me.

The guitar, the anger in Jaggers vocals, even the drumming.... Just a wonderful, troubling song.

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sdstonesguy
Outstanding track on the greatest album ever made.

Mick's performance of this at the Wiltern in Los Angeles is probably his most stand out moment I have seen him live. I really suspect he wanted to show the VIPs who's who & what's what. I'm pretty sure the VIP balcony (b/c the rest of us got in line at midnight & made it front row center) all went home, quit their jobs & became members of a traveling circus. Why keep trying after seeing Mick that night?

Keef did hand me 2 picks that night Best show of my life...and I'm no novice.

Nice story and thanks for the laugh! peace

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drewmaster

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liddas

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drewmaster

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liddas
It's incredible how such a messy bass works!



C

Agreed. But was it Bill or Keith on bass? René lists it as Keith and elsewhere I've seen it listed as Bill.

Drew

Keith all the way. Absolutely no doubt.

C

So Nico Zentgraf got it wrong? From his website:

681206A 6th December: THE ROLLING STONES. LP ‘Beggars Banquet’ (Decca SKL 4955). Producer: Jimmy Miller. Line-up ‘Stray Cat Blues’: MJ (voc)/KR (gtr)/BJ (mellotron)/BW (bass)/CW (dr)/Nicky Hopkins (p)/Rocky Dijon (congas)

Drew

It's Keith.

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DandelionPowderman

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drewmaster

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liddas

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drewmaster

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liddas
It's incredible how such a messy bass works!



C

Agreed. But was it Bill or Keith on bass? René lists it as Keith and elsewhere I've seen it listed as Bill.

Drew

Keith all the way. Absolutely no doubt.

C

So Nico Zentgraf got it wrong? From his website:

681206A 6th December: THE ROLLING STONES. LP ‘Beggars Banquet’ (Decca SKL 4955). Producer: Jimmy Miller. Line-up ‘Stray Cat Blues’: MJ (voc)/KR (gtr)/BJ (mellotron)/BW (bass)/CW (dr)/Nicky Hopkins (p)/Rocky Dijon (congas)

Drew

It's Keith.

Keith couldn't possibly have played such lame bass...and I'm surprised that even Bill could have done it...

2 1 2 0

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Come On

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DandelionPowderman

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drewmaster

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liddas

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drewmaster

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liddas
It's incredible how such a messy bass works!



C

Agreed. But was it Bill or Keith on bass? René lists it as Keith and elsewhere I've seen it listed as Bill.

Drew

Keith all the way. Absolutely no doubt.

C

So Nico Zentgraf got it wrong? From his website:

681206A 6th December: THE ROLLING STONES. LP ‘Beggars Banquet’ (Decca SKL 4955). Producer: Jimmy Miller. Line-up ‘Stray Cat Blues’: MJ (voc)/KR (gtr)/BJ (mellotron)/BW (bass)/CW (dr)/Nicky Hopkins (p)/Rocky Dijon (congas)

Drew

It's Keith.

Keith couldn't possibly have played such lame bass...and I'm surprised that even Bill could have done it...

When you listen to Stray Cat Blues, do you really think that the bass is lame? I don't. It's excellent.

Listening to isolated tracks is pointless. Keith plays WITH the music here, and the result, as we all know, is magical.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2014-11-11 11:02 by DandelionPowderman.

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drewmaster

So Nico Zentgraf got it wrong? From his website:

681206A 6th December: THE ROLLING STONES. LP ‘Beggars Banquet’ (Decca SKL 4955). Producer: Jimmy Miller. Line-up ‘Stray Cat Blues’: MJ (voc)/KR (gtr)/BJ (mellotron)/BW (bass)/CW (dr)/Nicky Hopkins (p)/Rocky Dijon (congas)

Drew

I would say so.

Here is the isolated bass track from Gimme Shelter.

video: [www.youtube.com]

THIS is Bill.

The Stray Cat bass is clearly a guitarist work. The notes are fretted inaccurately (lots of buzzing), so there is less umpf in the tone, so to say, the time is wobbly (which to a certain extent can be justified if the SC bass was overdubbed) the licks are "guitarish" - it just can't be Bill. Or, if it was him, he must have been on some truly bad shi@t

C

Keith probably on bass on GS as well.

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Redhotcarpet
Keith probably on bass on GS as well.

Timeisonourside doesn't even say "probable line up":

Line-up:

Drums: Charlie Watts
Bass: Bill Wyman
Electric guitars: Keith Richards
Lead vocals: Mick Jagger & Merry Clayton
Background vocals: Mick Jagger, Keith Richards & Merry Clayton
Piano: Nicky Hopkins
Harmonica: Mick Jagger
Guiro: Jimmy Miller
Maracas: Jimmy Miller

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liddas

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drewmaster

So Nico Zentgraf got it wrong? From his website:

681206A 6th December: THE ROLLING STONES. LP ‘Beggars Banquet’ (Decca SKL 4955). Producer: Jimmy Miller. Line-up ‘Stray Cat Blues’: MJ (voc)/KR (gtr)/BJ (mellotron)/BW (bass)/CW (dr)/Nicky Hopkins (p)/Rocky Dijon (congas)

Drew

I would say so.

Here is the isolated bass track from Gimme Shelter.

video: [www.youtube.com]

THIS is Bill.

The Stray Cat bass is clearly a guitarist work. The notes are fretted inaccurately (lots of buzzing), so there is less umpf in the tone, so to say, the time is wobbly (which to a certain extent can be justified if the SC bass was overdubbed) the licks are "guitarish" - it just can't be Bill. Or, if it was him, he must have been on some truly bad shi@t

C

Nico Zentgraf doesn't claim to have everything right, he says he's a "collector", and in for corrections and alterations.

Actually no Stones site claims to have everything right. In case of doubt just trust your ears.

Not even the Stones's own album liner notes have everything right