HAPPY BIRTHDAY MICK JAGGER!

He is 66 years old today. Shiiite.

Stray Cat Blues has been my favorite song for the past 6 months...as a dirty and nasty song as it is...the SOUND as got me hooked.

Descriptions of Stray Cat Blues by people who GET IT:

"The one song that goes electric is 'Stray Cat Blues'. Don't let the title fool you. This song is malicious and mean and rocks like little else they had done prior to Beggar's Banquet."

""Prodigal Son" is awesome acoustic blues, but the mood is broken with my favorite Stones song of all time, "Stray Cat Blues." Brian and Keith don't just duet on guitars, they DUEL each other. Listen on headphones to the solo; it rocks out! The beginning is what makes the song for me, though. That distant bass guitar... the chopping guitar that comes in as Mick whimpers and coos... Charlie starting in as Mick growls "I hear the click-clack of your feet on the stairs." PERFECTION!"

"Stray Cat Blues is a very good, raunchy song, with nice guitar work."

"The Stones put away the acoustics for Stray Cat Blues. Keith starts out with an ominous, biting guitar as the band crashes into the fray, Nicky Hopkins� piano chords forming the framework for Richards to lay out more bent razor-blade riffs. Enough of Jagger�s lyrics are audible here to know exactly what he�s muttering about, but the song would be pornographic WITHOUT any words. After building to an absolute frenzy it unexpectedly shifts gears, shifting emphasis back to Rocky Dijon�s percussion. In this new mode they once again build back up to a steamroller pace. This song has absolutely everything a rock & roll song should - sex, swagger, sneers, snot. despite being called a "blues", its structure is fairly complex and unusual. But it is as elemental and crude as rock & roll gets. It is another defining moment for the band. "

"Then there's 'Stray Cat Blues', the most vicious and obscene rocker up-to-date: it's still full of metaphors (Jagger didn't start using obscene lexicon until Sticky Fingers), but lines like 'you see another friend, now she's wilder than you/why don't you bring her upstairs?/if she's so wild she can join in two' set the picture as clear as possible. It's not the lyrics, though, but rather the terrific melody and especially the arrangement that gives exclusive depth to this one: the fade-out in the end resembles The Beatles' fade-out on 'Helter Skelter' but is actually superior. I especially like the way they construct the crescendo, with guitar after guitar after guitar rising up in the mix (love that bassline! -du-DOO-ddu-do-ddo-do-ddo-do du-DOO ddu-do-ddo-do-ddo-do... ...sorry...) In fact, this is the only song whose rearrangement on the live Ya-Ya's is a lot inferior to the original."

"Hands down for the Stray Cat Blues. Any band recording a song like that in these days would be sent to jail."

"Then we have Stray Cat Blues which is one of the best that The Stones ever came up with. It just screams rock and roll."

"'Stray Cat Blues' may be the standout moment: seething with lyric and sonic malevolence, pierced by screeching feedback, it's almost the antithesis of the gentlemanly 'Salt of the Earth'."