A couple months ago I learned the Rolling Stones were releasing their first album of new music in ... years. Just how many years, I forget, but long enough to have been ... ages. Speaking of time, it's almost 62 years since the band first got together. As for their last listenable album, that's debatable, but most of those I listen to say 42 years ago, when they released Tattoo You (1981).
How old is the band's singer? often gets asked when this new album is mentioned. So I looked it up. Mick Jagger was born in July, 1943, making him 80. As for the album, it's called Hackney Diamonds, and in a recent CBC interview Jagger was talking about it as if it too were old -- having been mastered in March. Judging from the album's first single, "Angry", Jagger is still capable of hitting some high notes, some of them above middle C.
As for songwriting, listeners familiar with the Stones will recognize "Angry" as a pastiche of past licks (the video visually supports that). It's not unusual for bands that have been around long enough to write songs like this, especially those conscious of a come-back (yes, the Stones have been away long enough for those under 50 to have forgotten them), but something about "Angry" had me wondering if they used AI to make it? And if so, what instructions were added? You can hear the drum intros that signal past hits like "Get Off My Cloud" (1965) and Tattoo You's "Start Me Up" (1981). So a combination of the two? Certainly a nice way to say goodbye to the band's nice guy drummer, Charlie Watts, whose died a couple years back of natural causes.
What is "new" about this song is its lyric, which very much speaks to our moment -- and just how difficult it is for some of us to converse with it. This is not a lyric designed to produce a memorable chorus (the world spins too quickly for that now, and besides, where this song might have a chorus, it has a bridge instead), but a refrain based on an emotion ("anger") and to whom it is directed (the singing "me"). Indeed, this refrain ("Angry/ Don't be angry with me") is a refinement of past "angry"s and "me"s and comes in the last 1:30 minutes of a 3:46 minute song that essentially runs out of itself at the end of the second minute.
Here's the lyric:
One, two
One, two, three, go
Don't get angry with me
I never caused you no pain
I won't be angry with you
But I can't see straight (Yeah)
It hasn't rained for a month, the river's run dry
We haven't made love and I wanna know why
Why you angry with me?
Why you angry?
[Chorus]
Please just forget about me
Cancel out my name
Please never write to me
I love you just the same
I hear a melody ringing in my brain
Just keep the memories
Don't have to be ashamed
Don't get angry with me
I'm in a dеsperate state
I'm not angry with you
Don't you spit in my facе
The wolf's at the door with the teeth and the claws
My mouth's getting sore, I can't take anymore
Ah, why you angry with me?
Why you angry?
[Chorus]
Voices keep echoing
Calling out my name
Hear the rain keep beating
On my window pane
I hear a melody ringing in my brain
You can keep the memories
Don't have to be ashamed
Don't get angry with me
[Outro]
(Angry, angry)
Yeah, yeah (Angry, don't be angry with me)
If we go separate ways
(Angry) Yeah, don't be angry with me
Let's go out in a blaze
(Angry, don't be angry with me) Yeah
Don't you spit in my face
(Angry) Oh
Don't be angry with me
Don't get, don't get
(Angry, don't be angry with me)
I'm still taking the pills and I'm off to Brazil
(Angry, don't be angry with me)
Please, don't be angry with me (Angry, don't be angry with me)
Come on
Don't, don't, don't, not (Angry, don't be angry with me)
Not, not, not, not, not, not, not
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