“I Just Want to See His Face” (1972) – The Rolling Stones * Written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards * LP: Exile on Main Street * Produced by Jimmy Miller * Label: Rolling Stones Records
“I Just Want to See His Face,” which fades in and fades out near the end of side 3 on the Rolling Stones’ Exile on Main Street, is like a moment when that album’s blood gets tested and American gospel is confirmed, indeed, to run through the album’s veins. Derek and the Dominos keyboardist Bobby Whitlock has claimed to have lost out on rightful album credits, describing the session as a Wurlitzer piano riff he concocted in response to Mick Jagger’s queries about his religious upbringing. Did Jagger also have the Rufus H. Cornelius 1916 hymn “Oh I Want to See Him” running through his mind, with its prominent “just to see his face” line in the chorus? Possible recordings of it that may have reached his ears include ones by Mother McCollum’s Sanctified Singers (1930), James Cleveland and the Cleveland Singers (1964), or the Famous Davis Sisters (1967). Whatever the case, Jagger would be stirring gospel into goat’s head soup while dancing with Mr. D. in 1973.