Keith Richards could be 20 years sober and he’d still fail a breathalyzer test. And the walking in a straight line test, for that matter.
Though the latter may well have more to do with his carefully honed swagger. Raised on the blues and R&B, the Rolling Stones star has always admired and attempted to emulate a sense of ‘coolness’. To some degree, the extent to which he has achieved this is evidenced by the fact that he’s one of about three white British men in history who can refer to someone as ‘a cat’ and just about get away with it.
So, it’s no surprise that he arcs back through the annals of guitar history and holds up one of the coolest artefacts in the mausoleum when he was asked: “If you could go back in time and be credited for writing any song, which would it be and why?”
It’s one hell of a question, one which Roger Waters answered ‘Powderfinger’ by Neil Young, Elton John opted for ‘A Song for You’ by Leon Russell, and Lou Reed went with ‘Brownsville Girl’ by Bob Dylan. But Richards had little hesitation when immodestly snapping that he’d love to have written ‘Are You Lonely for Me’ by Freddie Scott.
Speaking about the 1966 track that rose to number one on the R&B chart that Richards frequently perused, the guitarist said, “That, to me, is the most superb R&B song. I mean, to me, it’s the epitome of…” And for once, he finds himself lost for words as he answers on his YouTube channel.
Picking his awed train of thought back up by commenting, “To beat that. To me, would be… I’m trying. I’m going for it,” he laughs, emitting a plume of cigarette smoke, like a human dry rising outlet, in the process. On another occasion adding that it is one of the few songs that he couldn’t possibly live without.
While it might have only peaked at 39 in the wider Billboard chart, for Richards, the combination of Freddie Scott’s searing, soulful voice, and Bert Berns’ production that lifts to such heights that it threatens to take Sputnik out of orbit, is “the classic” combination that never fails to drop his jaw and leaves him in awe.
But this “classic” triumph was no accident. Scott recorded over 100 takes with Berns as they strove for perfection. All the while, Cissy Houston and the Sweet Inspirations on the backing vocals remained locked-in, with each take achieving greater harmony rather than growing exasperated. The result stirs from a deep-down place as Scott sings for the lonely.
In time, it became his signature hit, adored not only by Richards, but also Al Green, Otis Redding, Carla Thomas, and even a band that the Stones guitarist hates, The Grateful Dead. Did any of them match it? They got about as close as a paper airplane gets to Conchord. That’s why it has been no mean feat for Richards to spend his adult life trying to “beat it”, and you suspect he won’t rest until he does.
