In Another Land

Composer: Bill Wyman
Recording date: June-July 1967        Recording location: Olympic Sound Studios, London, England
Producers: The Rolling Stones        Chief engineer: Glyn Johns
Never performed onstage

Probable line-up:

Drums: Charlie Watts
Bass: Bill Wyman
Acoustic guitars: Steve Marriott & Keith Richards
Lead vocal: Bill Wyman
Background vocals: Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Steve Marriott & Ronnie Lane
Harpsichord: Nicky Hopkins
Piano: Bill Wyman
Organs: Ian Stewart & Bill Wyman
Mellotron: Brian Jones
Snoring: Bill Wyman or Brian Jones
 

In another land
Where the breeze and the trees and the flowers were blue
I stood and held your hand
And the grass grew high and the feathers floated by
I stood and held your hand

And nobody else's hand will ever do
Nobody else will do

Then I awoke
Was this some kind of joke?
Much to my surprise
I opened my eyes

We walked across the sand
And the sea and the sky and the castles were blue
I stood and held your hand
And the spray flew high and the feathers floated by
I stood and held your hand

And nobody else's hand will ever do
Nobody else will do

Then I awoke
Was this some kind of joke?
Much to my surprise
I opened my eyes

We heard the trumpets blow
And the sky turned red when I accidentally said
That I didn't know
How I came to be here, not fast asleep in bed
I stood and held your hand

And nobody else's hand will ever do
Nobody else will do

Then I awoke
Was this some kind of joke?
I opened my eyes
Much to my surprise

 
 

TrackTalk

I did that with Nicky (Hopkins), Charlie and two of the Small Faces.

- Bill Wyman


I went to the studio one night and when I arrived at the studio Glyn (Johns) said, The session's canceled, so I said, Oh, what a drag, 'cause it was quite a drive for me, about a 45 minute drive. And he said, Well... got any songs you want to mess around, try and demo and things? Nicky Hopkins was there on keyboards. I'm not sure whether Charlie was there or not. I can't remember. And I said, Yeah, 'cause I'd been messing with this song. It was a bit... what I thought was kind of spacy, you know... a bit kind of Satanic Majesties-like. And psychedelic in a way. And he said, We'll have a go at it and I just used those players and next door, in the other studio, were the Small Faces who were recording. And Steve Marriott came in and Ronnie Lane and they sang with me 'cause I just didn't want to sing. So I used that tremolo effect on the voice 'cause I was really uptight about my singing - which I still am. And we just used effects and we tried all kinds of things and it came out quite nice and I went home sort of reasonably satisfied, with an experiment, if you like. And next day I got to the studio and we were just chatting about what we were going to do tonight and Glyn said, Hey, hang on, he said to Mick and Keith and Brian. He said, Hang on, have a listen to this, and put the tape on, played them a rough mix. They said, That's really good, what is it? He said, Bill. He did it yesterday. And so they all liked it and they thought it fitted in so we put it on the album.

- Bill Wyman, 1982


The track was given the working title Acid In The Grass.

- Bill Wyman, Rolling With The Stones, 2002


The idea for the song is about this guy who wakes up from a dream and finds himself in another dream. I'm very hopeful of it being on the next album.

- Bill Wyman, August 1967

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