Carly Simon’s biggest hit, instantly recognisable from that bass line burble at its start and subject to much interpretation over the years. Warren Beatty has been pointed to as the object of Simon’s lyric and Simon has said the second verse is indeed about him but the others aren’t necessarily.
I knew that Mick Jagger had been an uncredited backing singer on this but it wasn’t until one day it was on in the background in a shoe shop in Kirkcaldy that I made out his voice. Now I can’t stop hearing him every time it plays.
Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts, never really one to seek the limelight so it’s a bit ironic he was a member of one of the biggest entertainment acts of the last 60 years, has died. He was a key contributor to that act’s sound.
I was of course aware of The Rolling Stones from frequent TV appearances before 1966 but that was the year my family finally got a transistor radio and I could listen to the radio on my own. As a result Let’s Spend the Night Together was the first Stones track that really made an impact on me.
This is a clip I remember vividly from Top of the Pops and shows Mick Jagger’s ability to sell a song. He’s moving around so much that the cameraman’s close-up fails to keep him in shot. Charlie drum rolls on this are delicious, though, and make the track.
As I recall some DJs and radio stations in the US objected to the implication in the song’s title and demanded it be changed to Let’s Spend Some Time Together.
The Rolling Stones: Let’s Spend the Night Together
That single’s double A-side, Ruby Tuesday, features some more signature drumming by Charlie.
The Rolling Stones: Ruby Tuesday
Charles Robert (Charlie) Watts: 2/6/1941 – 24/8/2021. So it goes.
Another one from 1970 but this is one of the great cover versions. A Jagger-Richard composition, Melanie (Safka) invests Ruby Tuesday with much more emotion than Jagger ever could.
I’d remembered this as a sixties song but though it was recorded in 1968 I discovered on looking it up it wasn’t released till 1970.
Not one of the better known Jagger/Richard compositions. Memo From Turner was written for and featured heavily in the film Performance in which Jagger had an acting role.
This wasn’t a single (so falls outwith the artificial borders of my category – which admittedly I have breached at least three times already) but there is a link to this time of year, albeit tenuous.
The first time I heard this was on a BBC retrospective of music from the 60s, aired I think on Hogmanay 1969. As I recall Mick Jagger was prancing around with some floaty bits of black cloth which were attached to his shirt flying about as he moved.*
The intro for me conjures up weird, not to mention approaching menace. Much more so than Sympathy For The Devil.
“Ooooh, ooooh, ooooh.” “Ooooh, ooooh, ooooh.”
*Edited (2/12/19) to add. This seems to be that performance. Bits of red cloth too I see.
