5 Facts About Rolling Stones’ ‘Lady Jane’ Most Fans Don’t Know

Many girls were named Lady Jane after this song was released by The Rolling Stones. But do the parents know what the song meant? Who is Lady Jane? Here are 5 facts about the song you probably didn’t know, take a look below.

1. Women or drugs?

There are a lot of speculations on what this song is about. Some say it’s about the third wife of King Henry VIII, Jane Seymour. She was one of the few wives not executed, but died in childbirth while bearing his only son.

While some say, it’s about Jane Ormsby-Gore, a British woman Mick Jagger was involved with. There are also some rumors that the song doesn’t talk about a real person, but drugs. Saying that “Lady Anne” is a code for amphetamine and “Lady Jane” is a reference to marijuana as in “Mary Jane.”

Mick Jagger said:

“‘Lady Jane’ is a complete sort of very weird song. I don’t really know what that’s all about myself. All the names are historical but it was really unconscious that they should fit together from the same period.”

2.  Who played the dulcimer?

The Stones guitarist Brian Jones played the dulcimer on the song. He had just recently learned how to play the instrument when they recorded this.

Keith Richards explained:

“Brian was getting into dulcimer then because he dug Richard Farina. We were also listening to a lot of Appalachian music then too. To me, Lady Jane is very Elizabethan. There are a few places in England where people still speak that way, Chaucer English.”

3. Aftermath, only in the UK!

The song was on the Flowers compilation, but not included on the US version of Aftermath.

4. After the band performs
After the band left the stage, Chip Monck, the person who handled lighting and production duties for the Stones in the late ’60s and early ’70s, often played an instrumental version of this song over the sound system. He said it was,

“like a madrigal, really. Have a good evening, get home safely, we look forward to seeing you the next time around.”

5. Neil Young’s borrowed tune

This song was the basis for Neil Young’s song “Borrowed Tune,” which appears on his Tonight’s The Night album. He sings the lyric:

“I’m singin’ this borrowed tune I took from the Rolling Stones.”