Jagger/Richards

The songwriting partnership of Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, known as Jagger/Richards (and occasionally Richards/Jagger) is a musical collaboration whose output is primarily part of the catalogue of their group, The Rolling Stones.

In addition to Jagger and Richards' songwriting partnership, they have also produced or co-produced numerous Rolling Stones albums under the pseudonym The Glimmer Twins.

History

Jagger and Richards have different recollections about their first songwriting endeavours, but both credit manager Andrew Loog Oldham as the catalyst for their collaboration. Richards says:

So what Andrew Oldham did was lock us up in the kitchen for a night and say, 'Don't come out without a song.' We sat around and came up with 'As Tears Go By'. It was unlike most Rolling Stones material, but that's what happens when you write songs, you immediately fly to some other realm. The weird thing is that Andrew found Marianne Faithfull at the same time, bunged it to her and it was a fuckin' hit for her - we were songwriters already! But it took the rest of that year to dare to write anything for the Stones.

Jagger's version is:

Keith likes to tell the story about the kitchen, God bless him. I think Andrew may have said something at some point along the lines of 'I should lock you in a room until you've written a song' and in that way he did mentally lock us in a room, but he didn't literally lock us in. One of the first songs we came out with was that tune for George Bean, the very memorable 'It Should Be You'.

The first original Jagger/Richards song to be released as the a-side of a Rolling Stones single was "Tell Me (You're Coming Back)", from their debut album. Released as a single in the US only, peaked at number 24 on the charts there. The earlier "Good Times, Bad Times" had been released as the b-side to their cover of Bobby and Shirley Womack's "It's All Over Now". The band's first UK single featuring an a-side Jagger/Richards original was "The Last Time"; released in February 1965, it went to number 1 in the UK and number 9 in the US.

Although most Jagger/Richards compositions have been collaborations, some of the songs credited to the famous partnership have been basically solo songwriting from either Jagger (for example "Sympathy for the Devil" and "Brown Sugar") or Richards ("Happy" and "Before They Make Me Run"). This is comparable to the Lennon/McCartney partnership, who also adhered to a tradition of joint credits even on numbers that were written by just one of the pair. As Mick Jagger stated in his comprehensive 1995 interview with Jann Wenner, "I think in the end it all balances out."

One of the patterns that the Jagger/Richards collaboration has followed has been that Jagger writes most of the lyrics while Richards focuses on the music. Jagger discussed this in the same 1995 interview with Wenner, in which he explained how songs like "Get Off of My Cloud", "As Tears Go By", "Wild Horses", "Tumbling Dice" and "Beast of Burden" were created. He has also pointed out that this pattern was more prevalent in the early 1960s, while in their later collaborations their roles have overlapped more, with both songwriters contributing both lyrics and music.

Co-credits

Jagger and Richards have shared credits with very few others. Among them are:

Andrew Loog Oldham: "As Tears Go By"
Marianne Faithfull: "Sister Morphine"
Mick Taylor, former Rolling Stones guitarist: "Ventilator Blues" (Taylor has stated that he left the Rolling Stones partly due to not being given co-writing credits on some numbers.)
Ronnie Wood, Rolling Stones guitarist: "Dance (Pt. 1)", "If I Was A Dancer (Dance Pt. 2)", "Everything Is Turning to Gold", "Black Limousine", "No Use in Crying", "Pretty Beat Up", "One Hit (to the Body)", "Fight", "Dirty Work" and "Had It With You". He is credited as "Inspiration by Ronnie Wood" on "It's Only Rock'n Roll (But I Like It)" and "Hey Negrita"
Billy Preston is credited as "Inspiration by Billy Preston" on "Melody"
Chuck Leavell, keyboardist: "Back to Zero"
Steve Jordan: "Almost Hear You Sigh"
k.d. lang and Ben Mink: "Anybody Seen My Baby?" (Lang and Mink were not involved with the composition of this number; they were given co-writing credits when, just prior to the song's release, one of the Rolling Stones' offspring pointed out a similarity to "Constant Craving," a hit from Lang's 1992 Ingénue album.)
Pierre de Beauport: "Thief in the Night"

The Verve's 1997 hit single “Bitter Sweet Symphony” uses a small five-note sample from an orchestral version of the Rolling Stones’ “The Last Time.” After the song became a hit, The Verve was sued by Allen Klein, who owns the copyrights to The Rolling Stones' pre-1970 songs. Klein claimed The Verve broke their licence agreement when they used a larger portion than was covered in the license. The band handed over 100 percent of their songwriting royalties. They were then sued by Oldham, who claimed to possess the copyright on the sampled sound recording. “Bittersweet Symphony” was nominated for a Grammy in the Best Song category, which honours songwriters. Because the unfavourable settlement transferred the Verve’s copyright and songwriting credit to Klein and The Rolling Stones, the Grammy nomination went to “Mick Jagger and Keith Richards.”

Jagger/Richards compositions released only by other artists

Some Jagger/Richards compositions have been released only by artists other than The Rolling Stones:

"That Girl Belongs to Yesterday", a January 1964 single by Gene Pitney
"Will You Be My Lover Tonight"/"It Should Be You", a January 1964 single by George Bean
"Shang a Doo Lang", a March 1964 single by Adrienne Posta
"So Much in Love", an August 1964 single by The Mighty Avengers
"Act Together", on Ronnie Wood's September 1974 LP I've Got My Own Album to Do
"Sure the One You Need", on Wood's September 1974 LP I've Got My Own Album to Do and the associated July 1974 The First Barbarians: Live from Kilburn concert (released in October 2007); and on The New Barbarians' May 1979 concert album Buried Alive: Live in Maryland (released in October 2006).

List of Jagger/Richards songs released as Rolling Stones singles

These are the Jagger/Richards songs that have been released as Rolling Stones singles (both A-sides and B-sides):

"2000 Light Years from Home"
"19th Nervous Breakdown"
"All Down the Line"
"All the Way Down"
"Angie"
"Beast of Burden"
"Before They Make Me Run" (concert rendition)
"Biggest Mistake"
"Bitch"
"Break the Spell"
"Brown Sugar"
"Child of the Moon"
"Congratulations"
"Cook Cook Blues"
"Crazy Mama"
"Dance Little Sister"
"Dancing With Mr. D"
"Dandelion "
"Don't Stop"
"Doo Doo Doo Doo Doo (Heartbreaker)"
"Down in the Hole"
"Emotional Rescue"
"Fancy Man Blues"
"Far Away Eyes"
"Fool to Cry"
"Gimme Shelter"
"Good Times, Bad Times"
"Get Off of My Cloud"
"Gotta Get Away"
"Hang Fire"
"Highwire"
"Honky Tonk Women"

"Happy"
"Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby, Standing in the Shadow?"
"Heart of Stone"
"Hot Stuff"
"Hurricane
"(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction"
"I Go Wild"
"I Think I'm Going Mad"
"I'm Free"
"I'm Gonna Drive"
"It's Only Rock'n Roll (But I Like It)
"Jiving Sister Fanny"
"Jump On Top of Me"
"Jumpin' Jack Flash"
"Lady Jane"
"The Lantern"
"The Last Time"
"Let's Spend the Night Together"
"Love Is Strong"
"Miss You"
"Mixed Emotions"
"Mother's Little Helper"
"No Expectations"
"Off the Hook"
"Out of Control"
"Out of Tears"
"Out of Time"
"Paint It, Black"
"Play With Fire"
"Respectable"
"Rock and a Hard Place"
"Rough Justice"

Production (as the Glimmer Twins)

Jagger and Richards adopted the nickname "The Glimmer Twins" after a vacation cruise they took to Brazil in 1969 with their then-girlfriends, Marianne Faithfull and Anita Pallenberg. During several meals, an older English couple ate at the same table as the rock stars and kept asking Richards and Jagger who they were. When they refused to reveal their identities, reportedly, the older couple kept asking, "just give us a glimmer" (as in "give us a hint to your true names"), for the couple did vaguely recognize the men from television and tabloids. Jagger and Richards were so amused by this recurrent request, they began to call themselves the 'Glimmer Twins' when producing Rolling Stones records.

Jagger and Richards began to produce the Stones' albums under the pseudonym "The Glimmer Twins" starting with It's Only Rock 'n' Roll (released in 1974). The Glimmer Twins were the sole credited producers for the band's studio and live albums from that point through "Still Life" (American Concert 1981) (released in 1982). Starting with Undercover (released in 1983), the Glimmer Twins have shared production credit for the Rolling Stones albums with other producers, most frequently Don Was (five times) and Chris Kimsey (three times).

Besides their production work for the Rolling Stones, Jagger and Richards also used the Glimmer Twins for their co-production credit on Peter Tosh's album Bush Doctor, released in 1978. A rare exception to Jagger and Richards' use of the Glimmer Twins name for production credits appeared on John Phillips' Pay, Pack and Follow album, recorded 1973-1979 and released in 2001, for which Jagger and Richards were credited as producers under their own names.