Superstar DJ Norman Cook a.k.a. Fatboy Slim has finally been approved to release his fabled Rolling Stones mashup, 25 years after it first emerged as a widely-bootleged 12" single.
Satisfaction Skank mixes Cook's own The Rockerfeller Skank - a UK Top 10 hit in 1998 – with Keith Richards' original riff from the Stones' 60-year-old smash (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction. The bootleg became part of Cook's DJ set after he became bored with his original, but he was never able to get sample clearance from the band to release it officially.
"It was my secret weapon," Cook tells BBC News. "I had this tune that nobody else had, and it was a really good encore."
Cook tried several times to get clearance to use the sample, but was always turned down.
"I got a call from Mick Jagger, and he said he'd heard it and he liked the mix," says Cook. "But his management was just like, 'No, not even negotiable'. We've had a pretty flat 'no' for 20 years. I think we asked four times, and I wouldn't have dared to ask them again."
A mooted single release featuring a Fatboy Slim remix of another Stones classic, 1968's Sympathy For The Devil, backed with Satisfaction Skank, fell through, but finally a deal was made, and Cook was able to recreate his mashup using the stems from the original Rolling Stones sessions.
"Big thanks to The Rolling Stones for just being The Rolling Stones," says Cook. "And also for making this happen!"
Cook's original version of The Rockerfeller Skank contains samples from 13 different songs, including snippets of I Fought the Law by The Bobby Fuller Four, Twistin' 'N' Twangin' by Duane Eddy, and David Bowie's Join The Gang.
