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Jumpin' Jack Flash

1,218

times played live

Original album not yet verified for this song identity.

About the song

ABKCO traces the name to Keith Richards’s gardener, Jack Dyer; Jagger later described the song as a metaphor for getting through a bad patch. Its distorted guitar sound came from Richards playing an acoustic through a tape recorder’s microphone.

ABKCO’s title and recording account · Jagger interview reprinted by La Nación

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Honky Tonk Women

The song took two contrasting musical forms: the cowbell-led rock single and the country treatment, “Country Honk”, on Let It Bleed. Mick Taylor’s slide guitar helped shape the album version; the single had reached listeners four months earlier.

ABKCO’s Let It Bleed recording history

Tumbling Dice

Jagger recalled turning an earlier song called “Good Time Women” into a gambler’s story. He said a housekeeper who played dice helped him with the gambling language that became the lyric.

Jay McDowell’s song history in American Songwriter

Brown Sugar

Controversy: The lyric’s treatment of slavery and sexual exploitation has drawn criticism. By October 2021, the band had left it out of its US shows; Richards defended it as a depiction of slavery’s horrors, while Jagger said they were trying a set without it.

ABC News’s 2021 report on the song and set-list decision

(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction

The guitar sound was supposed to be a sketch for horns, according to ABKCO’s recording account. Richards’s fuzz-guitar riff stayed on the single, turning a provisional idea into the record’s central hook.

ABKCO’s Satisfaction recording history

Start Me Up

The Stones first tried “Start Me Up” as reggae. Engineer Chris Kimsey recalled keeping a later rock take that Richards had wanted erased; that unused recording eventually became the basis of the 1981 single.

Chris Kimsey’s Sound On Sound interview

Sympathy for the Devil

Jagger said he began with a Dylan-like song before Richards suggested changing its rhythm. He described its subject as a way of turning accepted ideas of good and evil upside down; Godard filmed the band as the recording developed.

Jagger interview reprinted by La Nación

It's Only Rock 'n' Roll (but I Like It)

Kenney Jones recalled developing the song with Jagger during a late-night session at Ronnie Wood’s studio. Jones said the Stones could not recapture the feel when they tried again, so his drumming remained on the released recording.

Kenney Jones interview in Modern Drummer

You Can't Always Get What You Want

Jagger described the central idea as the everyday frustration of not getting what you want. The London Bach Choir and Jack Nitzsche’s vocal arrangement gave that simple premise an unusually expansive setting.

Jagger interview reprinted by La Nación · ABKCO’s recording account

Miss You

The dancefloor groove took work. Engineer Chris Kimsey recalled Bill Wyman visiting clubs while developing the bass line, and credited that part with making the recording come together.

Chris Kimsey’s Sound On Sound interview

Midnight Rambler

The song’s blues narrative draws on the Boston Strangler case. Jagger recalled working out its dramatic changes of tempo with Richards in Positano, building the shifts into the composition itself.

ABKCO’s Let It Bleed song history · Jagger interview reprinted by La Nación

Gimme Shelter

Richards recalled the idea arriving as he watched people flee a storm. Jagger later described the song’s apocalyptic mood in terms of the Vietnam era and the feeling that war was always present.

Ian McPherson’s TrackTalk compilation: Gimme Shelter

Street Fighting Man

Jagger linked the song to the upheavals surrounding the Vietnam War and the late 1960s. Richards built its abrasive backing around acoustic guitars driven into a cassette recorder; he said the only electric instrument was the overdubbed bass.

Ian McPherson’s TrackTalk compilation: Street Fighting Man

Happy

Richards recalled that “Happy” began with just him, saxophonist Bobby Keys and producer Jimmy Miller, who played drums. The lead vocal stayed with Richards on the finished record.

Richards interview in The Independent · Ian McPherson’s TrackTalk compilation: Happy

Paint It Black

Brian Jones’s sitar gave “Paint It Black” its distinctive lead sound. Richards recalled trying guitar first, then finding that the sitar could bend the notes in the way the song needed.

Ian McPherson’s TrackTalk compilation: Paint It Black

You Got Me Rocking

In Jagger’s account, Richards began the idea on piano as a blues. Jagger recalled urging him to switch to guitar, helping the band turn the loose idea into the guitar-driven song on Voodoo Lounge.

Rolling Stones Data’s credited recording account

All Down the Line

An early acoustic version was recorded in 1969; the song was later reworked for Exile. The album recording features Mick Taylor’s slide guitar, which Ronnie Wood later singled out for praise.

Marcelo Sonaglioni’s recording history, citing Martin Elliott · Ian McPherson’s TrackTalk compilation: All Down the Line

Before They Make Me Run

Richards described the song as autobiographical, linking its defiant mood to a period when he felt under pressure. He also sings the lead vocal himself.

Richards’s 2011 interview reported by Global News · Some Girls recording credits on Ronnie Wood’s site

Let's Spend the Night Together

Disputed anecdote: The Stones were asked to soften the title line for their 1967 Ed Sullivan Show appearance. A censorship case history preserved by NTT ICC says they used the altered words; Jagger later said he had mumbled instead. The accounts disagree about what he actually sang.

National Association of Artists Organizations case history, preserved by NTT ICC · Jonathan Cott’s Jagger interview, reprinted by Rolling Stone India

Bitch

Jagger described the song emerging from a rhythm he worked on with Charlie Watts and Bobby Keys. Its prominent brass parts feature Keys on saxophone and Jim Price on trumpet, giving the finished record its guitar-and-horns attack.

Ian McPherson’s TrackTalk compilation: Bitch · Universal Music Enterprises’ Sticky Fingers announcement

Angie

Richards said he supplied the title and chord sequence, then Jagger developed the song. Jagger later described its piano-and-strings sound as a change of pace after the harder Exile on Main St.

Ian McPherson’s TrackTalk compilation: Angie

Beast of Burden

Richards supplied the chords and an initial idea; Jagger improvised melody and words over the repeating groove. Richards recalled a faster, funkier beginning settling into the relaxed soul feel of the finished recording.

Ian McPherson’s TrackTalk compilation: Beast of Burden

Shattered

Richards and Ronnie Wood’s riff came first; Jagger added the portrait of New York. He recalled choosing a delivery between speaking and singing, giving the words a clipped, insistent rhythm.

Ian McPherson’s TrackTalk compilation: Shattered

Not Fade Away

The Stones reshaped Buddy Holly’s song by pushing its Bo Diddley rhythm to the front. Bill Wyman described that stronger rhythmic emphasis as the key change from Holly’s lighter arrangement.

Ian McPherson’s TrackTalk compilation: Not Fade Away

Rocks Off

Engineer Andy Johns recalled being called back to the studio after five in the morning to record another rhythm-guitar part with Richards. In his account, that late overdub gave “Rocks Off” the groove it had been missing.

Ian McPherson’s TrackTalk compilation: Rocks Off

Out of Control

Richards acknowledged the bass riff’s debt to the Temptations’ “Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone”. Jagger added the harmonica solo, bringing a blues voice to the soul-inspired groove.

Rolling Stones Data’s credited participant account

Slipping Away

Meaning: Reviewing Steel Wheels in 1989, Time critic Jay Cocks read Richards’s ballad as a reflection on loss and mortality. Richards later said the band had only recognised its full potential when they returned to it for Stripped.

Jay Cocks’s 1989 reading, preserved in Ian McPherson’s Steel Wheels review compilation · Richards’s 1995 recollection in TrackTalk

Get Off of My Cloud

Richards recalled the pressure to produce another hit immediately after “Satisfaction”. Jagger described the result as a young person’s protest against being ordered around, giving the rushed follow-up its central attitude.

Ian McPherson’s TrackTalk compilation: Get Off of My Cloud

Ruby Tuesday

Brian Jones’s recorder and a bowed double bass give the ballad its distinctive arrangement. That bass had two players: ABKCO credits Wyman with fingering the notes and Richards with working the bow.

ABKCO’s Ruby Tuesday recording account

Star Star

Controversy: The band called it “Starfucker”; the album listed it as “Star Star”. Richards complained in 1973 that Atlantic was interfering with the song and raising fears of legal objections to its celebrity name-dropping.

Ian McPherson’s TrackTalk compilation: Star Star

1,506 concerts with setlists · 2,181 concerts

Counting method

The figures use the 3 October 2026 snapshot and cover the performances documented in our 1962–2024 concert collection. Each song counts once per listed source concert record; playback is excluded. Setlists can be incomplete or contain errors, so these are not complete lifetime totals. Out of Control and Slipping Away share rank 26.

† The Satisfaction figure includes a Chicago entry dated 15 November 1964, before its documented 1965 recording history. That entry is under review; the displayed count preserves the snapshot. No live-debut claim is made. Recording-history source.

Source: setlist.fm · Counts: Glimmer Wire

Playback is excluded from the live counts.

Snapshot: 2026-10-03

Sources & coverage

About these numbers

Concert figures describe 2,181 distinct archive record IDs from 1962-07-12 to 2024-07-21. Separate same-day record IDs remain separate; they have not all been reviewed as unique performed concerts.

1,506 records have stored song entries; 675 do not. Complete-setlist coverage is not established. Missing entries do not establish that a song was not played.

Song observations count distinct record IDs with a matching title after playback entries are excluded. These are documented appearances, not verified full-song performances. Tour groupings can include warm-up dates.

MusicBrainz — album identities, editions and track programmes
Core metadata only. Exact release-group, edition and recording links appear on the relevant pages. Artwork, annotations, genre associations and ratings are excluded.
MusicBrainz data licence
setlist.fm — concert history and setlists
Concert dates, venues and setlists from the editor-supplied archive. Every concert page credits setlist.fm and links to its original record. Song observations are calculated by Glimmer Wire from those entries, with playback excluded.

Snapshot: 2026-10-03T21:42:51Z. Original database supplied and factually approved by the editor; normalized and calculated by Glimmer Wire. Counts can change when records or identities are corrected.

Calculation record

Concert records: distinct concert.setlist_id. Country groups: concert.country_code. Stored entries: records with non-playback setlist_song rows. Song appearances: distinct concert_song.setlist_id matched to setlist_song by record ID, position and exact raw title, excluding tape = 1. This does not use a complete-setlist percentage denominator.

Snapshot SHA-256: 7e86a3e2d0670574fd1e8bf42cd9e4dc99d3325db8db1b471707805387b00e5a

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