The five most heinous songs by The Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones are one of the most successful bands on earth; there’s no denying that. Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, and the rest of the group are musical icons embodying the rock star trope, with a host of famous stories to go alongside the anthems. However, like most outfits of their generation, the band isn’t whiter than white.
It’s safe to say that the sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll idiom might not have come to fruition without Jagger, Richards and their many bandmates and associates pushing life to the limit. Not only were they the more transgressive answer to The Beatles, coming to embody the hedonistic nature of their generation, but with brushes with death, the law, and an array of other wild exploits, their topsy-turvy careers have long been woven deep into the cultural fabric. It prompts fascination from people who are too scared to leave their cul-de-sac, let alone smoke up a fat one.
While Lord Byron was once described as “mad, bad, and dangerous to know,” you can apply this to The Rolling Stones. Being bad is one thing they have been notably adept at over the years. Although this can be used in several contexts, they’ve done some pretty despicable things over the years, including pouring this nature into song.
The band haven’t just offended with their transgressive clothing, questionable love lives and shameless pilfering of Black musicians. They’ve also written some pretty heinous songs, which include themes of paedophilia, racism and general misogyny, painting the band in a completely different light from musical heroes when taken in tandem with their life stories. They’re not just the cheeky mummy’s boys they’re often depicted as.
The Rolling Stones’ five most heinous songs:
‘Stray Cat Blues’
Why not kick the list off with what is the most heinous song that The Rolling Stones have ever written? The eighth song on 1968’s lauded Beggars Banquet, ‘Stray Cat Blues’ is vile. Regardless of the creepy nature of gender relations and the rampant chauvinism and misogyny during the era it was written, it’s a wonder how it was ever released. It’s also afforded a chilling essence when you note the romantic history of bassist Bill Wyman and that many groupies connected to prominent bands were underage during that decade and the ensuing ones.
The issue with the track is that it’s sung from the perspective of a man wanting sex with a 15-year-old groupie. The following verse is particularly alarming and seemingly points to the fact that it being illegal doesn’t bother him: “I can see that you’re fifteen years old / No, I don’t want your I.D / And I can see that you’re so far from home, but / That’s no hanging matter / It’s no capital crime”.
Elsewhere, another vomit-inducing lyric is: “I bet, bet your mama don’t know you scream like that / I bet your mother don’t know you do spit like that”.
Astoundingly, during a performance in 1970, as heard on the Get Yer Ya-Ya’s Out! live album, frontman Jagger changed the lyric to “thirteen years old”. The band then dropped the song from their set for decades in 1971, save for a performance in 1973 and 1976, and then, questionably, brought it back in 2002 for a tour. They haven’t played it since; good for them.
‘Hey Negrita’
The late 1970s wasn’t a great time for The Rolling Stones, as 1976’s Black and Blue affirms. While things had started to slow down following 1973’s Goat’s Head Soup, towards the end of the decade, the band were entering something of a musical low point. There were saving graces, but ‘Hey Negrita’ is not one of them. On it, the band delved into reggae and Latin music while Jagger delivered some truly uncomfortable lyrics.
Remarkably, the words were written about Bianca, Jagger’s Nicaraguan wife. Although the lyrics are comically bad, they are made all the more uncomfortable by Jagger employing the word “Negrita”, which can be used as a term of endearment but sometimes has racial undertones in the Latin-speaking world. Allegedly, Jagger affectionately called Bianca the word.
Despite the band being criticised for heavily appropriating Black music and objectifying Black women, such as on the hit ‘Brown Sugar’, they were undeterred in writing a song that has caused them and many others much discomfort.
“I hate telling about it,” Jagger explained to Rolling Stone in 1976. “If I tell you what the song is about, will you put it in your own words? Okay: it’s about a South American whore, and the singer, a poor man, is trying to get her price down. ‘One last dollar / I’ve got my pride / I’ll cut your balls and I’ll tan your hide.’ A very deep subject, eh?”
It doesn’t make it any better.
‘Little T&A’
1981’s Tattoo You is regarded as a return to form for The Rolling Stones. Containing tracks such as ‘Start Me Up’, you can understand why. However, it also contains ‘Little T&A,’ a ghastly celebration of the aforementioned underage groupies.
Written and sung by guitarist Richards, the song sees him pipelines such as, “She’s my little rock ‘n’ roll, ah hah / My tits and ass with soul, baby” and “The pool’s in / but the patio ain’t dry”. Apparently, these young women are just sexual organs and not autonomous humans.
Describing the song to Rolling Stone, Richards once said: “Every good time I’ve had with somebody I’d met for a night or two and never seen again. And also about the shit that sometimes goes down when you just sort of bump into people unknowingly, and not knowing the scene you’re walking in on, you know? You pick up a chick and end up spending the night in the tank, you know?”
‘Some Girls’
Sometimes, artists should know when they’re out of their element. The title track of the 1978 album of the same name, ‘Some Girls,’ is claimed by Jagger to have meant to satirise racism and sexism women across the world face, but with tracks like ‘Hey Negrita’ and ‘Brown Sugar’, he should have known this wasn’t his place.
Ostensible intention aside, when you read lyrics such as “Black girls just wanna get fucked all night” and “Chinese girls are so gentle / They’re really such a tease,” you realise that Jagger only dug the ditch even further, perpetuating harmful stereotypes.
As you can imagine, when the song was released on the album, it was met with outrage by feminist and civil rights groups. Even the legendary activist Reverend Jesse Jackson weighed in on the matter. He derided it as a “racial insult” that “degrades blacks and women”.
Even the head of Atlantic Records, Ahmet Ertegun, was forced to respond to the outcry. He said: “Mick assured me that it was a parody of the type of people who hold these attitudes. Mick has great respect for blacks. He owes his whole being, his whole musical career, to black people.”
‘I Go Wild’
The Rolling Stones really know how to offend women. After years of shamelessly doing so and ample criticism, they doubled down on this tact with 1995’s ‘I Go Wild’, with the lyrics made that bit more uncomfortable by the fact that the band were now well into their 40s. The final single from 1994’s Voodoo Lounge concerns the narrator’s relationship with a “femme fatale”, which is, surprise, surprise, another negative gender stereotype.
All you need to read is the following passage: “And the doctors say you’ll be okay / And if you’d only stay away / From femme fatales and dirty bitches / And daylight drabs and night time witches / And working girls and blue stockings / And dance hall babes and body poppers / And waitresses with broken noses / Checkout girls striking poses / And politicians’ garish wives / With alcoholic cunts like knives”.
Truly dreadful.
