Satisfaction - 5 Notes That Changed The World
New York, NY (PRWEB) June 09, 2015 -- 50 years ago, Rolling Stones lead guitarist Keith Richards dreamt a few notes and a few words and recorded it on a personal tape deck. Songwriting partner and bandmate Mick Jagger fleshed out the rest of the song by the pool of the Fort Harrison Hotel in Clearwater, FL on May 7th, 1965, and “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” became the Rolling Stones’ first #1 hit in America. Considered by most music critics to be THE quintessential rock song, Rolling Stone magazine, in 2004, ranked it as the second greatest song in music history. “Satisfaction” is the Stones’ most popular recording, considered their signature song, and that riff, written by Keith in a dream in 1965, was later referred to by Newsweek as the “five notes that shook the world.”
This week on their eBay store, the Bob Bonis Archive issued a special collection - Get Some Satisfaction - a series of never-before-released limited edition photographs, including previously unpublished images, taken by then Rolling Stones U.S. Tour Manager Bob Bonis in 1965. The photographs document the day “Satisfaction” was written by Jagger and Richards, as well as the recording sessions where the Stones completed what was to become a world-changing hit.
Keith Richards awoke one morning to find that his recently purchased cassette player seemed to be broken; the new tape he had inserted the day before had run to the end. Having no recollection of using the recorder, he rewound the tape to discover that, in his sleep, he had recorded a five note riff, the phrase “I can’t get no satisfaction,” and some chords blocking out a verse, followed by forty minutes of snoring.
Their concert at the Jack Russell Stadium on May 6 was aborted after four songs because fans started to riot. The Stones returned to the Fort Harrison Hotel in Clearwater (today the headquarters of the Church of Scientology) and that night Keith had his fateful dream. The next day Mick Jagger wrote the controversial lyrics to the song sitting by the hotel pool. A few days later they recorded an acoustic version of “Satisfaction” at the world-famous Chess Studios in Chicago that remains unreleased to this day.
Four days later, at RCA Studios in Hollywood, CA, Keith, attempting to simulate a saxophone, used a newly developed Maestro Fuzz Box effect pedal Gibson had sent over and the revolutionary riff was laid down for posterity. “The fuzz tone had never been heard before anywhere, and that’s the sound that caught everybody’s imagination,” Richards wrote in his 2010 autobiography, Life. “As far as I was concerned, that was just the dub. [But] ten days on the road and it’s number one nationally! The record of the summer of ’65.” By mid-July it was #1 at the top of the Billboard Hot 100 chart and would go on to sell over 4.5 million copies.
According to Mick Jagger, “Satisfaction” was “my view of the world, my frustration with everything… simple teenage aggression. It was about America, its advertising syndrome, the constant barrage.”
Bob Bonis (1932-1992), who was the U.S. Tour Manager for both The Beatles and Rolling Stones from 1964 through 1966, was with the Stones on their third tour of America in May 1965. He photographed them by the pool at the hotel on the very day Mick penned the lyrics and completed the song, and also in the studio a week later when they recorded the version of “Satisfaction” that would be released and make history.
Get Some Satisfaction includes other photographs of the Stones from May of 1965 and newly released photographs of The Beatles Bonis took during their historic tours of America.
The photographs are available as limited edition fine art prints that are hand-numbered, estate embossed and accompanied by a Certificate of Authenticity from The GRAMMY Museum® at L.A. Live. The Get Some Satisfaction collection may be viewed through the Bob Bonis store on eBay.
Larry Marion, Bob Bonis Archive, +1 7189264989, [email protected]
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