# Their Satanic Majesties' Request
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [May 15, 2017, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685 "2017-05-15T20:50:41Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Reddy\_Mercury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reddy_Mercury)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2017, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/1 "2017-05-15T20:50:41Z")
What are SD’s thoughts on this often overlooked '67 Stones foray into psychedelia?
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### Author:  [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2017, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/2 "2017-05-15T21:12:16Z")
Badly underrated at the time, more so today. It’s a far better album than most people seem to think.
I was 18 when it came out, had already been a huge Stones fan for four years, and initially I thought it was “ok”; I never lost my taste for it though, and as time passed I came to appreciate it more and more. Today I think it’s a great album, even with one or two overlong “psychedelic noodling” areas.
(Sir Michael himself has acknowledged that the record would have benefited from a better producer. Or any producer, as it turned out.)
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### Author:  [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2017, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/3 "2017-05-15T21:15:02Z")
It’s hardly their best work, it’s chasing a movement, and yet it has on it imo one of their very best songs:
[She’s A Rainbow](http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2qt2rs) I love that
I’ve never really thought of the Stones as an album band - save perhaps Let it Bleed which I think works as a collection - but they were an absolutely stellar singles band in their heyday, with a generous sprinkling of additional gold on the long-players.
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### Author:  [@Hilarity\_N.Suze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hilarity_N.Suze)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2017, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/4 "2017-05-15T21:25:30Z")
It was not my favorite album of 1967, although I liked it. For one thing, up until then the Rolling Stones had been kind of distinctively different, and this album just went along with what lesser bands (okay, my opinion) were doing. I mean, I had favorite tracks on this album, but not as many favorite tracks as on most other Stones albums up to that time. Were they trying to one-up the Beatles, or one-up Ultimate Spinach?
I think everybody in the rock world went a little crazy in 1967. Sgt. Pepper’s was not my most favorite Beatles album, either. And then things got worse.
ETA: Okay, but I’ll tell you what, this Satanic Majesty’s album cover was UNPRECEDENTED at freaking out mothers all over the country, mine including. Making them think, “Oh, hey, okay…the Beatles are maybe not so bad.”
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### Author:  [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)
#### Post date: [May 15, 2017, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/5 "2017-05-15T22:38:34Z")
_2000 Light Years_ is a great song.
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### Author:  [@jaycat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jaycat)
#### Post date: [May 16, 2017, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/6 "2017-05-16T00:05:46Z")
I like it. No need for comparisons with anything else that they or anyone else was doing.
Here’s a shout out to two of the Stones’ contemporaneous singles, Child of the Moon and We Love You (the latter evidently a satire of All You Need Is Love). Check them out if you’re not already familiar.
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### Author:  [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)
#### Post date: [May 16, 2017, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/7 "2017-05-16T00:13:59Z")
Who remembers the original lenticular cover?
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### Author:  [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)
#### Post date: [May 16, 2017, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/8 "2017-05-16T00:24:37Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#):
>
> Who remembers the original lenticular cover?
Still own that one!
Not a bad album. Not _Let It Bleed_ or _Exile On Main Street_, but more than adequate.
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### Author:  [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)
#### Post date: [May 16, 2017, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/9 "2017-05-16T01:15:07Z")
> [@silenus](#):
>
> Still own that one!
I also.
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### Author:  [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)
#### Post date: [May 16, 2017, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/10 "2017-05-16T01:22:20Z")
> [@jaycat](#):
>
> I like it. No need for comparisons with anything else that they or anyone else was doing.
>
> Here’s a shout out to two of the Stones’ contemporaneous singles, Child of the Moon and We Love You (the latter evidently a satire of All You Need Is Love). Check them out if you’re not already familiar.
**We Love You** has been one of my top five Stones songs since the day I first heard it. Terrific song, also noteworthy for the backing vocalists being Jagger, Lennon, and McCartney.
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### Author:  [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)
#### Post date: [May 16, 2017, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/11 "2017-05-16T01:43:13Z")
“We Love You” is my favorite.
“She’s a Rainbow” and “2000 Light Years from Home” work. “On with the Show” too.
“In Another Land” does NOT hold up at all. The tremolo, or whatever they’re doing to Wyman’s voice makes me cringe.
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### Author:  [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)
#### Post date: [May 16, 2017, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/12 "2017-05-16T01:46:05Z")
Oh, wait: “We Love You” isn’t on this album.
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### Author:  [@jaycat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jaycat)
#### Post date: [May 16, 2017, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/13 "2017-05-16T12:42:30Z")
Oh and I forgot this one: [- YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VcndxAyNDYw)
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### Author:  [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)
#### Post date: [May 16, 2017, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/14 "2017-05-16T16:15:29Z")
I agree that the Stones didn’t think in terms of albums the way Lennon and McCartney did. _Aftermath_ was a great album almost all the way through, but _Between the Buttons,_ Majesties (where is that apostrophe in the thread title coming from? and Hilarity N. Suze, shame on you), and \*Beggar’s Banquet \*all have a couple of fine songs with the rest just for Stones fanatics.
One of the great aspects of that period was that Nicky Hopkins started doing session work with them. He plays that marvelous tinkling piano that sets the tone for “She’s a Rainbow” and also the thumping barrelhouse of “We Love You.” He really should have been made a permanent member of the Stones, but bad timing and his poor health squashed that.
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### Author:  [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)
#### Post date: [May 16, 2017, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/15 "2017-05-16T16:20:59Z")
Though I’ve been a Stones fan since I was nine, strangely enough I didn’t discover this album until AFTER I’d heard the Ace Frehley (KISS guitarist) cover of “2000 Man,” when I was maybe twelve.
I once read a 1968 interview with Mick where the interviewer cited a review of the album as full of “sleeping and dreaming” (not in a bad way). Mick says something, then stops and says, “What was that? Dreaming and waking up? That’s cool.”
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### Author:  [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)
#### Post date: [May 16, 2017, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/16 "2017-05-16T17:01:52Z")
> [@F.U.Shakespeare](#):
>
> Oh, wait: “We Love You” isn’t on this album.
No, but it clearly should have been. Recorded during the same sessions. Same applies to “Child Of The Moon”.
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### Author:  [@Hilarity\_N.Suze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hilarity_N.Suze)
#### Post date: [May 16, 2017, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/17 "2017-05-16T18:02:04Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#):
>
> … and Hilarity N. Suze, shame on you)…
What because I thought the white album sucked? I admit there were good songs on it. There were not two LPs’ worth of good songs on it though…not really even one LP’s worth of good songs. My opinion only.
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### Author:  [@jaycat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jaycat)
#### Post date: [May 16, 2017, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/18 "2017-05-16T21:50:29Z")
> [@JKellyMap](#):
>
> . . . the Ace Frehley (KISS guitarist) cover of “2000 Man,” . . .
ugh, really? I didn’t need to know about that.
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### Author:  [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)
#### Post date: [May 16, 2017, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/19 "2017-05-16T22:19:54Z")
Wasn’t “Child of the Moon” recorded in ‘68 (B-side to Jumpin’ Jack Flash), and so would have been on _Beggars Banquet_, if anything?
Anyhoo…I remember being 13 and noticing that John Paul Jones did some string arrangements and played some piano parts on _Satanic_, almost a year before Led Zeppelin got going.
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### Author:  [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)
#### Post date: [May 16, 2017, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/their-satanic-majesties-request/786685/20 "2017-05-16T22:23:24Z")
Lest we forget, the whole album isn’t just psychedelic haze. “Citadel” rocks out.
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