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Brian Jones of The Rolling Stones’ favourite blues songs
The Rolling Stones established themselves in the London rhythm and blues scene with an insatiable thirst for American blues music by the likes of Muddy Waters, Bo Didley and Howlin’ Wolf. In their early years, the band was creatively directed by multi-instrumentalist and blues fanatic Brian Jones, who named the group after Muddy Waters’ 1950 song ‘Rollin’ Stone’. His vision for the band was to take his beloved American blues music to the top of the UK charts, and in countless ways, their success exceeded his own expectations.
The stable line-up for The Stones consisted of frontman Mick Jagger, Brian Jones, guitarist Keith Richards, bassist Bill Wyman, and drummer Charlie Watts. In the early years, the songwriting talent of the Jagger-Richards partnership was still in its infancy, so the band mainly opted for blues covers, much to Jones’ satisfaction.
By the mid-1960s, Jagger and Richards had refined their songwriting abilities to a degree fit for chart success; with this, they gradually unshackled the group from Jones’ much-adored blues covers. In spring 1966, The Rolling Stones released Aftermath, an album considered a breakthrough due to its lack of covers. The album arrived following a string of highly-successful singles, including ‘The Last Time’, ‘(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction’ and ‘Get Off of My Cloud’, which pushed the Stones to the top alongside The Beatles.
As Jagger and Richards took an increasingly firm grasp on the rudder, Jones fell into the turmoil of a debilitating drug problem. Jones’ disarray worsened, compounded by his disillusionment with his band’s new direction. The Cheltenham-born musician was a blues purist, and this new, highly successful pop material brought Jones very little satisfaction; he felt they had sold out.
Jones remained in the band on sufferance for a couple more years, with his contribution to the music ever-dwindling. He was eventually fired from the band in 1968. “The fact that he was expecting it made it easier,” Richards once recalled. “You know, he wasn’t even surprised, and I didn’t really think he took it all in. He was already … up in the stratosphere”.
While a hedonistic lifestyle greatly impacted Jones’ detachment and ultimate ejection from the band, this worsening state was either compounded by or supplementary to his disillusionment with the band’s developing sound. Additionally, there was an overbearing sense that Jones had achieved what he set out to do very early on – December 5th, 1964, to be exact.
This date is very specific, but this was the day The Rolling Stones’ rendition of Willie Dixon’s blues standard, ‘Little Red Rooster’, hit number one on the UK Singles Chart. The occasion marked the first time a traditional blues track had reached the top spot in the UK, and it remains the only one to this day. With this milestone, Jones had accomplished something beyond his wildest dreams.
‘Little Red Rooster’ is widely understood to have been Jones’ favourite Rolling Stones single. In his book, Stone Alone, Wyman noted that the song “realised a cherished ambition [of Jones’] to put blues music at the top of the charts, and meant his guilt of having ‘sold out’ completely to pop fame was diminished”.
He added, “I believe ‘Rooster’ provided Brian Jones with one of his finest hours”.
As a blues purist, Jones was the proud owner of quite a hefty stack of blues records. Below is a compiled playlist of the late Stone’s favourite blues tracks.
Brian Jones’ favourite blues songs
- Muddy Waters – ‘I Can’t Be Satisfied’
- Muddy Waters – ‘I Feel Like Going Home’
- Elmore James – ‘Dust My Broom’
- Sonny Boy Williamson II – ‘Don’t Start Me Talkin’’
- Sonny Boy Williamson II – ‘All My Love In Vain’
- Robert Johnson – Stones In My Passway
- Robert Johnson – ‘I’m A Steady Rollin’ Man’
- Slim Harpo – ‘I’m A King Bee’
- Slim Harpo – ‘I Got Love If You Want It’
- Howlin’ Wolf – ‘Smolestack Lightning’
- Howlin’ Wolf – ‘The Red Rooster’
- B.B. King – ‘Three O’clock Blues’
- John Lee Hooker – ‘Dimples’
- John Lee Hooker – ‘Crawling King Snake’
- Muddy Waters – ‘I’m Your Hoochie Coochie Man’
- Muddy Waters – ‘Look What You’ve Done’
- Muddy Waters, Little Walter – ‘Louisiana Blues’
- Little Walter – ‘I Got To Find My Baby’
- Jimmy Reed – ‘Hush-Hush’
- Jimmy Reed – ‘Big Boss Man’
- Elmore James – ‘Happy Home’
- Chuck Berry – ‘Come One’
- Nat King Cole – ‘Route 66’
- Bo Diddley – ‘Pretty Thing’
- Barrett Strong – ‘Money’
- Benny Spellman – ‘Fortune Teller’
- Marvin Gaye – ‘Hitch Hike’
- Solomon Burke – ‘Cry To Me’
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