- Writers: Mick Jagger and Keith Richards
- Producer: Jimmy Miller
- Recorded: December 1969 at Muscle Shoals Studios, Alabama, and early 1970 at Olympic Studios, London
- Released: April 1971 (U.K.) and May 1971 (U.S.)
- Players:
Mick Jagger — vocals, percussion
Keith Richards — guitar
Mick Taylor — guitar
Bill Wyman — bass
Charlie Watts — drums
Ian Stewart — piano
Bobby Keys — saxophone - Album: Sticky Fingers (Rolling Stones, 1971)
- Also On:
Hot Rocks 1964-1971 (London, 1972)
Made In The Shade (Rolling Stones, 1974)
Love You Live (Rolling Stones, 1977)
Rewind (1971-1984) (Rolling Stones, 1984)
Singles Collection: The London Years (ABKCO, 1989)
Flashpoint (Rolling Stones, 1991)
Jump Back: The Best Of The Rolling Stones (Alex/Virgin, 1993)
Forty Licks (Virgin, 2002) - “Brown Sugar” was the Rolling Stones‘ first hit single in their native Britain in two years. It peaked at Number Two on the U.K. pop chart, but was kept out of the top spot by Tony Orlando & Dawn‘s “Knock Three Times.”
- In the U.S., the single hit Number One on the Billboard Hot 100.
- The Sticky Fingers album topped the Billboard 200 as well.
- Mick Jagger married Bianca Rose Perez Moreno De Macias on May 12th, 1971, in St. Tropez, France, shortly after Sticky Fingers was released. Their daughter, Jade, was born five months later.
- The Andy Warhol-designed cover of Sticky Fingers shows a man’s crotch area that features a working steel zipper. The packaging was recreated in 1994 for a CD reissue, when the Stones switched to Virgin Records.
- “Brown Sugar,” a graphic account of slave trading, was criticized at the time for what some considered both racist and sexist overtones. The Stones, of course, denied the accusations.
- The song has remained a staple of the Stones’ live shows.
FAST FORWARD:
- Mick Taylor left the Stones in 1974.
- The band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1989.
- Bill Wyman left the Stones in 1993.
