Format 7" single Length 2:55 | Genre Blues rock | |
B-side "I'm Free" (US)
"The Singer Not the Song" (UK) Released 25 September 1965 (US)
22 October 1965 (UK) Recorded 6–7 September 1965, RCA Studios, Hollywood | ||
"Get Off of My Cloud" is a song by the English rock band the Rolling Stones. It was written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards as single to follow the successful "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction". Recorded in early September 1965 and released that November, the song topped the charts in the United Kingdom, the United States and Germany, reaching No. 2 in Australia and Ireland.
Contents
Composition
The Stones have said that the song is a reaction to their suddenly greatly enhanced popularity and deals with their aversion to people's expectations of them after the success of "Satisfaction". According to Keith Richards, "'Get off of My Cloud' was basically a response to people knocking on our door asking us for the follow-up to 'Satisfaction' ... We thought 'At last. We can sit back and maybe think about events'. Suddenly there's the knock at the door and of course what came out of that was 'Get off of My Cloud'". In 1971 he commented; "I never dug it as a record. The chorus was a nice idea, but we rushed it as the follow-up. We were in L.A., and it was time for another single. But how do you follow-up "Satisfaction"? Actually, what I wanted was to do it slow like a Lee Dorsey thing. We rocked it up. I thought it was one of Andrew Loog Oldham's worst productions."
In a 1995 interview with Rolling Stone, Jagger said, "That was Keith's melody and my lyrics. ... It's a stop-bugging-me, post-teenage-alienation song. The grown-up world was a very ordered society in the early '60s, and I was coming out of it. America was even more ordered than anywhere else. I found it was a very restrictive society in thought and behavior and dress."
The song is in E major and is built on variants of the "Louie Louie" riff, a short repeating pattern of the chords I, IV and V, in this case E–A–B–A. The arrangement is noted for its drum intro by Charlie Watts and twin guitars by Brian Jones and Keith Richards. Brian Jones' twelve-string guitar part can only just be heard in the mono mix of the song but can be clearly heard in some unofficial stereo remixes.
Personnel
Release history
The 1965 single release was a major success for the Rolling Stones. In the US, the single reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 on 6 November 1965, and remained there for two weeks. The single was included on the band's next full-length album, December's Children (And Everybody's), released in December, 1965. The track stayed at No. 1 in the UK Singles Chart for three weeks in November that year.
Appearances on later Stones releases include:
Cover versions
Australian new wave band Jimmy and the Boys released a cover version as a single titled "Get Off My Cloud" in 1981.