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Rating: Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Bill Wyman, Brian Jones, and Charlie Watts, known as The Rolling Stones, remarkably bounce to the top of the hit parade thanks to a bold and lethal album, fierce and irresistible, cruel and playful.
The album is "Out of Our Heads" and it stands out, especially for "(I can't get no) Satisfaction", perhaps the band's most famous and beloved track. It is 1965 and rock, after years of 'Be Bop a Lula' and 'Tutti Frutti' has decided, almost mechanically, to change course and shock the conformists.
We are in the midst of the Sixties, harmless and tender beat music is sailing smoothly, the Beatles are all the rage with "Love Me Do" and Alberto Sordi is about to escape to England in search of a bit of "Fumo di Londra." However, something is about to change. The first signals arrive in 1964 when the Rolling Stones release their debut album, "The Rolling Stones" in which they devilishly twist famous black music and country-blues tracks. The debut is electrifying: in half an hour the Stones sweep away any shadow of doubt, leave no room for calculated vulgarity, and burst onto the scene with a force and determination never seen or heard before. The Decca, a historic Anglo-Saxon production house, immediately decides to sign them. The second album is "The Rolling Stones No. 2", a sort of self-remake of the previous record (this time, even blues, rock, and rock & billy songs are revamped). However, the great success will come only with the third and most exciting rock album: "Out of Our Heads."
"Out of Our Heads" is a complex and meticulous work. The Stones unleash with high-level American covers ("Mercy Mercy", "That's How Strong My Love Is", "Cry to Me") and then, almost mathematically, load the gun and hit the target: "Satisfaction" is an acoustic and vocal masterpiece, perhaps the highest example of how the Stones were able to disrupt the rules of rock and, without using particular hyperboles, how they were able to create, almost from nothing, a series of musical genres that later became famous (hard rock, disco, punk). "Satisfaction" is obsessive, spasmodic, gritty, combative: the guitar always plays those four chords, the drums 'bang' to exhaustion, and the bass pumps in an almost infernal manner. From this very simple musical concept (playing the same note until it becomes almost unbearable), soon emerged the great musical genres that are often, a bit superficially, praised as creative and original (Velvet Underground, Deep Purple, Beastie Boys).
"Satisfaction" is a timeless masterpiece that owes all its strength and effectiveness to the artistic genius of Keith Richards (excellent in creating a simple yet extremely difficult melody) capable, in a few minutes, of overturning and shocking an entire music-loving and rebellious generation. "Out of Our Heads" was the turning point Decca had been waiting for at least two years. The Stones became legendary and the beautiful "Heart of Stone" (today unjustly underestimated) was sung, for almost a decade, by at least one generation of impulsive and shaggy youths. "Out of Our Heads" is still today a sort of farsighted musical masterpiece (effective, besides the guitar, are the drums and bass), undoubtedly effective on a vocal level, perhaps a bit dated in terms of writing (the lyrics, "Satisfaction" aside, aren't particularly impressive), yet, these five British bad boys seem anything but human.
The cover is curious: the Rolling Stones appear in the foreground (very young and clean-shaven) with a haircut very similar to that of the fabulous four from Liverpool. It is, in fact, a clever commercial operation: not yet certain of a definitive success, the Stones try to emulate, at least in hairstyle, the already famous Beatles. The operation was, naturally, very successful.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Mercy, Mercy (02:49)
Have mercy, have mercy, baby
Have mercy, have mercy on me
Well I went to see the gypsy
To have my fortune read She said "Man, your baby gonna leave you
Her bags are packed up under the bed,"
That's right
Have mercy, have mercy, baby
Have mercy, have mercy on me
But if you leave me baby
Girl if you put me down
I'm gonna make it to the nearest river child
And jump overboard and drown
That's right
Have mercy, have mercy, baby
Have mercy, have mercy on me
I said hey hey baby, hey hey now
What you trying to do
Hey hey baby, hey hey now
Please don't say we're through
Have mercy, have mercy, baby
Have mercy, have mercy on me
But if you stay baby
I tell you what I'm gonna do
I'm gonna work two jobs, seven days a week
And bring my money home to you
That's right
Have mercy, have mercy, baby
Have mercy, have mercy on me
Yeah
Have mercy, have mercy, baby
Have mercy, have mercy on me
02 Hitch Hike (02:27)
(Gaye/Stevenson/Paul)
I'm going to Chicago that's the last place my baby stayed
I'm packing up my bags I'm gonna leave this town right away
I'm gonna find that girl if I have to hitch hike around the world
"Chicago City" that's what the sign on the freeway read
I'm gonna keep on going 'til I get to that street's called 6th and Main
I've gotta find that girl if i have to hitch hike around the world
C'mon hitch hike
Hitch hike children
Hitch hike
Hitch hike baby
Hitch hike
Hitch hike baby
C'mon hitch hike
Hitch hike darling
I'm going to St. Louis but my next stop just might be L.A., that's what I say
I got no money in my pocket so i'm going to have to hitch hike all the way
I'm gonna find that girl if i have to hitch hike around the world
C'mon hitch hike
Hitch hike children
Hitch hike
Hitch hike baby
Hitch hike
Hitch hike baby
C'mon hitch hike
Hitch hike children
Now c'mon c'mon hitch hike
Hitch hike children
Hitch hike
Hitch hike darling
C'mon hitch hike
Hitch hike children
Hitch hike hitch hike
Hitch hike baby
Mmmmm...
07 (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction (03:47)
I can't get no satisfaction
I can't get no satisfaction
'Cause I try, and I try, and I try, and I try
I can't get no, I can't get no
When I'm drivin' in my car
And a man comes on the radio
He's tellin' me more and more
About some useless information
Supposed to fire my imagination
I can't get no, oh no no no
Hey hey hey, that's what I say
I can't get no satisfaction
I can't get no satisfaction
'Cause I try, and I try, and I try, and I try
I can't get no, I can't get no
When I'm watchin' my TV
And a man comes on and tells me
How white my shirts can be
Well he can't be a man 'cause he doesn't smoke
The same cigarettes as me
I can't get no, oh no no no
Hey hey hey, that's what I say
I can't get no satisfaction
I can't get no girl reaction
'Cause I try, and I try, and I try, and I try
I can't get no, I can't get no
When I'm ridin' 'round the world
And I'm doin' this and I'm signin' that
And I'm tryin' to make some girl
Who tells me, "baby better come back later next week
'Cause you see I'm on losin' streak"
I can't get no, oh no no no
Hey hey hey, that's what I say
I can't get no, I can't get no
I can't get no
Satisfaction, no satisfaction, no satisfaction, no satisfaction
I can't get no
10 Play With Fire (02:18)
( Nanker Phelge)
Well, you've got your diamonds and you've got your pretty clothes
And the chauffeur drives your car
You let everybody know
But don't play with me, 'cause you're playing with fire
Your mother she's an heiress, owns a block in Saint John's Wood
And your father'd be there with her
If he only could
But don't play with me, 'cause you're playing with fire
Your old man took her diamond's and tiaras by the score
Now she gets her kicks in Stepney
Not in Knightsbridge anymore
So don't play with me, 'cause you're playing with fire
Now you've got some diamonds and you will have some others
But you'd better watch your step, girl
Or start living with your mother
So don't play with me, 'cause you're playing with fire
So don't play with me, 'cause you're playing with fire
11 The Spider and the Fly (03:41)
(M. Jagger/K. Richards)
Sittin' thinkin' sinkin' drinkin'
Wondering what I'd do when I'm through tonight
Smoking moping, maybe just hopin'
Some little girl will pass on by
Don't wanna be alone but I love my girl at home
I remember what she said
She said, "My, my, my don't tell lies, keep fidelity in your head
My, my, my don't tell lies, when you've done the show go to bed
Don't say hi, like a spider to a fly
Jump right ahead and you're dead"
Sit up, fed up, low down go 'round
Down to the bar at the place I'm at
Sitting drinking, supereficially thinking
About the rinsed-out blonde on my left
Then I said, "hi", like a spider to a fly
Remebering what my little girl said
She was common, flirty, she looked about thirty
I would have run away but I was on my own
She told me later she's a machine operator
She said she liked the way I held the microphone
I said my, my, like the spider to the fly
Jump right ahead in my web
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Other reviews
By charles
We immediately find ourselves facing the greatness of the Jagger character, not a great singer but with an interpretative ability truly among the best.
"Satisfaction," to which any description or commentary would definitely be superfluous.
By MauroCincotta66
The album captures the raw energy that made The Rolling Stones legendary.
'Out of Our Heads' remains a timeless rock classic that continues to inspire.
