Probable line-up:

Drums: Kenny Jones
Bass: Willie Weeks
12-string acoustic guitar: Ron Wood
Electric guitars: Keith Richards
Lead vocals: Mick Jagger
Backing vocals: Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Ron Wood & Mick Taylor
Piano: Ian Stewart
 

If I could stick my pen in my heart
I would spill it all over the stage
Would it satisfy you? Would it slide on by you?
Would you think the boy is strange?
Ain't he strange?

If I could win you, if I could sing you
A love song so divine
Would it be enough for your cheating heart
If I broke down and cried?
If I cried?

I said I know it's only rock & roll but I like it
I know it's only rock & roll
But I like it, like it, yes I do

Oh well, I like it (yeah)
I like it
I said can't you see that this old boy has been lonely?

If I could stick a knife in my heart
Suicide right onstage
Would it be enough for your teenage lust?
Would it help to ease the pain?
Ease your brain?

If I could dig down deep in my heart
Feelings would flood on the page
Would it satisfy you? Would it slide on by you?
Would you think the boy's insane? He's insane

And do you think that you're the only girl around?
I bet you think that you're the only woman in town

Ooh yeah

I like it...
Only rock & roll but I like it...
Oh yeah but I like it...
 
 

TrackTalk

Mick (Jagger) and I worked out I Can Feel the Fire and after we'd done that, he said, Help me with this song 'cause I wanna see how it turns out. So, say on a Tuesday evening: two guitars - Mick and I - and Mick singing lead vocal and David Bowie and myself on backup vocals. Then I overdubbed the rest of the instruments last and it sounded like a good demo. So the next night, we wanted to put it in a more presentable shape so we got hold of Kenny Jones who plays the drums on the actual record. Ah... I ended up with just my acoustic guitar that I laid originally. Keith replaced - RIGHTLY SO - the guitars that I'd done electrically.

The idea of the song has to do with our persona at the time. I was getting a bit tired of people having a go, all that oh, it's not as good as their last one business. The single-sleeve had a picture of me with a pen digging into me as if it were a sword. It was a light-harded, anti-journalistic sort of thing. We originally recorded it in Ronnie Wood's demo-studio.

I didn't do that, that was done - I was in bed at the time of that... And that was done - Kenny played that, Kenny Jones, they pulled HIM out' cause he lived near to Richmond. It was done in a very beautiful house in Richmond that Ronnie used to own. Pete Townshend owns it now, there's a bit of name-dropping isn't it, you'll like that.

We cut it but it just didn't have that one-off feel. So eventually we went back to the dub and overdubbed (laughs) on David and on Kenny and... did another one of those because it just had the right...

I said, But you forgot one thing, Keith, you forgot my twelve-string. And he said, (grunts) I left that on.

I like that track It's Only Rock 'n Roll...

Yeah, it's a very Chuck Berry song, but it's got a different kind of feeling to it than a Chuck Berry song. But it's completely Chuck Berry...

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