Turn Yer Ya-Ya's Up - 10/16/23

Some of our favorite Stones covers, for Rolling Stones Week

Oct 16, 2023

It’s Rolling Stones Week at No Fences Review. With Hackney Diamonds due on Friday—their first studio album since Blue & Lonesome in 2016 and the first ever without Charlie Watts behind the kit—we thought the time was right to take a brief glance back at the band’s legacy. First up, we focus our weekly listening recommendations on the band’s role as songwriters and influencers. It’s not definitive by any means, and we’ve purposely skipped some justifiably canonical choices. (And remember that Charles recently spotlighted a great recent cover from Elisapie.) But we hope that you’ll still want to turn ‘em up. (As always, there are also some new reading recommendations at the bottom.) Let us know in the comments if you have favorite Stones covers that aren’t here, and stay tuned for more Stones all week long.

“Salt of the Earth” - Rotary Connection (from Songs, 1969)

On Beggar’s Banquet, this working-class toasting track hits a little like a Brit-boho version of Alabama’s “Forty Hour Week,” if only thematically. Even the song’s distancing bridge—which pegs salt-of-the-Earth types as a good-enough reason for another print, sure, but also sees them as strange and unreal—works for me because that emotional detachment is coming, after all, from Mick Jagger, who does detachment for a living. On the other hand, when Minnie Ripperton, Rotary Connection’s lead singer, claims that hard-working people are unreal and unrecognizable, it borders on race-and-class treachery: Her dad was a Pullman porter, for people-power’s sake! Still, the record is saved and then some by its grand setting. Rotary’s heartfelt take, full of striving strings and dramatic church organ and horns, presents the proletarian stakes here as life and death. Attention must be paid. - DC

“No Expectations” - Tom T. Hall & Earl Scruggs (from The Storyteller and the Banjoman, 1982) and “Honky Tonk Women” - Earl Scruggs (from Nashville’s Rock, 1971)

This banjo-with-drums-and-trumpets take on “Honky Tonk Women” is such a delightful surprise—one more reminder of what a brilliant and capacious musician Earl Scruggs was. (And if you know who that woman is who keeps singing the title, then screaming like Merry Clayton crossed with Margie Hendrix, please write!) Tom T. Hall doing “No Expectations” is delightful, too, but not what I’d call surprising. “Take me to the station, put me on a train…” sounds like a Tom T. opener if I ever heard one, and the Storyteller must have shaken his head enviously at “As I watch you leaving me, you pack my peace of mind.” “Play it, Earl,” Tom T. says, and Scruggs’s solo sounds like it can’t catch a train fast enough. - DC

“Honky Tonk Women” Charlie Walker (from Honky Tonkin’ with Charlie Walker, 1971)

The very best “Honky Tonk Women” are: 1) the Stones’ original; 2) their “Country Honk” follow-up; and 3) Charlie Walker’s #56 country hit. Twangy Texan Walker and countrypolitan producer Billy Sherrill (playing way-ay against type) earn bonus points right out the gate by downshifting Keef’s indelible lick into the airhorn on some a-passin’-everything-in-sight Peterbilt. But what really sells this one is the chorus, a clanging, banging full-on singalong at some little dive I never want to leave. “Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! The honky-tonk blues!” - DC

“(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” Jerry Lee Lewis (from The (Complete) Session Recorded in London with Great Artists, 2006)

A rock-and-roll visit to London during his country stardom peak, Lewis was backed here by an all-star trio of electric guitarists (Albert Lee, Rory Gallagher, Peter Frampton), yet supposedly still felt like the Stones’ original was too good to mess with. “They did that one so good that me singin’ it would be like stickin’ a greasy noodle up some critter’s ass,” Lewis reportedly snarled. (Wait... What?) In any case, he always did love Jerry Leeing-up someone else’s signature, though, and the song’s frustrated sentiment could hardly be more up his alley. He pares things down to one bored pass through that “useless information” verse, then bellows chorus after chorus after malcontented chorus. Did anyone ever sound more perpetually dissatisfied than Jerry Lee Lewis? - DC

“Happy” Pointer Sisters (from Priority, 1979)

With session pros David Spinoza and Waddy Wachtel waving broadly in the direction of the parts Keith laid down in the studio, and with Stones supplement Nicky Hopkins adding piano, this Pointers track sounds a little like Rolling Stones karaoke—and for a few words there, I always think it’s Elton John doing the singing. It’s June Pointer, though, manifesting (as the sisters do on this entire album) an alternative universe where the Pointers are full-fledged arena rockers. Keef’s original is decadent raggedy fun, but June, with Anita’s and Ruth’s supportive harmonies backing her on each joyous chorus, really leans into that “I need love to keep me happy.” The point is that - in this rock and roll life - she’s going to need her sisters’ love. - DC

“Down Home Girl” Nic Armstrong & the Thieves (from The Greatest White Liar, 2004) and The Coasters (from On Broadway, 1973)

“Down Home Girl” is a Jerry Leiber and Artie Butler number, first recorded in 1964 by New Orleans R&B man Alvin Robinson. So, yeah, these versions of the song aren’t technically covering the Stones. But “Down Home Girl” has been covered a couple dozen times through the decades precisely because the Stones chose to cut it for their second album. Including it here underscores that the band’s influence was always bound up not just with originals but in their popularizing, and often exoticizing, taste in American roots music. Take Nic Armstrong, a fellow Brit whose irresistibly groovy version of the song leans both into mocking the title woman’s lack of sophistication and into the sexual attraction he, like Mick before him, feels for her. Sneering and slippery behind processed vocals, Armstrong’s performance is knowing and wants you to know it, even tossing in a lick from “Sunshine Superman” for nifty counter melody. Of course, the Coasters hardly needed the Stones to hip them to a Jerry Leiber tune, but Lieber’s Stones-boosted royalties doubtlessly did nudge him to suggest it to the Coasters—and to craft a couple new verses for his longtime collaborators. Smiling instead of sneering, the Coasters tease the girl for perpetrating big-city airs, but only very gently. They I.D. this newcomer as country right off because they’ve been there, done that themselves. Down home recognizes down home. - DC

“Tumblin’ Dice” – Johnny Copeland (feat. Shemekia Copeland) (from Paint It, Blue, 1997)

The 1997 collection Paint It, Blue - renamed All Blues’d Up in later editions - is a particularly welcome and successful addition to the catalog of Stones tribute albums. Its best track is also the last recording made by Texas blues stalwart Johnny Copeland, a triumphant roar through the Exile on Main Street hit backed by a fittingly all-star combo of Derek Trucks, the Yayhoos, and Copeland’s daughter Shemekia, who was then just emerging into her own transformative career. She’s the not-so-secret weapon here, punctuating her father’s sweetly knowing testimony with harmonies that alternate between support and commentary as Trucks and the Yayhoos chug along behind. The Copelands and their crew don’t change much about “Tumblin’ Dice” – they just fully claim it as their own. - CH

“Sway” and “Moonlight Mile” – Alvin Youngblood Hart (from Paint It, Blue, 1997)

From the same collection that produced that Johnny Copeland stunner, here’s a Sticky Fingers twofer from the mighty Alvin Youngblood Hart, the Memphis/Mississippi-based artist who’s paid tribute to the Stones both directly and sonically throughout his career. Here, Hart explores both sides of Sticky Fingers’ shagged-out haze and earns his spot as the only artist to get a double spotlight on the tribute. He crunches through the restless rocker “Sway” with rock-star assurance and a soaring, world-weary vocal. Then he stretches out on “Moonlight Mile,” the epic ballad that closes both Sticky Fingers and Paint It, Blue. Over a bed of crying steel and aching acoustic guitars, Hart brings the song to the back porch and reframes its lonely-road lament inside a haunting blues moan. Taken together, the songs work not only as a reminder of that great Stones album, but also of the compelling music – equally “rootsy” and expansive – that’s made Hart himself such a vital contributor. - CH

“Moonlight Mile” – The 5^th Dimension (from Earthbound, 1975)

The 5^th Dimension might not seem like obvious Stones interpreters. From the moment their glistening version of the Sticky Fingers closer starts to spread its wings, though, it’s a perfect fit. The quintet’s 1975 take expands the original’s muted soundscape into an alternating mix of hushed verses, insistent choruses, and a spaceway-traveling bridge. Produced by Jimmy Webb and backed by expert musicians including a young Jeff Porcaro on drums, Billy Davis Jr., Florence LaRue, Lamonte McLemore, Marilyn McCoo, and Ron Townson find interlocking modes of unison, harmony, and call-and-response singing to create a tapestry of sound that encapsulates their stylistic range. “Moonlight Mile” here becomes a kind of devotional anthem that closes Earthbound (save for a brief “epilogue”) with an epic, curtain-closing climax. Given that the classic lineup disbanded soon after the album’s release, it serves a similar role in the story of the group’s under-appreciated run. - CH

“Angie” – Womack & Womack (from Love Wars, 1983)

1983’s Love Wars brought hit songwriters Cecil and Linda Womack into the spotlight, starting a great run of albums that gave them acclaimed hits under their own storied family name. “Angie” is the album’s one cover. Beyond the warm and simmering arrangement (the product of brother Bobby’s guitar and studio aces like Nathan East and James Gadson, among others), perhaps the Womacks’ greatest – and simplest – innovation is turning Jagger’s lonely solo yowl into a conversation. Cecil begs, and then Linda reminds him why this is the only way forward. This cuts down on the sadboi pathos of the original and gives “Angie” the kind of grown-up recognition that characterized so much R&B/soul in this era. (And a gospel undercurrent, too: is Cecil pleading with “Angel” here instead of “Angie?” It sure sounds like he is.) When the Womacks finally join together on the final phrase, it’s a firm and reassuring affirmation that it really is “time we said goodbye.” Amen. - CH

“19^th Nervous Breakdown” – Jason and the Scorchers (from Still Standing, 1986)

Few were better equipped to tackle the Stones’ giddiest mid-‘60s kiss-off than Nashville’s cowpunk heroes. With frontman Jason Ringenberg bringing his signature twang and twinkle, and the Scorchers’ punk-metal stomp behind him, “19^th Nervous Breakdown” hurtles forward with joyous abandon. Ringenberg relishes all the internal rhymes and clever put-downs, on top of Warner Hodges’ relentless guitar riffs and the freight-train boogie of bassist Jeff Johnson and drummer Perry Baggs. The lyrics skirt the kind of smirking, negging sexism that became a regrettable Stones pattern, but the Scorchers don’t sound like they’re taking any of it very seriously. Instead, they kick up too much of a sonic whirlwind for the words to stick as uncomfortably as they do elsewhere. Maybe that’s a copout. But it’s also a gas, gas, gas. - CH

“Surprise Surprise” – Lulu (from From Lulu… with Love, 1967)

Lulu’s success with “To Sir, With Love” sometimes obscures the fact that her records possessed a great deal of rock ‘n’ soul fire. She leaves no doubt with her take on an early Jagger/Richards copyright. As evidenced most famously by Marianne Faithful’s “As Tears Go By,” the Stones team became part of the Swinging London Industrial Complex, with versions of their well-known and hired-out songs recorded by new artists on the come-up and veterans looking to capture some new magic. Lulu’s is one of the best: simply put, she kicks the living hell out of “Surprise Surprise.” Backed by her band The Luvvers (or maybe session pros in disguise), the Scottish singer unleashes this rebuke of a no-good asshole with near-punk speed, pure chaos energy, and a vocal alternating between mocking humor and defiant snarl. “I never wanted you that baaad,” she says, and – to paraphrase a later British pop star with whom this lyric offers a historical near-rhyme – she means it, maaan. Rock on. - CH

Turn Yer Ya-Ya's Up - 10/16/23

Some of our favorite Stones covers, for Rolling Stones Week

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