Lady Gaga skies up into her highest, most soulful register on the new Rolling Stones gospel blues burner “Sweet Sounds of Heaven.” The latest preview single from the Stones’ upcoming Hackney Diamonds album takes its time, unspooling over more than seven minutes of righteous rambling that sounds like outtake from the band’s beloved 1972 Americana rock classic Exile on Main St.
The song opens with a rolling piano riff and Jagger in classic barroom crooner form, emoting, “I hear the sweet, sweet sounds of heaven/ Fallin’ down, fallin’ down to this earth,” before Gaga joins him on the second verse, parachuting in to echo Jagger’s lines in a high and sweet churchy register.
“I smell the sweet/ Sweet scents of heaven/ Tumblin’ down/ Tumblin’ down to the earth,” Jagger sings as Gaga’s voice rises to double his on the next verse, matching the 80-year-old rock legend note-for-muscular-note on the track that takes its sweet time. The song eventually rises to a joyous riot of guitar, drums, saxophone and keyboards more than five minutes in, building to a pair of joyous peaks as Jagger and Gaga get entangled in a growly soul shout-off.
In a new interview with Apple Music 1’s Zane Lowe, Jagger heaped praise on Gaga, calling her a “really great singer,” noting that he’d “never heard her sing quite that style before.” The Stones vocalist also described tracking the song — which also features soulful Fender Rhodes, piano and Moog from Stevie Wonder — which he said the band laid down live while all in the same room in an era when many A-list collaborations are digitally stitched together from afar.
“That was a great experience, her just coming in the room and her just opening up and seeing her bits and feeling her way and then getting more confident,” Jagger said, noting that the band and album producer Andrew Watt then tidied it up and that he and Gaga were at some point, “really face-to-face, getting them really tight, the parts really tight, and then being slightly competitive and screaming” on the track that is reminiscent of such Stones classics as “You Can’t Always Get What You Want.”
Though guitarist Ronnie Wood recently told Sky News that the collab came together somewhat spontaneously when Gaga happened to be in the same studio complex working on a different project, it’s not the first time they’ve gotten together. Gaga jumped on stage with the Stones in Dec. 2012 during their 50 and Counting tour to duet on a version of their 1969 single “Gimme Shelter.”
Hackney Diamonds, the Stones’ first album of new material in 18 years, is due out on Oct 20. The album’s previous single, “Angry,” features a video starring Euphoria actress Sydney Sweeney.
Listen to “Sweet Sounds of Heaven” below.
