Mother's Little Helper

"Mother's Little Helper" is a song by the English rock band the Rolling Stones. A product of Mick Jagger and Keith Richards' songwriting partnership, it is a folk rock song with Eastern influences. Its lyrics deal with the popularity of prescribed tranquilisers like Valium among housewives and the potential hazards of overdose or addiction. Recorded in December 1965, it was first released in the United Kingdom as the opening track of the band's April 1966 album, ''Aftermath''. In the United States, it was omitted from the album and instead issued as a single in July 1966. The Rolling Stones' twelfth US single, "Mother's Little Helper" spent nine weeks on the US ''Billboard'' Hot 100, peaking at , and it reached on both ''Record World'' and ''Cash Box'' charts.

Though American fans generally found "Mother's Little Helper" lacking when compared to the band's previous singles, contemporary reviewers described the song in favourable terms. The first pop song to address middle-class drug dependency, it helped to establish the band's reputation for cultural subversion. Retrospective commentators have described it as an early example of the Rolling Stones' developing sound and suggestive of Jagger's later songwriting. They have often compared the song's sound and lyrics to the contemporary work of Ray Davies, especially the Kinks' 1965 song "A Well Respected Man", and have typically interpreted its lyrics as either admonishing the older generation for their hypocrisy in critiquing recreational drug use, or as a social commentary on housewives who found their lives unfulfilling.

Background and composition

Music

Keith Richards composed the music to "Mother's Little Helper" in September or October 1965, before the Rolling Stones left the UK for their fourth North American tour. The song is a folk rock composition based around an Eastern-flavoured guitar riff. Written in the Aeolian mode, it is an early instance of modal experimentation in rock music, helping provide the song with an Indian feel. One of the few Rolling Stones songs written in a minor key, its underlying tonality is that of E minor, but ends on an unexpected G major chord, which Richards later suggested may have been contributed by bassist Bill Wyman. Journalist Stephen Davis writes the song uses the same "frantic rockabilly rhythm" heard on " 19th Nervous Breakdown" – both songs subdivide their beats into triplets – before shifting to a country and western styled bridge.

Lyrics

In early December 1965, the Rolling Stones began recording songs for their next LP, released the following year as ''Aftermath''. The main recording engineer for the album, Dave Hassinger, later recalled asking his wife if she could get some drugs: Inspired by the event, Mick Jagger immediately composed the song's lyrics, and the song is credited to the Jagger–Richard songwriting partnership.

Variously described as a satire or a parody, the lyrics focus on a middle-aged woman with children who has become dependent upon pills. So dependent on Valium to alleviate her feelings of existential pain, she asks her doctor to write extra prescriptions. The mother's state of anxiety is reinforced by the song's recurrent lyric of "What a drag it is getting old", sung by Jagger from her point of view, with the bridge consisting of pleas from the mother for more pills before the final verse warns her of the threat of an overdose posed by the drugs.

Recording

The Rolling Stones recorded "Mother's Little Helper" in early December 1965 at RCA studios in Hollywood, California. Andrew Loog Oldham produced the sessions. Like contemporary Indian-influenced rock songs, such as the Yardbirds' "Heart Full of Soul" (June 1965) and the Kinks' "See My Friends" (July 1965), "Mother's Little Helper" uses an electric guitar to mimic the sound of a sitar; Brian Jones and Richards each play a dual-slide riff on an electric twelve-string guitar.; . Author Andrew Grant Jackson suggests the riff was Richards' attempt to imitate the sitar heard on the Beatles' song "Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)", which had been released on the album ''Rubber Soul'' the week before the Rolling Stones began recording. Jones doubles Richards with a Rickenbacker 12-string, tuned down an octave, while Richards played a beaten-up twelve-string which he had repaired:

Richards further contributed rhythm guitar with his Gibson Hummingbird acoustic guitar. During the song's intro, at 0:30, an electric guitar chord is emphasised leading into the riff, accomplished with either a volume pedal or by violining. Wyman's bass guitar contribution includes distortion made with a Maestro FZ-1 Fuzz-Tone, and authors Philippe Margotin & Jean-Michel Guesdon describe his playing as reminiscent of the Memphis sound-style. Jagger's lead vocal is double-tracked while Richards contributes a vocal harmony. Jagger's vocal style for the song irritated his bandmates, later described by Oldham as sounding "near-cockney". Jagger later described the complete song as "a very strange disc", with a music hall sound made more distinct by the electric twelve-string guitar.

Release and reception

UK release

Decca Records released ''Aftermath'' in the UK on 15 April 1966, sequencing "Mother's Little Helper" as the opening track. The first pop song to address middle-class drug dependency, it was one of several tracks on ''Aftermath'' which contributed to listeners interpreting Jagger and Richards as anti-feminists, while also helping to establish the band's reputation for cultural subversion. Due to its explicit drug references, the BBC
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