Edit 2 for headphones, March 2024. "Sister Morphine" is a song written by Marianne Faithfull, Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. Faithfull released the original version of the song as the B-side to her Decca Records single "Something Bet…
Edit 2 for headphones, March 2024. "Sister Morphine" is a song written by Marianne Faithfull, Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. Faithfull released the original version of the song as the B-side to her Decca Records single "Something Better" on 21 February 1969. Source of this edit: the 1965 album "Come my way" 1965 (2006 remastered edition). A much different version is on the 1979 album "Broken English" (deluxe 2cd edition 2013).
The personnel for the Faithfull version are Marianne on vocals, Mick Jagger on acoustic guitar, Ry Cooder on slide guitar and bass guitar, Jack Nitzsche on piano and organ, and Charlie Watts on drums.
The original UK Decca single credited Faithfull as a co-writer, but when London Records issued the single in the United States, her name was omitted, as it was from the credits on the Rolling Stones' version of the song on their album "Sticky Fingers". After a legal battle Faithfull retained her rights as a co-author, acknowledged by the 1994 Virgin Records reissue of the Stones' album catalogue from "Sticky Fingers" through "Steel Wheels". The glimmer thieves corrected...
In the United Kingdom, Marianne's single was withdrawn by Decca due to the drug reference in the title, after an estimated 500 copies had been issued, but in other countries the single remained in release. In some territories such as the Netherlands, Italy and Japan, "Sister Morphine" appeared on the A-side. In addition, the French, US and Netherlands editions of the single actually featured alternate versions of both sides to the UK release.
In New Zealand the single with "Broken English" as b-side charted #37 in 1982.
Here are some facts about the song:
Marianne Faithfull recorded this during The Stones' "Let It Bleed" sessions (she was Mick Jagger's girlfriend at the time). Her version was released in 1969 and tanked. Decca Records pulled it after two weeks.
The song is about a man who gets in a car accident and dies in the hospital while asking for morphine.
Mick..
