PAINT IT BLACK was never originally intended as a single. Instead, it ended up as one of the band's most inventive singles, a number one in Britain and America and a live favourite to this day. Given a dark lyric and one of Mick's best vocal perfomances, the track was transformed by the contribution of Brian Jones who added a Turkish vibe and an exciting sitar passage. "What's amazing about that one for me is the sitar," Keith said in 1971. "We cut it as a comedy track". According to Richards, equally vital was the contribution of Bill Wyman, who shifted the rhythm into the two-beat that eventually characterised the song. "I suggested Hammond organ pedals," Wyman recalls. "I lay on the floor under the organ and played a second bass riff on the pedals with my fists at double.time."
Once again, the single, which was released in May 7, 1966, in the US (May 13 in the UK), appeared with different b-sides. In America it was STUPID GIRL, a track from the album "Aftermath" and one of the Stones' most misogynist song of all as Jagger yells, "She's the worst thing in the world!". In Britain, the b-side was LONG LONG WHILE, a rather fine soul ballad in the style of Otis Redding or Solomon Burke. In sharp contrast to STUPID GIRL, the song finds an unusually contrite Mick actually asking a girl for forgiveness.
If Ray Davies of The Kinks was famous in the 1960s for the sharpness of his social observation, on songs such as MOTHER'S LITTLE HELPER, Jagger and Richards were at least his equal. With its' famous put-down, "What a drag it is getting old", the song finds Mick pouring scorn on a middle-class suburban housewife's reliance on pills to get through her humdrum life. The song is lent an exotic tinge by Brian Jone's twanging sitar riff.
Equally affecting was the b-side, LADY JANE. A lovely baroque ballad on which Jones again elegantly came into his own on electric dulcimer, the track also features Jack Nitzche on harpsichord. The lyric is written in the form of a courtly love letter, in which Mick uncharacteristically declares himself to be 'your humble servant'. Keith described the song as "very Elizabethan" and it was reported at the time that the lyric was inspired by the story of Lady Jane Seymour, the third of Henry VIII's six wives. Mick appeared to confirm this in 1968 when he admitted, "All the names are historical". Released as a US-only single in July 1966, MOTHER'S LITTLE HELPER made number eight in the Billboard chart. In Britain, both tracks appeared on the album "Aftermath". (Nigel Williamson)
All five songs written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, produced by Andrew Loog Oldham and recorded in March 1966 at RCA Studios, Hollywood. These versions are the original mono recordings, beautfully remastered for the compilation box "The Rolling Stones Singles: 1965 - 1967".
