There’s a good chance that the comparisons between The Beatles and The Rolling Stones will be played out until the end of time. Despite both bands getting along quite well throughout the majority of their tenure, The Stones were always looked at as the evil twin to the Fab Four, playing songs that were similar with a slightly sinister edge to them, like ‘Jumpin Jack Flash’ and ‘Sympathy for the Devil’. Though plenty of music journalists have said their piece about the similarities between the groups, no one asked George Harrison what they thought of them nearly as often.
Despite The Stones being closer to the blues, Mick Jagger was always looking to expand his musical horizons and often took some cues from John Lennon and Paul McCartney. It has even gone down in legend that the songwriting duo convinced Jagger and Keith Richards to write songs together, watching them create ‘I Wanna Be Your Man’ from scratch right in front of them.
As the 1960s started to get underway with the Summer of Love, The Stones also started to pick up a few tracks from their supposed rivals. Making a psychedelic experience on Their Satanic Majesties Request, the album served as a homage to what their counterparts did a few months before on Sgt Pepper.
That need to understand what they were doing even translated into The Beatles’ personal lives. After wrapping up production on their film Magical Mystery Tour, Harrison was adamant about The Beatles going on a meditation retreat with The Maharishi Mahesh Yogi in India. Though all of The Beatles were onboard, Harrison also remembered a few other musicians following them, remarking in the Anthology, “Mick Jagger was also there. He was always lurking around in the background, trying to find out what was happening. Mick never wanted to miss out on what the Fabs were doing.”
Jagger wasn’t the only musician hanging around the group, either, with Mike Love of The Beach Boys turning up for a little while and folk songwriter Donavon teaching John Lennon a few fingerpicking tricks along the way, which Lennon would utilise in later songs like ‘Julia’. Then again, Jagger would say later that he thought the spiritual side of things was a bit of a fad before realising just how attuned Harrison was with his spirituality.
From there, The Stones borrowed even more from The Beatles, including their answer to ‘Hey Jude’ on ‘You Can’t Always Get What You Want’, which included a lavish choir singing behind Jagger. Harrison wasn’t the only one turning his nose up at some of The Stones’ habits, with Lennon later remarking to Rolling Stone: “I would like to just list what we did and what the Stones did two months after on every fuckin’ album. Every fuckin’ thing we did, Mick does exactly the same – he imitates us.”
Despite The Stones pinching ideas from their rivals, all the members remained friendly throughout their tenure. Lennon even formed the impromptu supergroup The Dirty Mac when appearing on The Rolling Stones’ Rock and Roll Circus. There’s nothing wrong with a healthy friendship between musicians, but sometimes The Beatles thought that the constant presence of Jagger may have been a bit too close for comfort.
