I’ve only posted this one once, in August 2019.  It’s more … loud … than my usual fare, but tonight I’m angry, I’m hurt, I’m in the mood for loud and raucous … I want people off of my damned cloud!  I want mass shootings stopped, I want guns all destroyed, I want war banned, I want … I want … I want peace.  I want radicals, bigots, and greedy, arrogant people off my damned cloud.

I’ve been doing music posts long enough that you all know by now this song is not my normal style.  I only vaguely remember loving the Rolling Stones, but I don’t think it was their music that was the draw as much as it was Keith Richards’ … er … um … cuteness?  Hey, gimme a break … I was 14 years old and just discovering that boys were good for something other than playing football & baseball with!

At any rate … moving along …

This song, released in 1965, was the Stones’ follow up to their #1 hit, Satisfaction.  According to co-writer Keith Richards …

“‘Get Off My Cloud’ was basically a response to people knocking on our door asking us for the follow up to ‘Satisfaction,’ which was such an enormous hit worldwide. This, to us, was mind-blowing. I mean not only was it a #1 record but, boom! We thought, ‘At last. We can sit back and maybe think about events.’ Suddenly there’s the knock at the door and of course what came out of that was ‘Get Off Of My Cloud.’ Because within three weeks, in those days hey, they want another single. And we weren’t quite ready for that. So it was our response to the knock at the door: Get off of my cloud. And I’m surprised that it did so well. I mean it has a certain charm but I really remember it as a knee-jerk reaction. And it came out better than I thought.”

And from the other co-writer, Mick Jagger …

“That was Keith’s melody and my lyrics. It’s a stop-bugging-me, post-teenage-alienation song. The grown-up world was a very ordered society in the ’60s, and I was coming out of it. America was even more ordered than anywhere else. I found it was a very restrictive society in thought and behavior and dress.”

The song has energy … I’ll say that about it.  Today, it wouldn’t be a favourite of mine.  And yet … as I was tidying the kitchen this evening, it just popped into my head.  And so …

Get Off Of My Cloud
The Rolling Stones

I live in an apartment on the ninety-ninth floor of my block
And I sit at home looking out the window
Imagining the world has stopped
Then in flies a guy who’s all dressed up just like a Union Jack
And says, “I’ve won five pounds if I have his kind of detergent pack”

I says, “hey, you, get off of my cloud
Hey, you, get off of my cloud
Hey, you, get off of my cloud
Don’t hang around ’cause two’s a crowd
On my cloud, baby”

The telephone is ringing
I say, “hi, it’s me, who is there on the line?”
A voice says, “hi, hello, how are you?”
“Well, I guess I’m doin’ fine”
He says, “it’s three a.m., there’s too much noise
Don’t you people ever want to go to bed?
Just ’cause you feel so good
Do you have to drive me out of my head?”

I says, “hey, you, get off of my cloud
Hey, you, get off of my cloud
Hey, you, get off of my cloud
Don’t hang around ’cause two’s a crowd
On my cloud, baby, yeah”

I was sick and tired, fed up with this
And decided to take a drive downtown
It was so very quiet and peaceful
There was nobody, not a soul around
I laid myself out, I was so tired
And I started to dream
In the morning the parking tickets were just
Like a flag stuck on my window screen

I says, “hey, you, get off of my cloud
Hey, you, get off of my cloud
Hey, you, get off of my cloud
Don’t hang around ’cause two’s a crowd
On my cloud, baby”

“Hey, you, get off of my cloud
Hey, you, get off of my cloud
Hey, you, get off of my cloud
Don’t hang around ’cause two’s a crowd
On my cloud, hey, you

Songwriters: Keith Richards / Mick Jagger
Get Off Of My Cloud lyrics © Abkco Music, Inc