Salt
of the Earth
Composers: Mick
Jagger & Keith Richards
Recording date: May & July
1968
Recording location:
Olympic Sound Studios, London,
England & Sunset Sound Studios, Los Angeles, USA
Producers: Jimmy
Miller
Chief engineer: Glyn
Johns
Performed onstage: 1968,
1989, 2001* (performed by Mick & Keith), 2003
Probable line-up:
Drums: Charlie
Watts
Bass: Bill Wyman
Acoustic guitar:
Keith Richards
Slide electric guitar:
Keith Richards
Lead vocals: Mick
Jagger & Keith Richards
Background vocals:
Watts Street (L.A.) gospel choir
Piano: Nicky
Hopkins
Let's drink to the
hard working people
Let's drink to the
lowly of birth
Raise your glass to
the good and the evil
Let's drink to the
salt of the earth
Say a prayer
for the common foot soldier
Spare a thought for
his back breaking work
Say a prayer for
his wife and his children
Who burn the fires
and who still till the
earth
When I
search a faceless crowd
A swirling mass of
greys and blacks and whites
They don't look
real to me
In fact they look
so strange
Raise your
glass to the hard working people
Let's drink to the
uncounted heads
Let's think of the
wavering millions
Who need leading
but get gamblers instead
Spare a
thought for the stay-at-home voter
His empty eyes gaze
at strange beauty shows
And parades of
grey-suited grafters
A choice of cancer
or polio
When I look
into that faceless crowd
A swirling mass of
greys and blacks and whites
They don't look
real to me
Oh don't they look
so strange?
Let's drink
to the hard working people
Let's think of the
lowly of birth
Spare a thought for
the ragtaggy people
Let's drink to the
salt of the earth
Let's drink
to the hard working people
Let's drink to the
salt of the earth
Let's drink to the
2000 millions
Let's think of the
humble of birth
Let's take a
drink to the salt of the earth
Let's take a
drink to the salt of the earth
Let's take a
drink to the salt of the earth
Let's take a
drink to the salt of the earth
Let's take a
drink to the salt of the earth
Let's take a
drink to the salt of the earth
Let's take a
drink to the salt of the earth
Let's take a
drink to the salt of the earth
TrackTalk
(That was recorded
in the) studio (not on a cassette).
Mick's words, but I think I was there for a bit of them too. I'd
forgotten
about that actually. Nearly all Mick, that one.
-
Keith Richards, 1971
Salt of the
Earth, I think I came up with the title of that and had the basic
spur of it, but Mick did all the verses.
-
Keith Richards, Life (2010)
My voice
first appeared solo on the first
verse of Salt of the Earth. (Not
so: Keith's voice first appears solo on "Something Happened to Me
Yesterday".)
We
did the chorus together, me and Mick.
-
Keith Richards, 1971
(T)he song is
total cynicism. I'm saying those
people haven't any power and they never will have.
-
Mick Jagger, 1970
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