Friday, October 21, 2011

Chess and RCA, once again

After short tours of the UK and Scandinavia, and three sold-out shows at the famous L'Olympia, Paris, France, the Rolling Stones hit the United States for the third time in their career. During the tour (April 23 - May 29, 1965) the band once again returned to their favourite US studios (Chess Studios and RCA Studios) to record new material for single and album release.

On May 10 the Stones entered Chess Studios, Chicago, to record some five songs, among which cover versions of Don Covay's "Mercy Mercy", and Roosevelt Jamison's "That's How Strong My Love Is" (a song made popular by Otis Redding), and a Nanker-Phelge group composition called "The Under Assistent West Coast Promotion Man".

Ian Stewart's presence during the sessions was pretty clear, as is shown by his piano playing on "The Under Assistent", a composition which gently pokes fun at George Sherlock who accompanied the Stones as a representative of their American-based label, London Records. The song is akin to "Off The Hook", another Nanker-Phelge composition.

1 comment:

  1. May 10, 1965: Chess Studios, Chicago, USA.
    The Rolling Stones: That's How Strong My Love Is (Jamison) (2:26)
    The Rolling Stones: Mercy, Mercy (Covay-Miller) (2:47)
    The Rolling Stones: The Under Assistant West Coast Promotion Man (Nanker-Phelge) (3:20)

    650510A 10th May: Chicago, Chess Studios. Producer: Andrew Oldham. Sound engineer: Ron Malo.
    - That's How Strong My Love Is (Jamison) - Brian Jones on organ
    - Mercy, Mercy (Covay-Miller)
    - Try Me (Brown) - unreleased
    - The Under Assistant West Coast Promotion Man (Nanker-Phelge).
    Line-up: Mick Jagger (voc, tamb)/Keith Richards (gtr, bvoc)/Brian Jones (gtr, harm)/Ian Stewart (p)/Bill Wyman (bass)/Charlie Watts (dr). Note: Under Assistant is the extended version of the one that appeared on Out Of Our Heads, and includes the originally censored “I break my ass every day”-line. The cover version of James Brown’s Try Me probably wasn’t released officially because it was considered too similar to That’s How Strong My Love Is.

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