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Rolling Stones songs: Plundered My Soul
*Click for MORE ROLLING STONES SONGS 1962-PRESENT

I hate quittin’ but I’m close to admittin’ I’m a sorry case/ But on quiet reflection, my sad rejections not a total disgrace…

Written by: Jagger/Richard
Recorded: Rolling Stones Mobile, Villa Nellcote, Villefranche-sur-mer, France, July and Oct. 14-Nov. 23 1971; New vocals and guitar by Mick, new guitar by Mick Taylor in New York City and Los Angeles, 2009
Guest musicians: Nicky Hopkins (piano), Bobby Keys (sax), Lisa Fischer and Cindy Mizelle (background vocals)
*Data taken from Martin Elliott’s book THE ROLLING STONES COMPLETE RECORDING SESSIONS 1962-2012

From Songfacts:
This soulful rock tune is one of ten tracks pulled from the Rolling Stones’ archives and re-recorded by the band for release on the 2010 update of their 1972 album, Exile on Main St.. It was the first song released by the band from the new recordings and 7-inch limited-edition copies of the single were sold in independent stores on April 17, 2010, in honor of Record Store Day. The song was the Stones’ first single release since “Biggest Mistake” came out on August 21, 2006.

The track features several former members of the Rolling Stones. Bill Wyman, who left the band in 1993, played bass, and Mick Taylor, who left in 1974, performed lead guitar. Also, the late Nicky Hopkins, who previously featured on earlier Rolling Stones albums and recordings, is featured on piano. Mick Jagger recorded new vocals in March of 2010. The Stones vocalist said: “The (Exile outtakes) weren’t all recorded in the same place. Some of them I really remembered, but some of them I didn’t remember at all. Some of them were really together – ‘Plunder My Soul’ that was perfect, you didn’t have to edit, it was all perfect. Some of the others were much more loose jams.”

Keith Richards told Billboard magazine: “I hadn’t really realized how much was left over until I started going into this project. I automatically assumed that anything good [and unused] that we’d done on ‘Exile’ would roll over to Goat’s Head Soup.””I knew there was loads of stuff lying around,” Mick Jagger added. “But I didn’t know what time period it came from. I wanted to be faithful to the time period – I didn’t want to take things out of context, so [I’ve tried] to pick things that were recorded in that time frame. Some of them are of interest and fun, but some of them are really good, so I hope people like them.”

Lisa Fischer and Cindy Mizelle sang backup on this track. They were called in to perform on the re-worked versions of the Exile outtakes. They were backup singers on The Stones 1989-90 Steel Wheels tour and have performed on albums for a variety of artists, including Luther Vandross, Carly Simon and Freddie Jackson.

Mick Taylor told Gibson.com that it didn’t take him very long to record his overdubbed guitar licks for this track. Said Taylor: “That was very quick. I mean, because the track was already there for me to overdub on, and Mick had already done a rough vocal, so it didn’t actually sound too much like an outtake from Exile on Main St. Well, it did, except Mick had added vocals and back-up vocals and all it needed was some lead guitar, which I did… very quickly. I think it took about two hours for me to do about four or five different passes on the guitar.”

From the The Rolling Stones – All the Songs book:
Universal’s rerelease of Exile on Main St., remastered and in new packaging, was accompanied by a number of supplementary recordings. The producer Don Was and the Stones unearthed what would become “Plundered My Soul” in a vast warehouse where dozens of tapes recorded over the years were stored. This particular song dates back to the Exile on Main St. sessions held in the basement at Nellcôte during the torrid summer of 1971. What they found was the backing tape containing rhythm guitars, bass, drums, and piano. The song now needed to be reworked and, of course, words had to be added.
Mick Jagger set to work straightaway. “Plundered My Soul” is a story of resentment. An ex-lover admits to being a bad loser because the woman he loved stole his heart. He adds: I thought you wanted my money, but you plundered my soul. A song of wounded love, “Plundered My Soul” was released as a limited-edition single on April 17, 2010 (with “All Down the Line” as the B-side), accompanied by a video made by the Swede Jonas Odell (“Make Me Smile [Come Up and See Me]” by Erasure, “Take Me Out” by Franz Ferdinand). This was the first single by the Stones since “Biggest Mistake” four years earlier (with the exception of the digital reissues of “Paint It Black,” “She’s a Rainbow,” “Sympathy for the Devil,” and “Wild Horses”). “Plundered My Soul” performed modestly in the United Kingdom (number 200) and the United States (number 42 on
Billboard’s Rock Songs Airplay), but climbed to an unexpected fifteenth place in France.