News The bands that made Mick Jagger fall out of love with rock: “I don’t feel connected”
When The Rolling Stones burst onto the music scene in the 1960s, they represented the voice of an angry new generation. The adolescent misfits of British blues rock, The Stones were the fear of parents and school teachers across the land, inspiring the kids of the swinging sixties to think a little bit differently from how their parents’ generation had done. Inevitably, though, the exponential success and fame that followed meant that the young rock and roll rebels soon became bitter stalwarts of the musical establishment.
The idea that The Rolling Stones had peaked by the end of the 1960s is fairly controversial. Many would argue that the group lost their mojo after the departure and subsequent death of Brian Jones, while others would claim that works like Exile on Main St. and Sticky Fingers are among some of their finest efforts. Either way, there is no debating that by the time the 1970s rolled around, the band was a globally successful and wealthy outfit, firmly at the top of the rock hierarchy.
So, when the musical revolution of punk rock rolled around, it would make sense for the likes of Mick Jagger and Keith Richards to feel a little threatened. While some of their 1960s contemporaries, like Pete Townshend or Jimmy Page showed an appreciation for this new style, Jagger did not believe the hype. In a 1981 interview, the Stones frontman rallied against this new generation of rock bands, arguing, “I don’t feel connected with bands like the Clash, the bands that still play every night. I can only see them as repeats of everything that happened before”.
Presumably, Mick Jagger revealing that he doesn’t “feel connected” to The Clash would be responded to with a resounding “good” from punk fans. After all, punk rock was not created for millionaires like Mick Jagger, The Clash were speaking for the disenfranchised youth of the 1970s. Nevertheless, Jagger continued, taking aim at the bands of the 2 Tone era, “Bands like the Selecter and The Specials, which are good bands, are repeats too. I mean, I saw bands like that in 1959. It’s the same old thing done slightly differently”.
The unnamed bands that were apparently performing a combination of ska and punk rock back in 1959 remain unknown. After all, ska was only just gaining traction within its home nation of Jamaica at the time, and mixed race band line-ups – as featured in both The Selecter and The Specials – were pretty much unheard of within the UK and America during the 1950s. Of course, Jagger did not entirely turn his back on rock in the 1980s, maintaining an appreciation for established acts like Pink Floyd, “I like some of the shows I’ve seen,” he explained, “I liked the Pink Floyd show – better, anyway, than Elvis Costello’s”.
Comparing Elvis Costello to Pink Floyd, somehow, is not the most bizarre statement Jagger makes in this 1981 interview. In fact, the Rolling Stones frontman derisively states, “I haven’t been interested in rock for years – I mean interested in it in the way of wanting to talk about it. […] I guess, I never have been,” a particularly strange statement coming from the songwriter behind the world’s biggest rock band.
Jagger’s opinions of the bands that made up punk and new wave are an interesting account of how that scene shook up the musical establishment. Groups like The Clash and Elvis Costello were directly rebelling against the complacency of the kind of rock music purported by the likes of The Rolling Stones. These groups were bringing rock music back into the hands of the youth, making music-making more accessible for a new generation, so it should probably come as no surprise that Jagger was not a very big fan.
