On Friday, Fatboy Slim dropped his decades-old Rolling Stones mash-up, “Satisfaction Skank“. The famed English DJ—real name Norman Cook—first crafted the track about 25 years ago. However, he couldn’t get permission to release it, even though Stones frontman Mick Jagger “was always a fan of it.”
Speaking to NME, Cook offered some background on how this new official version of the song came together. “The original version was done really cheaply, and the whole thing just came out of one hole in my sampler,” he shared. “Now, we got the original stems off The Stones so I could make everything a little bit cleaner, and using AI, we got better separation and clarity.”
“I’ve tidied it up, but it’s still the same thing,” Cook continued. “It’s shooting fish in a barrel to take a record that’s been around for 25 years and another that’s still a classic from 50 years ago and ask, ‘I wonder: will people like this?’ Certain riffs, motifs, and memes just never go out of fashion.”
Cook was also asked if the Stones were “good sports” about the track. He made it clear that they were fully on board. “Mick [Jagger] was always a fan of it. It was more of a business decision holding it back,” he clarified. “I haven’t spoken to them in this round of negotiations. My manager does all that. I don’t get involved in the ins and outs.”
“Although I seem to be meeting Mick and Keith [Richards] a lot in the AI world for the video, which is quite weird,” Cook added. “I kind of feel like I know them now.”
Don’t expect any other big mash-up tracks from Fatboy Slim anytime soon
So, does Cook have any other secret mash-ups stored away? “No, because generally I prefer them as secret weapons,” he replied. “If you’ve got something that nobody else does but everyone likes and recognises, then that’s a little bit of gold dust. In the old days, we used to stick little white labels over records so nobody knew what they were.”
“I’m at that age now where I’d prefer the kudos of being able to drop tunes in my shows that nobody else has,” Cook concluded, “rather than the kudos of getting to Number 77 in the charts with yet another mash-up.”
The post Fatboy Slim Says Mick Jagger ‘Was Always a Fan’ of His Decades-Old Rolling Stones Mash-Up ‘Satisfaction Skank’ appeared first on VICE.
