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Merry Clayton |
Imagine "Great Gig" with just Wright's tune and keys and Gilmour's slide
guitar – still phenomenal, but, come on…
Same with "Gimme Shelter." Keith's "freaky, tremolo-drenched
riff is something straight out of the future — or at least "a very chilling
alternate present,” as Guitar World put
it, but remove Merry Clayton's howl and yowl and what have you got? A pretty good Stones
tune but again that's all.
Jagger remembers that "we randomly phoned up this poor lady in the middle of the
night, and she arrived in her curlers and proceeded to do that in one or two
takes, which is pretty amazing. She came in and knocked off this rather odd
lyric. It’s not the sort of lyric you give anyone — 'Rape, murder/It’s just a
shot away' — but she really got into it, as you can hear on the record." Pregnant and getting ready for bed before she got the call from producer Jack
Nitzsche, Merry politely bowed out until her husband said: "Honey, you know, you
really should go and do this date." The incredible performance, though, would indeed turn
tragic. That night, Clayton miscarried.
Merry, though, turned what is assuredly
a good song – but no more – into rock canon.
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