Watch Etta James cover Rolling Stones’ ‘Miss You’ live
The late great Etta James had a voice that made silk seem coarse as sandpaper and satin about as comforting as a bailiff’s letter. Purring with feline femineity and as smooth as a swan on the surface, her sumptuous vocal style had an uncurrent of pure power.
She applied this force to so many genres that her labels would complain she was neither fish nor fowl and her records were destined to be scattered around various sections of the very same record shop, but as per her mission statement above, James was determined to show that good music was simply good music, and boy oh boy did she make good music!
As she proclaimed: “I wanna show that gospel, country, blues, rhythm and blues, jazz, rock ‘n’ roll are just really one thing.” She stayed true to this throughout her career and rammed the point home with a scintillating Rolling Stones cover disguised as a classic soul gem. This exploration was defined by one simple need: “When I look out at the people and they look at me and they’re smiling, then I know that I’m loved. That is the time when I have no worries, no problem.”
On her 24th studio album, Matriarch of the Blues, James returned to her roots in style. Of all the blues tracks she tackled on the record, this Rolling Stones classic is the one that swings the hips the most excitedly. James has more elegant swagger than the biggest swan on the lake and she pours all of that attitude into a vocal take that would make Mick Jagger gulp.
While, in truth, the true triumph of the track comes from the outstanding arrangement that James’ sons, Donto and Sametto, ushered into place, it is a mark of her eye for rhythm that she always knew what sort of sound would work best for her. The whole thing comes together beautifully and remains one of the best Rolling Stones covers ever put to tape.
She typifies the message of the song in the sexiest fashion. As Jagger said of the anthem himself: “’Miss You’ is an emotion, it’s not really about a girl. To me, the feeling of longing is what the song is.” With a beat by Charlie Watts inspired by “going to discos”, there is enough rhythm to this “longing” to rock a cruise liner.
You can check out Etta James’ epic cover on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno from 2001 below.
