The 20 Most-Covered Rolling Stones Songs

The Rolling Stones have been around a long time.

Long enough, certainly, for their catalog to amass a collection of cover versions from artists spanning genres and generations.

The great thing about Stones songs is that they can be interpreted just about every which way from straight rock ‘n’ roll to slow blues. In the list below, using data from secondhandsongs.com, we’ve compiled the 20 Most-Covered Rolling Stones Songs, with each entry featuring one cover version.

20. “Get Off of My Cloud” and “No Expectations”

From: 1965 Single/Beggars Banquet (1968)

Number of Covers: 60

Tying for 20th place with 60 covers each is “Get Off of My Cloud,” a 1965 single, and “No Expectations” from 1968’s Beggars Banquet. Joan Baez‘s version of the latter is below, from 1970’s The First Ten Years, an album that also included covers of Bob Dylan, Donovan and more.

19. “Dead Flowers”

From: Sticky Fingers (`1971)

Number of Covers: 61

In 2011, Scott Weiland released an entire album of covers titled A Compilation of Scott Weiland Cover Songs, full of songs by artists Weiland admired over the years. “Dead Flowers” was included on it. “I think I’m more of a Keith [Richards] person, because, you know, Mick [Jagger] is more the business guy, he keeps the band together that way,” Weiland told Esquire in 2015. “I’m more of a music person, so I identify more with Keith, but Mick had a huge influence on the way I perform.”

18. “Brown Sugar”

From: Sticky Fingers (1971)

Number of Covers: 64

From the very beginning, the Rolling Stones looked up to Little Richard. What a full circle moment it must have been for them then when Little Richard recorded a groovy cover of the Stones’ “Brown Sugar” for his 1971 album The King of Rock and Roll. “He was the biggest inspiration of my early teens and his music still has the same raw electric energy when you play it now as it did when it first shot through the music scene in the mid ’50s,” Jagger wrote on social media when Richard passed in 2020. “When we were on tour with him I would watch his moves every night and learn from him how to entertain and involve the audience and he was always so generous with advice to me.”

17. “Miss You”

From: Some Girls (1978)

Number of Covers: 66

Ann Peebles has interpreted the work of many, but her version of the Rolling Stones’ “Miss You” sounds like it was practically written for her, even with the similar song arrangement. (In fact, she even name-checks another one of her covers in the song itself: 1973’s “I’m Gonna Tear Your Playhouse Down.”) A special shoutout should be given to Sugar Ray Norcia who played the blistering harmonica solo.

16. “Lady Jane”

From: Aftermath (1966)

Number of Covers: 72

Trini Lopez’s cover of “Lady Jane” stays mostly true to the song’s original intention, but there’s a hint of Spanish-sounding guitar and of course, Lopez’s voice is a lot smoother than Jagger’s. This cover appears on the 1967 album Trini Lopez in London.

15. “Under My Thumb”

From: Aftermath (1966)

Number of Covers: 79

It would be fair to say that the Rolling Stones’ “Under My Thumb” has not aged very well — it’s best to avoid singing about putting women down. But in 1975 Tina Turner took some power in singing it herself, changing the pronouns and including it on her Acid Queen album. The year after that, Turner was finally able to leave her abusive husband Ike Turner and be free from his controlling and violent behavior.

14. “Let’s Spend the Night Together”

From: Between the Buttons (1967)

Number of Covers: 80

You may not think the Rolling Stones and the Grateful Dead had much in common, but Jerry Garcia evidently had a soft spot for the British bad boys, consistently covering “Let’s Spend the Night Together” with the Jerry Garcia Band over the years. Below is an extra special version featuring Clarence Clemons of Bruce Springsteen‘s E Street Band.

13. “You Can’t Always Get What You Want”

From: Let It Bleed (1969)

Number of Covers: 87

There are many frontmen who worship at the altar of Mick Jagger. But Jagger himself looked up to Aretha Franklin, who offered her interpretation of “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” on her 1981 album Love All the Hurt Away. “She was so inspiring,” Jagger wrote on social media after Franklin’s passing in 2018, “and wherever you were she always brought you to church.”

12. “Play With Fire”

From: 1965 Single

Number of Covers: 88

The Rolling Stones walked so bands like the Heartbreakers could run. “Everything comes from somebody,” Johnny Thunders once said in an interview. Thunders recorded a version of “Play With Fire” in the ’90s. “I mean, Keith Richards took it from Chuck Berry, I took it from Keith Richards, you know?”

11. “Gimme Shelter”

From: Let It Bleed (1969)

Number of Covers: 118

Merry Clayton set the bar incredibly high when she recorded her vocal for “Gimme Shelter” — a scorching part that squeaks and screeches in all the right rock ‘n’ roll ways. Patti Smith put a new, expressive spin on it for her 2007 album Twelve, which also featured covers of Jimi Hendrix, Neil Young, the Doors and more.

10. “Angie”

From: Goats Head Soup (1973)

Number of Covers: 120

Tori Amos’ version of “Angie” is possibly the most hauntingly beautiful rendition of a Stones song on this list. Stripped of any other instrumentation save a piano and Amos’ delicate vocal, it was included in her set lists for over a decade.

9. “Ruby Tuesday”

From: Between the Buttons (1967)

Number of Covers: 126

The original “Ruby Tuesday” is light, airy and a bit whimsical. Nazareth‘s 1984 version is the complete opposite. But Nazareth frankly had a knack for transforming the songs of others into their own sound — you may also want to check out their covers of things like “The Weight” by the Band or “This Flight Tonight” by Joni Mitchell.

8. “Sympathy for the Devil”

From: Beggars Banquet (1968)

Number of Covers: 127

Let’s be real: Axl Rose has the sort of wailing rock ‘n’ roll voice made for a song like “Sympathy for the Devil.” Guns N’ Roses‘ version of the song appeared over the ending credits of the 1994 film Interview With the Vampire. “We have lots of influences, but the Stones are most definitely a big part of it,” Rose told the Los Angeles Times in 1989. “As a band, we haven’t seemed to wear out the Stones yet. We keep learning more and more from them…about the fact you are able to do anything you want in your music.”

7. “Wild Horses”

From: Sticky Fingers (1971)

Number of Covers: 132

There would not be the Rolling Stones without blues music — it was the foundation on which they laid their sound on even in their early years. It’s fitting then that someone like Otis Clay, a Blues Hall of Famer, would choose to record their music. In 2002, Clay contributed a soulful rendition of “Wild Horses” to the tribute album All Blues’d Up: Songs of the Rolling Stones.

6. “Jumpin’ Jack Flash”

From: 1968 Single

Number of Covers: 132

Believe it or not, there was a brief window of time where the Rolling Stones considered having Peter Frampton join the band following the departure of Mick Taylor at the end of 1974. Two years before that, Frampton had included a cover of “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” on his album Wind of Change. Frampton ultimately was not invited into the Stones, but things turned out fine in the long run — he went on to enjoy enormous success with 1976’s Frampton Comes Alive!

5. “As Tears Go By”

From: 1965 Single

Number of Covers: 161

Before the Rolling Stones themselves even recorded “As Tears Go By” Marianne Faithfull had a hit with it. Here is another woman’s interpretation of it, recorded by the singer-songwriter Melanie.

4. “The Last Time”

From: 1965 Single

Number of Covers: 166

In 1967, two years after the Stones released it, the Who put their own spin on “The Last Time.” “The Stones really affected me very, very deeply, their wildness on the stage, the fact that they didn’t wear uniforms,” Pete Townshend said in a 1979 radio broadcast. “This kind of thing was very, just, outrageous, you know. Jagger’s stage performance and Keith Richards’ stage performance, which is just very, very wild and unkempt. They were the first, I think, the closest to sort of a latter-day punk image.”

3. “Country Honk”

From: 1969 Single

Number of Covers: 169

Truthfully, this writer didn’t really expect “Country Honk” to have this many cover versions, but here we are at No. 3. Here is a rendition from one of country’s most prominent names, Waylon Jennings, who really let the song’s roots show.

2. “Paint It, Black”

From: Aftermath (1966)

Number of Covers: 285

What if “Paint It, Black” was a heavy metal song? Look no further than W.A.S.P.‘s cover of the song, which was released on a 1998 CD reissue of their debut album.

1. “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction”

From: Out of Our Heads (1965)

Number of Covers: 380

The below cover looks and sounds like some kind of fever dream one might have: Devo in full Devo garb playing the Stones’ “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction.” And Jagger definitely approved — Mark Mothersbaugh and Gerald Casale of Devo played it for him in 1978 before they released it. “He suddenly stood up and started dancing around on this Afghan rug in front of the fireplace,” Casale later recalled of Jagger, “the sort of rooster-man dance he used to do, and saying ‘I like it, I like it.’ Mark and I lit up, big smiles on our faces, like in Wayne’s World: ‘We’re not worthy!’ To see your icon that you grew up admiring, that you had seen in concert, dancing around, like Mick Jagger being Mick Jagger. It was unbelievable.”