This Week In Rock History: Keith Richards, The Stooges, Weezer

This week in rock history, the Rolling Stones recorded “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction,” the Stooges began laying down Fun House, Keith Relf of the Yardbirds and Frank Sinatra passed away, and Weezer released their smash debut album.

May 12, 1965: The Rolling Stones record “(I Can‘t Get No) Satisfaction”
Humanity may be better off not knowing what Keith Richards dreams about, but it sure paid off once: when the Rolling Stones’ guitarist conjured the riff to “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” in his sleep.

As he’s explained in interviews, Richards heard his now-famous three-note run in a dream, woke to plant the riff on his tape recorder and mumble “I can’t get no satisfaction,” and then fell back asleep soundly. The band was initially worried that the hook was reminiscent of Martha and the Vandellas’ “Dancing in the Street” but committed it to tape anyway at RCA Hollywood Studios the following week.  Written with singer Mick Jagger and produced by band manager Andrew Loog Oldham, “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” launched the Stones’ true British Invasion fame as their first No. 1 single in America in June of 1965. The track was included on the American version of that year’s Out of Our Heads.

May 10, 1970 – The Stooges begin recording Fun House

When the Stooges recorded what would become their bristling second album, Fun House, civility went off the table. In its place: plenty of drugs. “We had a certain purity of intention,” wild frontman Iggy Pop reflects in Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, where the album resides at Number 189. “I don’t think we did ever get it from the drugs. I think they killed things.” But from the sound of the album, released on July 7, 1970 (or 7/7/70), the creative process was still electric, with scabrous proto-punk tracks “Loose,” “L.A. Blues,” and the winding seven-minute-plus title cut.

Fun House proved to be an influential force on punk rock, despite initially tepid sales. It was recorded at Los Angeles’s Elektra Sound Recorders in a 15-day blast and produced by former Kingsmen keyboardist Don Galluci, who proved crucial in capturing the Ann Arbor, Michigan, group’s live ferocity to tape. Fun House featured the iconic Stones lineup of Iggy Pop (vocals), Ron Asheton (guitar), Dave Alexander (bass), and Scott Asheton (drums), with woodwind support from Steve Mackay (saxophone).

May 14, 1976: Keith Relf of the Yardbirds dies of electrocution while playing electric guitar

Aside from their own hit singles, the Yardbirds helped predict some of the greatest rock music of all time. Their lineup in the Sixties included three of rock’s most immortal guitarists before they hit international glory ”” Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, and Jimmy Page ”” and was a steadily influential force in distortion-drenched, blues-rock experimentalism. The group charted with singles “For Your Love,” “Heart Full of Soul,” and “Over Under Sideways Down” but disbanded in 1968, though an incarnation reformed in 1992 and remains modestly active.

Unfortunately, the Yardbirds’ lead singer and harmonica player, Keith Relf, never got to realize his own rock stardom as fully as his six-stringers did. He died from electrocution while playing an improperly grounded electric guitar near an exposed gas pipe in his London home recording studio. He was 33, and in the process of regrouping another one of his vaunted rock acts, Renaissance.

Relf was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame posthumously in 1992.