Notes and Quotes: "Play with Fire"

Richards: Oldham was never a blues man, which was one reason he couldn't connect with us. But a lot of things like "Spider and the Fly" were cut at the end of a session, while some guy was sweeping up. "Play with Fire" is like that, with Phil Spector on tuned-down electric guitar, me on acoustic, Jack Nitzsche on harpsichord, and Mick on tambourine with echo chamber. It was about seven o'clock in the morning. Everybody fell asleep. (Greenflied 1981: 168a) (Rolling Stone, 1971).

1965 was a year of experimentation for Jagger and Richards as composers. We have already heard how they modified the blues idiom in which they had been working with Richards' riff-anchored "Satisfaction."

Oldham's successful ploy to portray them as naughty degenerates encouraged them to recreate an image of Edwardian England, an age when extravagance and wealth allowed members of the ruling class to ignore the social mores they pretended to uphold. In this marketing, rock stars became effete dandies given to appetites for sex and drugs. The image was sometimes not far from the mark.

"Play with Fire," with its numerous references to London geography (e.g., St John's Wood, Stepney, and Knightsbridge) was intended for British domestic consumption, challenging the existing class structure. The singer warns his lover (someone of obviously high economic and social standing) that despite her social rank, she (and her mother) can be brought down. Moreover, the singer suggests that it is his sexual power that will be her (and their) undoing. The image draws upon conventions of the blues where the singer wields power over a lover through manipulation of magical powers (e.g., "I've Got My Mojo Working" or "I Put a Spell on You"). Of course, this also plays to what would become one of Jagger's themes: the male domination of women.

Jagger, Richards, and Oldham probably had both American and British audiences in mind. Americans (indeed most of Western popular culture) was focused on British culture in 1965. British singers replaced their attempts at sounding American with a British accent (and it often did not matter which kind of British accent, since the vast majority of Americans did/do not know the difference between accents). That this recording was made in Hollywood and was unreleased as single in UK is indicative of this curious twist in logic, the same logic that led Herman's Hermits to cover Music Hall tunes instead of American R & B.

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21 March, 2012