EDITOR’S NOTE: This week on NRO, we’re rolling out the first five and then all 50 songs from a list John J. Miller compiled that appears in the June 5 issue of National Review. (#5 appeared here on Monday, #4 here on Tuesday.) To get the whole list NOW, check out the latest issue of National Review . For itunes links to all 50 songs, hang on until Friday, when we’ll unveil the whole list.
#3: ‘Sympathy for the Devil,’ by the Rolling Stones (1968) ; buy CD on Amazon.com
The charisma of evil–it comes down to that, really. “Wealth and taste.” Authority: “a general’s rank.” Turning history down dark alleys on a whim: “I stuck around St. Petersburg / when I saw it was time for a change.” Respect predicated on physical violence: “use all your well-learned politesse / or I’ll lay your soul to waste.” Evil is not merely inspired by the desire to gratify some common lust. Evil seduces also because it can be so damnably in charge: Imagine a being who turns heads to tails and sinners to saints; who chokes the life out of the powerful, sometimes with a word, sometimes with two bare hands around the neck. And then he walks away, free. He is in need of some restraint, but there is no restraint. Not in this life.
The devil as drawn by Mick Jagger–he alone wrote the lyrics, inspired by the samizdat novel The Master and Margarita by anti-Soviet author Mikhail Bulgakov–stands over stinking bodies as bombs fall from the sky, swaying to a samba. This is a portrait of badness as a bad guy himself–the personified, horns-on-his-head, pitchfork-and-a-tail bad guy, smiling in a bloody rain and still looking dapper. Yet he is not the Sunday-school devil. This one takes first-person credit for every damned thing: the Hundred Years War, the Bolshevik Revolution, Hitler, and the Kennedy assassinations. But Jagger’s devil doesn’t waste his speech swearing out more warrants against the future. Instead, he dances, shakes maracas, and grooves to a manic bass. He is fearless. The devil who watched Pilate wash his hands at the trial of Christ is the same one with you now. He is real and he will kill you, too. Yet… don’t you want to know more? Come closer. http://www.nationalreview.com/redirect/amazon.p?j=1411683056
The lyrics:
Please allow me to introduce myself
I’m a man of wealth and taste
I’ve been around for a long, long year
Stole many a man’s soul and faith
I was ‘round when Jesus Christ
Had his moment of doubt and pain
Made damn sure that Pilate
Washed his hands and sealed his fate
Pleased to meet you
Hope you guess my name
But what’s puzzling you
Is the nature of my game
I stuck around St. Petersburg
When I saw it was a time for a change
Killed the czar and his ministers
Anastasia screamed in vain
I rode a tank
Held a general’s rank
When the blitzkrieg raged
And the bodies stank
Pleased to meet you
Hope you guess my name, oh yeah
Ah, what’s puzzling you
Is the nature of my game, oh yeah
I watched with glee
While your kings and queens
Fought for ten decades
For the gods they made
I shouted out,
“Who killed the Kennedys?”
When after all
It was you and me
Let me please introduce myself
I’m a man of wealth and taste
And I laid traps for troubadours
Who get killed before they reach Bombay
Pleased to meet you
Hope you guessed my name, oh yeah
But what’s puzzling you
Is the nature of my game, oh yeah, get down, baby
Pleased to meet you
Hope you guessed my name, oh yeah
But what’s confusing you
Is just the nature of my game
Just as every cop is a criminal
And all the sinners saints
As heads is tails
Just call me Lucifer
’Cause I’m in need of some restraint
So if you meet me
Have some courtesy
Have some sympathy, and some taste
Use all your well-learned politesse
Or I’ll lay your soul to waste, um yeah
Pleased to meet you
Hope you guessed my name, um yeah
But what’s puzzling you
Is the nature of my game, um mean it, get down
Woo, who
Oh yeah, get on down
Oh yeah
Oh yeah!
Tell me baby, what’s my name?
Tell me honey, can ya guess my name?
Tell me baby, what’s my name?
I tell you one time, you’re to blame
Oh, who
woo, woo
Woo, who
Woo, woo
Woo, who, who
Woo, who, who
Oh, yeah
What’s my name?
Tell me, baby, what’s my name?
Tell me, sweetie, what’s my name?
–Michael Long is a director of the White House Writers Group and the editor of “Too Tough for TV: Rejected jokes of the late-night comics.”