This is a post about “Jumping Jack Flash”; it could also be about any one of fifty or sixty other songs that have followed me around ever since I can remember.  But I’m choosing this one.  It pounces on me when I least expect it.  The radio, a mix tape, my own CD.  The guitar riff twists and snaps like a loose power cable, and I stop whatever I’m doing.  That includes talking (shut up; I’m trying to listen).  That includes breathing (I’m purple and you’re ugly, but at least I’ll soon have air). That includes driving (get the hell out of my way; I’m not steering or braking for the next four minutes).

I like the Stones, but I’m not the world’s biggest fan.  I don’t have all their albums.  I’ve never even seen them in concert.  But “Jumping Jack Flash” tears into me every single time.  It’s not like I hear the song; it’s more like the song hears me.

I pay homage to those who have dared cover it. 

Aretha Franklin?  God bless you.  The movie with Whoopi sucked, but your cover isn’t half bad.  It reimagines the guitar hook so that it grinds against you insistently, like the hottest slow dance you ever had in high school.  It’s not on a par with the original, but it’s not bad.  I R-E-S-P-E-C-T you, sweetheart.

Peter Frampton?  You’re before my time, and I couldn’t care less about your lame music.  The fact that Frampton Comes Alive is one of the best-selling records ever just leaves me cold.  But you tried.  You put some heart into the cover.  You may live.

Terence Trent D’arby?  Your albums are overpriced even when they’re in the dollar bin.  But at least you know a good song when you hear it, even if you’re not worthy to record it.

And what about the Stones themselves?

I know what you’re thinking.  You’re thinking that there’s something melancholy about loving a song as old as this one, because you know that the people who created it are sick of it.  Is there anything sadder than watching an aging rocker belt out his biggest hit for the 10,000th time?  Decades ago, Mick Jagger famously said that he didn’t want to be singing “Satisfaction” when he was 60.

But in a recent interview, Keith Richards was asked: “What if you were sentenced to death and given a final wish?  What would you want?”

And you know what that blackened, charred scarecrow of a man said?  He said, “Please just let me play ‘Jumping Jack Flash’ one more time.  Just one more time before I die.’”

Because he knows.

He knows that he’s a flawed man--a talented musician, maybe, a genius, perhaps, but nonetheless only a human being-- who somehow managed to redirect a thunderbolt and bring it crashing down to earth.  Who tapped into something large and gorgeous. Who transcribed what God sounds like when He is happy and insane in front of six billion people, shattering harps into brilliant gold pieces.