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Rolling Stones songs: You Can Make It If You Try
Don’t it make you feel so bad sometime/ You wanna lay down and die…
Mick Jagger: vocals, tambourine Keith Richards: guitar Brian Jones: guitar, backing vocals Bill Wyman: bass, backing vocals Charlie Watts: drums Guest musicians: Ian Stewart (organ)
Before it became a staple of early Rolling Stones deep-cut appreciation, You Can Make It If You Try had already lived a long life—one shaped by heartbreak, reinvention, and a curious journey across musical borders. Long before Jagger ever wailed its opening lines, the song began in Nashville, in the hands of Ted Jarrett, a young songwriter whose career bloomed after World War II. Yet its path to the Stones wasn’t straightforward: from its slow, gospel-kissed origins in Gene Allison’s 1957 version, to its soulful reappearance in Solomon Burke’s repertoire, the track evolved with each new voice that touched it. When the Rolling Stones took it on, they didn’t just cover it—they reshaped it. They slowed the pulse, amplified the ache, and infused the melody with their own ragged mix of gospel urgency and rock ’n’ roll bite, revealing a band already capable of more than the blues-driven fire they were known for.
Ted Jarrett’s Early Spark
Ted Jarrett’s story starts in Nashville in 1925, where he began writing songs as a teenager and found his footing after WWII. His early career was rooted in radio, spinning records at WSOK before carving his name into the charts with It’s Love Baby (24 Hours a Day), which soared to number 2 on the R&B charts for Louis Brooks and his HiToppers. Jarrett followed that success with two more major hits—Love, Love, Love for honky-tonk star Webb Pierce in 1955 and You Can Make It If You Try for Gene Allison in 1957. The latter, born out of the emotional fallout of a breakup, would become one of his most enduring creations. Despite its gospel-tinged warmth and chart success across R&B and pop rankings, Jarrett likely had no idea the song would later be revived in the hands of a gritty British rock band still discovering its musical identity.
A Gospel Heartbeat Reinvented
Gene Allison’s original recording presented the song as a slow, soulful plea—part gospel testimony, part doo-wop comfort, threaded with a churchy organ and supported by a rocking saxophone. It carried the spirit of resilience, urging listeners to keep their heads high through adversity. While it reached the pop Top Forty and made a considerable impression at the time, it never went on to secure a permanent place in oldies radio. Yet the track kept moving quietly through musical circles, eventually landing on a Solomon Burke album in 1963. This detour through one of the Stones’ favorite soul singers may well have been the route through which Mick, Keith, Brian, Bill, and Charlie discovered it. If Allison’s version was a gentle encouragement, the Stones chose instead to tap into the song’s buried anguish, shaping their arrangement into something more raw, stretched, and dramatic.
The Stones Transform the Message
On their debut album—largely a charged collection of blues-rock energy—the Stones surprised listeners with a shift toward soul and balladry through You Can Make It If You Try. They slowed the tempo even further than Allison, turning the song into a more deliberate, emotionally tense moment. The arrangement spotlighted Jagger’s unaccompanied vocal entrances at the top of verses, creating vivid tension before the band swooped back in with rough yet compelling harmonies. Keith delivered an acoustic foundation while Brian Jones added a doo-wop-inspired counterpoint on his Gretsch Anniversary guitar. Bill, Brian, and Keith contributed backing vocals, stronger and more cohesive than their earlier efforts on tracks like Tell Me (You’re Coming Back). Ian Stewart’s gospel-colored organ—apparently played on a Vox Continental—bound everything together. Without abandoning the song’s spiritual core, the band injected their signature rock ’n’ roll spark, shaping a version that some consider more gripping than Allison’s original.
A Collector’s Quirk and a Sign of Early Range
Even the record sleeves carried quirks: on early pressings of the album, the word If vanished from the title, leaving an accidental—and slightly chaotic—“You Can Make It You Try.” A small mishap, perhaps, but one collectors still chase. More importantly, the track revealed something essential about the Stones: beneath their electric blues swagger was a hunger to explore. Rock, blues, rhythm ’n’ blues, pop ballads—and now gospel. Andrew Loog Oldham’s vision of broadening the band’s appeal was already taking root, and this song stood as early proof of their versatility. Though it remains a lesser-known gem in their early catalogue, You Can Make It If You Try showed a young group willing to stretch their sound far beyond expectations, blending American roots influences with their own gritty style and setting the stage for the musical shape-shifting that would define their future.
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