It’s the piano. That melancholic, slightly out-of-tune upright piano and the mournful recorder—played by Brian Jones, of all people—that sticks in your head. When you hear The Rolling Stones Ruby Tuesday, you aren’t just hearing a pop song from 1967. You’re hearing the sound of a band realizing that the 1960s were starting to get complicated.
Keith Richards wrote it. Most people assume Mick Jagger is the mastermind behind the emotional heavy hitters, but "Ruby Tuesday" is Keith’s soul laid bare. It was recorded during the Between the Buttons sessions, a time when the Stones were trying to keep up with the psychedelic whimsy of the Beatles while still being, well, the Stones.
But here is the thing: it’s a breakup song. A really painful one.
The Woman Behind the Song
If you want to understand the DNA of this track, you have to talk about Linda Keith. She was a Vogue model, a fixture of the London scene, and the woman who basically discovered Jimi Hendrix. She was also Keith Richards’ girlfriend.
She left him.
Keith was devastated. "Ruby Tuesday" was his way of processing a woman who couldn't be caged or caught. Linda was drifting into the heavy drug scene of the late sixties, and Keith, despite his own reputation, was terrified for her. He wrote the lyrics in a hotel room, allegedly about her departure and her bohemian spirit.
"She's a soul who's just not to be had," he wrote. It wasn't just a clever line. It was a literal description of a person who had slipped through his fingers.
Why the sound is so weird
Most rock songs of that era used a standard setup. Drums, bass, guitar. "Ruby Tuesday" throws that out the window. Bill Wyman isn't even playing a standard bass guitar on the record; he's playing a double bass, and Keith Richards is helping him by holding down the strings while Bill does the bowing. It gives the song that deep, woody, orchestral thud.
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Then there's Brian Jones. By 1967, Brian was distancing himself from the guitar. He was bored. On this track, he plays the recorder. It sounds medieval. It sounds like a folk song from three hundred years ago that somehow ended up on a rock album.
It’s beautiful. It’s also a bit tragic, considering Brian’s state of mind at the time.
A Battle for the Top of the Charts
In early 1967, the song was released as a double A-side with "Let's Spend the Night Together." Nowadays, we don't think much about radio censorship, but back then, "Let's Spend the Night Together" was a scandal. It was too suggestive for the Ed Sullivan Show.
Mick had to change the lyrics to "Let's spend some time together" while rolling his eyes at the camera. Because of that controversy, many radio programmers flipped the record over and played The Rolling Stones Ruby Tuesday instead. It was "safer."
It eventually hit Number 1 on the Billboard Hot 100.
The Melanie Version
You can't talk about this song without mentioning the covers. Usually, Stones fans hate it when people touch their stuff. But Melanie Safka—the woman who sang "Brand New Key"—did a version in 1970 that actually gained its own legendary status.
She stripped it back even further. While the Stones' version feels like a group of men mourning a lost girl, Melanie’s version feels like the girl herself singing back. It’s a different perspective on the same loneliness.
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Why it still hits so hard in 2026
We live in an era of disposable digital singles. Everything is loud. Everything is compressed. The Rolling Stones Ruby Tuesday is the opposite of that. It has "air" in the recording. You can hear the room. You can hear the slight imperfections in the vocal harmony between Mick and Keith.
The lyrics resonate because everyone has had a "Ruby Tuesday" in their life. That person who is fiercely independent to a fault. The one who refuses to "lose their way" by following the crowd, even if it means they end up alone.
"Goodbye Ruby Tuesday / Who could hang a name on you?"
It's a question about identity. Can you ever truly know someone? Or are we all just passing through each other's lives like ghosts? Keith Richards, the ultimate rock survivor, captured a moment of pure vulnerability here that he rarely showed again.
Technical brilliance in the studio
The recording took place at Olympic Studios in London. This was the spot for the Stones. They had a chemistry there that they couldn't find anywhere else. Glyn Johns, the legendary engineer, was behind the board.
- The Piano: It’s played by Jack Nitzsche, not a Stone.
- The Bowed Bass: That’s the secret sauce of the low end.
- The Vocal: Mick sings it with a restrained, almost folk-like delivery. No Jagger swagger here.
If you listen closely to the mono mix versus the stereo mix, the mono version has a lot more punch. The drums feel more integrated. In the stereo mix, things are panned wide, which was the style at the time, but it loses some of that "haunted" feeling that makes the song work.
The Legacy of a Nomadic Spirit
Linda Keith eventually moved on. She survived the sixties, which wasn't a guarantee for everyone in that circle. Keith moved on to Anita Pallenberg. The Stones moved on to Beggars Banquet and Let It Bleed, leaving the baroque-pop sound behind for gritty blues.
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But "Ruby Tuesday" remains their most sophisticated ballad. It’s more complex than "Angie." It’s more poetic than "Wild Horses."
It’s a song about the cost of freedom.
To be free, you have to be willing to leave things behind. You have to be willing to be "no one's slave." That sounds romantic until you're the one being left on the sidewalk while the other person disappears into the mist.
Actionable insights for the modern listener
If you want to truly appreciate this track today, stop listening to it on tiny smartphone speakers.
- Find an original vinyl pressing or a high-fidelity FLAC file. You need to hear the texture of the double bass.
- Listen for the recorder. Watch videos of Brian Jones playing it. It’s one of the last times he looked truly engaged with the music before his tragic spiral.
- Read Keith Richards' autobiography, Life. He goes into detail about Linda Keith and the pain that fueled his songwriting during this period.
- Compare the US and UK versions of Between the Buttons. The tracklisting is different, and it changes how the song feels within the context of the album.
The song isn't just a piece of nostalgia. It’s a masterclass in how to use non-traditional rock instruments to create an atmosphere of longing. It’s proof that the "bad boys of rock" had a depth that their rivals often struggled to match.
The next time Tuesday rolls around, put this on. Don't do anything else. Just sit there and let that opening piano line take you back to a London that doesn't exist anymore, for a woman who refused to be caught.