1965 The Rolling Stones: Get Off Of My Cloud

If he can't get no satisfaction then Mick's going to do the next best thing and take his ball home - 'Get Off Of My Cloud' is the sound of Jagger beating a retreat to "an apartment on the ninety-ninth floor of my block" where he can "sit at home looking out the window imagining the world has stopped", holding parties till 3 in morning and to hell with the neighbours. It's an audacious statement, a glimpse into the inner court where we the listener aren't particularly welcome ("Don't hang around 'cause two's a crowd on my cloud, baby") even if we did provide the means for him to settle on that cloud in the first place.

Still on a roll after '(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction', 'Get Off Of My Cloud' is another bucket filled from the same well, albeit one that sounds like a 'Satisfaction' left out in the rain. The guitars still blaze and Jagger still honks, but there's a woozy organ dribbling away in the background that tames the sharp edges and blurs them into an impressionistic watercolour. Which is apt enough because without the lyrics in front of us, we the listener would be hard pressed to make out much of what Jagger was yelling about beyond a general sense that he's not happy and the rest of the world is to blame. Which is 'Get Off Of My Cloud' in a nutshell, a bold leap of nihilism that tests the faith of the audience of a band that twelve short months ago were scrabbling around in their record collections for suitable songs to cover.