{"id":390861,"date":"2026-01-26T05:58:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-26T05:58:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/390861\/"},"modified":"2026-01-26T05:58:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-26T05:58:12","slug":"the-rolling-stones-song-mick-jagger-failed-to-understand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/390861\/","title":{"rendered":"The Rolling Stones song Mick Jagger failed to understand"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <img width=\"1140\" height=\"855\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Mick-Jagger-Keith-Richards-The-Rolling-Stones-Far-Out-Magazine-F-1140x855.jpg\" class=\"attachment-single-feature size-single-feature wp-post-image\" alt=\"Mick Jagger - Keith Richards - The Rolling Stones\" layout=\"fill\"  style=\"object-position: 50% 50%\" loading=\"eager\" fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" \/><\/p>\n<p>(Credits: Far Out \/ Alamy)<\/p>\n<p> Sun 25 January 2026 18:36, UK <\/p>\n<p>The power of rock \u2018n\u2019 roll lays in the energy that is exuded in a song and the feeling that it provokes in the listener, which <a href=\"http:\/\/faroutmagazine.co.uk\/tags\/the-rolling-stones\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" title=\"\">The Rolling Stones<\/a> have mastered as a craft.<\/p>\n<p>When a band has the charismatic presence of Mick Jagger, the human riff machine Keith Richards and the late great Charlie Watts setting the tempo, it was hard to fail. The chemistry that The Rolling Stones had in the studio was impossible to replicate, and could even make songs with undiscernible lyrics still be an earworm.<\/p>\n<p>Admittedly, a set of lyrics being confusing to the listener is one thing, but it\u2019s still expected that the person singing the song has a deeper understanding of the words leaving their mouth. However, that wasn\u2019t the case with \u2018Let It Loose\u2019, which even Jagger found to be a source of befuddlement.<\/p>\n<p>During the early days of the band, the songwriting was a collective process shared between Jagger and Richards. Naturally, as the years passed, they would write together in the same room less and less as their lives became more separated.<\/p>\n<p>When Jagger and Richards first started the band, they were joined at the hip, devoting every moment of their day to the Rolling Stones. Then, in the blink of an eye, they were fathers with considerable commitments, which meant they could no longer spend as much time as possible writing songs with one another.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/cdn1.faroutmagazine.co.uk\/uploads\/1\/2025\/04\/Mick-Jagger-Keith-Richards-1967-The-Rolling-Stones-Far-Out-Magazine.jpg\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"768\" loading=\"lazy\"  src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Mick-Jagger-Keith-Richards-1967-The-Rolling-Stones-Far-Out-Magazine-1024x768.jpg\" alt=\"Mick Jagger - Keith Richards - 1967 - The Rolling Stones\" class=\"wp-image-680220\" \/><\/a>Mick Jagger and songwriting partner Keith Richards. (Credits: Far Out \/ Alamy)<\/p>\n<p>Nonetheless, writing in an ad-hoc way was still successful for the band. Even though their methods had changed, Jagger and Richards still kept the hits coming. However, because of the separation, it meant the song\u2019s meaning was occasionally lost between band members. Therefore, on occasion, like \u2018Let It Loose\u2019 Jagger sang lyrics by Richards, which went over his head.<\/p>\n<p>When speaking about their methods, Richards once remarked, \u201cI mean there was a time when Mick and I used to write face-to-face all the time. But we were on the road then.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Using \u2018Mixed Emotions\u2019 as an example of how this changed, he added, \u201cNow we can bring ideas to each other, and sometimes it\u2019s strange \u2013 we hadn\u2019t seen each other for maybe five or six months, and we get together and funny enough, we\u2019d each have written a piece of music that actually fits together even though we haven\u2019t been in communication with each other\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>\u2018Let It Loose\u2019 arrived in 1972 on <a href=\"https:\/\/faroutmagazine.co.uk\/exile-on-main-street-the-rolling-stones-in-their-own-words\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" title=\"\">Exile on Main St<\/a>. The lyrics, written by Richards, are seemingly about love and lost about a relationship that has broken down. It knowingly contradicts itself throughout the song, which only adds to the sadness that bleeds out of every note.<\/p>\n<p>Jagger\u2019s vocals are spectacular; he sings the song like he believes every word, but he later claimed to be none the wiser about the subject matter.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking with Uncut in 2010, he said, \u201cI think Keith wrote that, actually. That\u2019s a very weird, difficult song. I had a whole other set of lyrics to it, but they got lost by the wayside. I don\u2019t think that song has any semblance of meaning. It\u2019s one of those rambling songs. I didn\u2019t really understand what it was about, after the event\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Despite not being familiar with the meaning behind the lyrics, Jagger still poured his heart and soul into his vocal performance, which is the mark of a consummate professional. Even if the lyrics don\u2019t make sense from a narrative perspective, rock \u2018n\u2019 roll doesn\u2019t have to. Vitally, the other elements of the song combine to make \u2018Let It Loose\u2019 one of the most heart-wrenching in <a href=\"https:\/\/faroutmagazine.co.uk\/the-rolling-stones-20-greatest-songs\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" title=\"\">The Stones\u2019 back catalogu<\/a>e.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>Related Topics<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"(Credits: Far Out \/ Alamy) Sun 25 January 2026 18:36, UK The power of rock \u2018n\u2019 roll lays&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":345108,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[96,25722,128,15747,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-390861","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-mick-jagger","10":"tag-music","11":"tag-the-rolling-stones","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom","14":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390861","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=390861"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390861\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/345108"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=390861"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=390861"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=390861"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}