This week we talk about one of the most recognizable guitar riffs in rock & roll history, created by Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones, “Jumping Jack Flash.” Jack is actually a real person, called Jack Dyer, who was Keith’s gardener at the time.
Richards explained how Dyer inspired the band to write the song: “The lyrics came from a grey dawn at Redlands. Mick and I had been up all night. It was raining outside, and there was the sound of these boots near the window, belonging to my gardener, Jack Dyer. It woke Mick up. He said, ‘What’s that?’ I said, ‘Oh, that’s Jack. That’s Jumping Jack.'”
He then added, “I started to work around the phrase on the guitar, which was in open tuning, singing the phrase ‘Jumping Jack.’ Mick said, ‘Flash,’ and suddenly we had this phrase with a great rhythm and ring to it.” So we got to work on it and wrote it.
One night, with plans to rehearse at RG Jones Studio in Morden, Surrey, there were only three Rolling Stones who turned up at the agreed time. Brian Jones, Bill Wyman, and Charlie Watts decided to fill the time waiting for Keith and Mick Jagger by jamming. Charlie and Brian were following Bill, who started picking out a distinctive new riff on the piano. “It sounded really good and tough,” Wyman remembered. “When Mick and Keith walked in, they said, ‘Keep playing that, and don’t forget it. It sounds great.'”
The riff is something that still fills Richards with an immense amount of pride today, as he divulged in the same interview: “When you get a riff like ‘Flash,’ you get a great feeling of elation, a wicked glee,” he said. “I can hear the whole band take off behind me every time I play ‘Flash.’ It never gets old!”
