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Rolling Stones songs: Everybody Knows About My Good Thing
Call the plumber darling/ There must be a leak in my drain…
Mick Jagger: vocals Keith Richards: rhythm guitar Ron Wood: rhythm and lead guitar Charlie Watts: drums Guest musicians: Eric Clapton (slide guitar), Darryl Jones (bass), Chuck Leavell (piano), Matt Clifford (Hammond B3)
Some songs don’t just survive time—they wait for the right moment to reappear. Everybody Knows About My Good Thing is one of those quiet blues classics that kept circulating beneath the surface, carried by musicians who understood its wit, irony, and emotional punch. From its sharp lyrical humor to its deceptively simple structure, the song has always rewarded artists who knew how to let it breathe.
First brought to wider attention by Little Johnny Taylor in 1970, the track blended gospel-born intensity with sly, knowing sarcasm. Its double meanings and conversational tone placed it firmly in the blues tradition, where storytelling mattered as much as musicianship. The song didn’t shout—it smiled, nodded, and let listeners connect the dots.
Decades later, the Rolling Stones heard that same spark and followed it back to its source. Their 2016 recording wasn’t revivalist nostalgia, but recognition—proof that great blues songs don’t age. They wait, listening, until the right band comes along and answers the call.
More about The Rolling Stones’ take on Everybody Knows About My Good Thing
*By Marcelo Sonaglioni
From Gospel Irony to Blues Revival
Everybody Knows About My Good Thing has lived several lives, each revealing a different shade of its character. Written by the sharp-minded duo Miles Grayson and Lermon Horton, the song first found its voice in 1970 through Little Johnny Taylor (John Lamarr Taylor), who transformed irony into something deeply human. Born in Gregory, Arkansas, Taylor carried his gospel upbringing—shaped within the Los Angeles-based Mighty Clouds of Joy—into a song dripping with sly humor. That tension between sacred delivery and secular wit gave the track its spark, strong enough to become the title of his 1971 album. Decades later, the Rolling Stones would reconnect with that same spark, not by reinventing it, but by recognizing something familiar. This wasn’t nostalgia—it was lineage. The song’s journey, from Southern gospel-inflected soul to British blues revival, traces a continuous thread of influence, friendship, and shared musical instinct across generations.
The original voice and its roots
When Little Johnny Taylor recorded Everybody Knows About My Good Thing he brought more than technical skill into the studio. His performance carried the emotional weight of gospel, even as the lyrics winked knowingly at domestic scandal and rumor. Lines like “I was talking to my neighbor / About the way you wear your hair” balance innocence with implication, culminating in the milkman punchline that defines classic blues wordplay. Taylor’s genius lay in never overselling the joke. Instead, he let vocal intensity do the work, allowing irony to emerge naturally. This blend of sincerity and sarcasm helped the song stand out in 1970 and ensured its staying power beyond its original context. It was blues storytelling with a preacher’s conviction, delivered by an artist who understood how humor and heartbreak often share the same breath.
A Stones connection decades in the making
The Rolling Stones had been absorbing this kind of blues language since 1963, long before Everybody Knows About My Good Thing crossed their path. When they finally recorded it for Blue & Lonesome in 2016, the attraction was obvious. The song’s structure left room to breathe, joke, and groove—everything the band values in blues material. Their version keeps the irony intact, but adds grit and ease born from decades of playing together. Keith Richards later likened the experience of collaborating again with Eric Clapton to the “good old days in Richmond,” underscoring how natural the session felt. This wasn’t a cover chosen for novelty; it was a piece that fit seamlessly into the Stones’ musical vocabulary, sounding less like revival and more like continuation.
British Grove and a fortunate collision
Blue & Lonesome itself was recorded in December 2015 at Mark Knopfler’s British Grove Studios in London, a setting that encouraged spontaneity rather than polish. By sheer coincidence, Eric Clapton was recording his album I Still Do in the same building. That overlap proved decisive. Clapton joined the Stones on Everybody Knows About My Good Thing with slide guitar and added lead guitar to I Can’t Quit You Baby, deepening the album’s blues authenticity. Producer Don Was later described the moment to the BBC: Clapton walked in, saw the Rolling Stones set up in a circle with amplifiers blaring, and was instantly transported back to his teenage years watching them play in Richmond. He picked up one of Keith’s guitars and joined in, turning chance into chemistry without ceremony.
Before Blue & Lonesome
Long before the Stones committed the song to tape, Mick Jagger had already explored it live. In 1992, he performed Everybody Knows About My Good Thing at the Hammersmith Odeon in London alongside Gary Moore. That collaboration highlighted a different side of the song, driven by Moore’s forceful guitar work and Jagger’s animated delivery. The performance later appeared as the B-side to Jagger’s 1993 solo single Don’t Tear Me Up, marking it as a meaningful detour within his individual career. Rather than feeling disconnected from the Rolling Stones, the moment reinforced Jagger’s ability to move fluidly between solo expression and band identity. In retrospect, that performance reads less like an experiment and more like a quiet prelude to the song’s eventual return—this time with the Stones themselves, closing a long, blues-soaked circle.
Mick Jagger (2016): “I did a blues night in London with Pops Staples, and one of the numbers I played with Gary Moore was Little Johnny Taylor’s Everybody Knows About My Good Thing“
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