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[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”intro-text” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_orientation=”center” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n
Back in April 2019, Keith Richards, MOJO\u2019s fourth ever Guest Editor, was 75 (just) and a walking, riffing advert for keeping young at heart, bursting to talk stimulants, electromagnetism and Talk Is Cheap, the solo album that shocked himself, and the Stones, back to life. All this and \u2013 what\u2019s this? \u2013 a brand new Rolling Stones album?<\/em> \u201cIf there\u2019s still juice in it, you want to squeeze it,\u201d he told Keith Cameron.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”credit-main” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”||||||||” text_font_size=”16px” text_orientation=”center” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Interview by Keith Cameron<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2024\/04\/Keith-Richards-credit-Mark-Seliger.jpg” title_text=”Keith Richards credit Mark Seliger” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text module_class=”image-gallery-caption” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”|300|||||||” text_font_size=”16px” text_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”-10px||||false|false” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n Street Fighting Man: Rolling Stones guitarist, Keith Richards<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”text-with-dropcap” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Stop the presses. Hold the front page. MOJO\u2019s Guest Editor is on the line, quite literally phoning in his copy for a Rock\u2019n\u2019Roll Lifestyle Exclusive. Ever wondered how Keith Richards maintains that chic physique? Behold, his very own hot-bod workout programme.<\/p>\n \u201cI get up. Ummm. And then, uh, you know, I sit down. I don\u2019t do none of this trotting around, I think it\u2019s bad for you. It\u2019s bad on the joints, especially on concrete. I don\u2019t go with that. It\u2019s just not for me. It works for some guys, but y\u2019know, it\u2019s just\u2026 Mmm.\u201d<\/p>\n That\u2019s all there is to it, folks.<\/p>\n \u201cOh, and when I go to the islands, I do quite a bit of swimming. It\u2019s not a regime, it\u2019s just very nice to be in the water, and, uhh, you know\u2026 float about a bit.\u201d [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n The \u2018islands\u2019 he\u2019s referring to are Turks & Caicos, in the Caribbean, north-east of Cuba, south-east of the Bahamas. Richards has a house on the private resort island of Parrot Cay \u2013 originally \u2019Pirate Cay\u2019, but renamed so not to frighten the super-rich clientele. Richards\u2019 presence there is cited by the official website of Turks & Caicos Tourism. Presumably what remains of his rogue buccaneer\u2019s reputation is deemed good for business.<\/p>\n Keith is calling us from his main abode in Connecticut, two days after returning from Parrot Cay where he spent the festive period with his wife, children and grandchildren. As holidays go, it was a busy one. Richards\u2019 birthday lands exactly a week before Christmas, and the date also happens to be his wedding anniversary.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s always been an exhausting time for me, December, because it\u2019s just one long party,\u201d he says. \u201cBy January 1, you\u2019re knackered. And that\u2019s a good way to start a new year, right?! I\u2019m drying out now!\u201d<\/p>\n He rolls out that patented wheezy chuckle, but there is serious news to impart. Hold all the pages: Keith Richards has quit drinking booze. For good, not just Dryanuary. Albeit, he\u2019s doing it strictly on his terms \u2013 Keith\u2019s world, Keith\u2019s rules.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve knocked the hard stuff on the head. I have a little wine with meals, and a Guinness or a beer or two, but otherwise\u2026 no. It\u2019s like heroin \u2013 the experiment is over.\u201d<\/p>\n He pauses.<\/p>\n \u201cMind you, if I meet you in a bar and you say, \u2018Do you want a drink?\u2019 \u2013 heheheh \u2013 I wouldn\u2019t turn it down! I\u2019m not a puritan<\/em> in these matters. It\u2019s just that it\u2019s not on the daily menu any more.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”pull-quote” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_text_color=”#111111″ header_2_font_size=”46px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider color=”#111111″ module_class=”custom-divider” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_divider][et_pb_text module_class=”text-with-dropcap” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Long before rock\u2019n\u2019roll plugged in and made gods out of mortals, it was electricity itself that got the blood pumping. In 18th century Europe, people flocked to city squares and salons to witness this elemental wonder in quasi-scientific demonstrations, like Georg Matthias Bose\u2019s Venus Electrificata, the \u201celectric kiss of Leipzig\u201d, whereby a woman standing on an insulating block of resin was given a moderate charge from Bose\u2019s generator. When a male audience member accepted the invitation to kiss the woman, whose lips were coated with a conductive substance, he received an electric shock \u2013 complete with vivid blue flash.<\/p>\n In due course, this primal energy was domesticated and channelled into what we now take for granted as the invisible elixir for 21st century life. As French philosopher Tristan Garcia writes in his recent book The Life Intense: \u201cIt was as if Leipzig\u2019s kiss, which sealed the modern alliance of desire and electricity, had never ended.\u201d<\/p>\n Garcia traces the history of the \u201cintense or electric person\u201d, those who \u201cfight to the death against boredom, petty manipulations, normalcy\u2026\u201d After 18th century libertines and 19th century romantics, he declares the apotheosis of \u201cthe electric person\u201d to be \u201cthe rocker, electrified adolescent\u201d: a universally available ideal, thanks to that supreme democratising weapon, the electric guitar.<\/p>\n Rock\u2019s verbal and visual iconography is littered with shrines to this life-force, be it Samuel Hopkins metamorphosing into Lightnin\u2019, Marc Bolan summoning the Electric Warrior, the holistic electrosphere of Kraftwerk, or the infernally plugged-in Angus Young on the sleeve of AC\/DC\u2019s Powerage<\/em>. But perhaps its purest representation, the form\u2019s ultimate electrified adolescent, the human jumping jack who personified rock\u2019s osculatory flash and defined its rage against conformity, is now greeting MOJO at Germano Studios in downtown New York. Keith Richards arranges himself on the sofa, a cloud of dishevelment amid this pristine control room where almost every available space is filled by analogue recording gear made by the likes of Neve and Chandler and API \u2013 output attenuators, limiters, compressors, distressors. It is six days before his 75th birthday. Keith lights a cigarette, sloshes the dregs of an iced drink around a red plastic cup, and considers the notion of Tristan Garcia\u2019s \u201celectric person\u201d.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n \u201cWell, I have often thought this,\u201d he nods. \u201cSee, you\u2019re in touch with the force of electromagnetism. It\u2019s the rock and the roll. Electromagnetism is the very bottom of a guitar pickup, but it\u2019s also one of the large ingredients in our life, in our bodies. We\u2019re all electromagnetic. So I think the guy was onto something there.\u201d<\/p>\n He waves a hand towards the window into Studio 1\u2019s live room, where a film crew is preparing to interview Richards for Play It Loud, a forthcoming exhibition at New York\u2019s Metropolitan Museum of Art dedicated to the instruments of rock\u2019n\u2019roll.<\/p>\n \u201cI can\u2019t talk about guitars particularly. Y\u2019know, \u2018Oh, the old 200 and this and that\u2026\u2019 All I can think of talking about, and you brought it up now, is the electromagnetism<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n Does playing an electric guitar make Keith Richards feel more alive?<\/p>\n \u201cI think it\u2019s something that got suddenly unleashed out of the bubble. There\u2019s something primal about electricity. Nikola Tesla, I think he\u2019s a little beyond me in the theory, but the essential source of everything is an electromagnetic impulse and I suppose by us harnessing it to a certain extent, it augurs well for the future. Nobody would know what to do without electricity. If these lights went off, everybody would be scrambling for the goddamn doorway and killing each other.\u201d<\/p>\n Ironically, the only guitar in the Studio 1 control room is an acoustic. Would he consider that an acceptable substitute?<\/p>\n Keith looks sceptical. \u201cIf I had that and a candle? Well, you might at least be able to see what you were doing. Heheheheh.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2024\/04\/G5NHHJ-scaled.jpg” title_text=”23RD NOVEMBER: On this day in 1964 the Rolling Stones were banned from the BBC for showing up late for radio shows. (l-r) Mick Jagger, Bill Wyman, Brian Jones, Keith Richards and Charlie Watts.” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text module_class=”image-gallery-caption” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”|300|||||||” text_font_size=”16px” text_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”-10px||||false|false” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n It’s Only Rock’N’Roll: The Rolling Stones’ original line-up in 1964 (l-r) Mick Jagger, Bill Wyman, Brian Jones, Keith Richards and Charlie Watts.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”text-with-dropcap” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Germano is familiar territory for Richards. His 2015 solo album Crosseyed Heart<\/em> was part-recorded and mixed at this quintessential space-at-a-premium Manhattan facility. More recently, he and Mick Jagger have been meeting here during 2018 to plot the contours of the next Rolling Stones album. Following 2016\u2019s blues covers set Blue & Lonesome<\/em>, this would be the band\u2019s first record of new material since 2005\u2019s A Bigger Bang<\/em>.<\/p>\n \u201cMick and I get together in this studio for a couple of weeks throughout the year,\u201d Richards nods. \u201cAfter the blues album, we looked at each other and said, \u2018Well, what do we want to do now?\u2019 But there are new songs coming along, and if you feel there\u2019s still juice in it, you want to squeeze it. I wouldn\u2019t wanna bother with a dried lemon, but it felt like: why not? Rather than \u2018why?\u2019, \u2018why not?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Did Blue & Lonesome<\/em> help re-stoke the fire?<\/p>\n \u201cThat would have been our setlist in 1962 in the clubs, and there was a certain satisfaction in tying that up. Maybe it\u2019s changed our attitude or the way we think about what we want to do next. So it\u2019s all in its early stages, but there\u2019s some interesting stuff coming out that isn\u2019t necessarily\u2026\u201d Keith rubs his chin, inadvertently knocking a long stack of cigarette ash onto the sofa. \u201cIt ain\u2019t the Stones *trying to be the Stones. It\u2019s the Stones still trying to be<\/em>. Heheheheh!\u201d<\/p>\n The fact of The Rolling Stones\u2019 ongoing existence no longer feels particularly worthy of note. 2019 will see their No Filter tour creak into its third consecutive year, calling at 13 US stadiums in a leisurely two-month stroll through the early summer, during which time Charlie Watts will turn 78 and Ron Wood 72. Age has apparently soothed 75-year-old Mick Jagger and Keith Richards\u2019 barbed relationship into a benign state of respectful co-existence.<\/p>\n \u201cEverybody wants to work as long as they can and feel good about it,\u201d says Keith. \u201cOur [2018] tour in Britain and Europe was fantastic, the band was rocking. Until we got to Warsaw and somebody said, \u2018That\u2019s the last show\u2026\u2019 Oh no man, it was just getting going! So when the proposition came up to play America in 2019, everybody jumped at it. It\u2019s what you do. If you give me 80,000 people, I feel right at home. There\u2019s something also about the harmless joy in turning loads of other people on. I wouldn\u2019t want to disappoint those people, doing the \u2018Ohh, I don\u2019t feel like it\u2019. If I didn\u2019t feel like it, I wouldn\u2019t do it. Nor would any of us. The roar of the grease paint, the smell of the crowd \u2013 it gets ya! You can\u2019t stay away.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”pull-quote” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_text_color=”#111111″ header_2_font_size=”46px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider color=”#111111″ module_class=”custom-divider” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_divider][et_pb_text module_class=”text-with-dropcap” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n The Rolling Stones\u2019 are currently a far more solid proposition than they were 30 years ago. In October 1988, Keith Richards released his debut solo album, Talk Is Cheap<\/em>, a belated riposte to Mick Jagger sidelining the Stones in favour of a solo career that launched in February 1985 with the Nile Rodgers-produced She\u2019s The Boss<\/em>. In Paris later that same year, the Stones had struggled through sessions for the album Dirty Work<\/em>, widely regarded as their lowest low (Steve Lillywhite later breezily noted: \u201cI produced the worst-ever Rolling Stones album!\u201d). Believing that Jagger had held back his best material for She\u2019s The Boss<\/em>, Richards raged in his lyrics for the song Had It With You: \u201cMoaning in the moonlight\/Singing for your supper\u2026 It is such a sad thing\/To watch a good love die\u2026 You\u2019re a mean mistreater\/You\u2019re a dirty dirty rat scum.\u201d Possibly relishing the opprobrium, or just aware that Keith already had two lead vocals on the record, Jagger sang it anyway.<\/p>\n Richards and the other Stones wanted to tour in 1986, but the singer demurred. In March 1987, however, Jagger declared he would go on the road in support of Primitive Cool<\/em>, his second solo album in three years \u2013 \u201ca move that seemed almost deliberately designed to close down The Rolling Stones,\u201d Richards later reflected in Life, his 2011 autobiography. Jagger stoked the sense of a band terminally sundered in a November 1987 interview: \u201cI don\u2019t particularly want to go on tour when things are not going well. Fifteen years ago, I could have just sat around\u2026 hoping it would blow over. Now I think, I\u2019ll get on with my life\u2026 I respect [Keith], and I feel a lot of affection for him\u2026 We\u2019ve had a lot of fun and a lot of heartache together. [But] I have much more I want to do. The Rolling Stones is just a straight-ahead rock\u2019n\u2019roll band.\u201d<\/p>\n For Richards, the \u201cslap in the face\u201d came when Jagger toured Japan in early 1988 with a band including guitarist Joe Satriani. By the time the show reached Tokyo, the 22-song set was three-quarters comprised of Stones material. Initially, Richards fired off insults in the press: \u201cslit his throat\u201d; \u201cDisco Boy\u201d; \u201cJagger\u2019s Little Jerk Off Band\u201d\u2026 But then he changed tactics. Such was the extent of the Stones\u2019 inner malaise during the Dirty Work<\/em> Paris sessions that even the rock-steady Charlie Watts had slid into a drug-and-alcohol funk and was momentarily replaced by Steve Jordan. With this New York powerhouse, mainstay of the Saturday Night Live house band, Keith Richards would build a new creative identity for himself, distinct from The Rolling Stones.<\/p>\n \u201cI never decided, or expected, to put another band together,\u201d says Richards. \u201cI\u2019d never written with anybody else except Mick. Being a Rolling Stone is a full-time job, you know\u2026 Or so it should\u2019ve been at that point. Both Steve and I got off on just the fun of songwriting. Suddenly I realised, God, it\u2019s like I\u2019m at the beginning of The Rolling Stones again. Hanging out with Steve opened up all these possibilities of making a really good rock\u2019n\u2019roll band, without any pretensions. Then, of course when Bobby Keys joins in, it\u2019s, uh, a-heheheh<\/em>\u2026 it\u2019s just like being at home.\u201d<\/p>\n Saxophonist Keys was Richards\u2019 old partner in crime and misdemeanour from the Stones\u2019 1969-72 imperial flush until Jagger fired him from the 1973 European tour, and he would play on two Talk Is Cheap<\/em> tracks. The core of the band, however, had a more studiedly professional calibre. Jordan brought in Charley Drayton, a young drummer and bassist with serious jazz pedigree, while Richards picked ace session guitarist Waddy Wachtel (Fleetwood Mac, Linda Ronstadt) and keyboardist Ivan Neville, a cousin of the New Orleans Neville Brothers. Collectively, they became the X-Pensive Winos.<\/p>\n \u201cWe started to come up with some interesting songs,\u201d says Richards.<\/p>\n One of the most interesting was You Don\u2019t Move Me, clearly aimed at Keith\u2019s erstwhile Glimmer Twin. \u201cWhy do you think you got no friends\/You drove them all around the bend\u2026 Now you wanna throw the dice\/You already crapped out twice\u2026 What makes you so greedy\/Makes you so seedy\u2026 It\u2019s no longer funny\/It\u2019s bigger than money\/You just don\u2019t move me anymore.\u201d Hearing the lyrics read back to him today, Richards laughs.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m pissed off with Mick and I couldn\u2019t hide it! I’ve been stood up! It\u2019s a jilted song. Yeah, I was venting, basically. The songs were coming out like that. That\u2019s the way it is. So you do it.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”pull-quote” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_text_color=”#111111″ header_2_font_size=”46px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider color=”#111111″ module_class=”custom-divider” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_divider][et_pb_text module_class=”text-with-dropcap” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Recorded initially in Canada, then the Hit Factory in New York, with a detour South to record the Memphis Horns with Willie Mitchell, Talk Is Cheap<\/em> saw a stellar supporting cast queuing up to help Keith open the vents: Bootsy Collins, Bernie Worrell, Maceo Parker, LaBelle\u2019s Sarah Dash, the E Street Band\u2019s Patti Scialfa, auxiliary Stones pianist Chuck Leavell, former Stones guitarist Mick Taylor. Even Keith\u2019s dad Bert, with whom he\u2019d become reconciled after two decades\u2019 non-communication, came to hang out.<\/p>\n Most notable of all the contributors, however, especially in the specific context of Richards\u2019 life trajectory, was Johnnie Johnson. The pianist who in 1953 hired a young guitarist named Chuck Berry to join his band, was by the mid-\u201980s a bus driver in St Louis. Berry had named Johnny B Goode in his honour, but Johnson\u2019s writing and arrangements on the likes of No Particular Place To Go, Sweet Little Sixteen, Roll Over Beethoven, Rock And Roll Music and many others went uncredited, and his alcoholism eventually led to a split with Berry in 1973, after which his inimitable playing was confined to the St Louis blues clubs. But kismet offered him a rascal\u2019s smile in 1986, when film director Taylor Hackford approached Richards to be the musical producer for his Chuck Berry concert documentary Hail! Hail! Rock\u2019n\u2019Roll. Beyond corralling Steve Jordan, Richards admits he was floundering, until he remembered a piece of information given him by Ian Stewart, the Stones\u2019 recently deceased co-founder and consiglieri.<\/p>\n \u201cStu had said, \u2018Never forget, Keith, that Johnnie Johnson is alive and playing in St Louis\u2019. So I just found the right moment with Chuck, to say, \u2018Uh, do you know if Johnnie Johnson is still around?\u2019 Chuck says, \u2018Yeeeah man, I think he\u2019s in town.\u2019 Now, we both know, but we\u2019re jousting around. \u2018What about the chance of getting Johnnie in on this thing?\u2019 Chuck’s like, \u2018Yeeeah, I’ll give him a call\u2026\u2019 It was one of the best things I ever did \u2013 because out of that, Johnnie Johnson resurrected his career.\u201d<\/p>\n Years later, Richards recalls, he suggested to Johnson that he seek recompense from Berry for his input to rock\u2019n\u2019roll\u2019s foundational canon. \u201cJohnnie told me how those records were made. \u2018Chuck would have all these words, and I would\u2026\u2019 I said, That\u2019s called \u2018co-writing\u2019, Johnnie! It did go to court, and it went in Chuck\u2019s favour, but I think there was a substantial readjustment in studio fees, which I was very happy to help out on. Of course, me bringing that up really pissed Chuck off. Chuck\u2019s not used to having anybody telling him what to do. But we got over that. We\u2019re both prickly creatures. Heheheheh\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”pull-quote” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_text_color=”#111111″ header_2_font_size=”46px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider color=”#111111″ module_class=”custom-divider” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_divider][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Together with his contributions to Tom Waits\u2019 1985 album Rain Dogs<\/em> and producing Aretha Franklin\u2019s 1986 version of Jumpin\u2019 Jack Flash, the Chuck Berry film and Talk Is Cheap<\/em> collectively represent the regeneration of Keith Richards, both as a creative wellspring and also a significant figure in the increasingly corporate business landscape of the 1980s music industry. For much of the previous decade, Richards was typically caricatured as a cadaver-in-waiting: the NME declared him Number 1 in a list of \u201crock stars most likely to die\u201d. The joke wasn\u2019t so funny for Keith, caught in the maelstrom of his heroin-addled relationship with Anita Pallenberg, lurching from one drug calamity to the next, just as the Stones, post-Exile On Main St<\/em>, slid into a parallel trajectory of artistic stasis, then decline. The Glimmer Twins took divergent paths: Keith \u201cdown the road to dopesville\u201d, while Mick \u201cascended to jet land\u201d, as Richards noted in Life. \u201cMick picked up the slack; I picked up the smack.\u201d<\/p>\n But by the very end of the \u201970s, the fog was lifting. Shaken by his trumped up March 1977 arrest for drug trafficking in Toronto and the tortuous subsequent 18-month preamble to the trial, Richards at last quit heroin (more or less) for good. He was spurred by the support of his new manager Jane Rose, who stuck with him throughout the horrors of a 72-hour cold turkey, and the fact that the Stones had finally made a raw, focused album, 1978\u2019s *Some Girls, that it was worth getting cleaned up to tour.<\/p>\n \u201cRonnie Wood\u2019s first Stones album, let\u2019s not forget, that\u2019s one of the reasons it was so focused,\u201d Keith says. \u201cBecause if he didn\u2019t do well on that one, he was fired! Heheheh!\u201d<\/p>\n Some Girls<\/em>\u2019 co-producer Chris Kimsey would be back on board the following year, as the Stones attempted to slipstream the resurgent energy. But Emotional Rescue<\/em>, eventually released in 1980, was a desultory affair, pieced together from sessions in Paris, the Bahamas and New York. Kimsey witnessed at close quarters Keith Richards coming to terms with his new view of the world \u2013 and fighting a lot with Mick Jagger. \u201cIt was like Keith was waking up,\u201d said Kimsey, in Bill Janovitz\u2019s song-by-song Stones primer Rocks Off. \u201cI think he had missed quite a few years.\u201d<\/p>\n Despite its title, the album\u2019s only authentic shot of emotion came with the Richards showcase All About You, a ravaged soul ballad with a lyric prefiguring Talk Is Cheap<\/em>\u2019s clear-eyed takedowns of Jagger. \u201cWell if you call this a life\/Why must I spend mine with you\/If the show must go on\/Let it go on without you\/I get so sick and tired\/Of hanging around with jerks like you.\u201d The guitarist himself plays piano and bass, with Charlie manfully intuiting where this all might be going and Ron Wood duetting on background vocals. Mick is absent, which possibly explains the errant Bobby Keys honking in lachrymose consolation. The litany of complaint ends with a killer twist: \u201cSo how come I\u2019m still in love with you?\u201d<\/p>\n Keith chuckles at the memory.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was a song of love, discarded love. I never really thought about it in terms of how it was going to be interpreted \u2013 \u2018Oh, that\u2019s obviously him<\/em> writing about him<\/em>!\u2019 I\u2019m just writing another film noir love song\u2026 I know that when I was singing All About You I was certainly not thinking about Mick. But relationships in the band being the way they were at the time, these feelings are all transferable. And once it was pointed out to me, I said, Yeah! Maybe I do mean that! We\u2019re not in control of our subconscious.\u201d<\/p>\n Five years later, of course, Jagger was singing Had It With You: \u201cmean mistreater\u201d, \u201cdirty rat scum\u201d and the rest. That\u2019s another level of feeling transference.<\/p>\n \u201cI know!\u201d Richards laughs. \u201cThis is the really weird bit. At the time, Mick just said, \u2018Oh yeah, that\u2019s a good \u2019un!\u2019 Oh, I dunno man, Mick and I\u2019s relationship is so convoluted. And actually so over-covered with brotherly love, and probably jealousies. It\u2019s just the things we go through. But it doesn\u2019t really affect the fact that we get on with it and enjoy it. It is a strange relationship, I\u2019ll give it that. Strange, and very long!\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”text-with-dropcap” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Keith brushes a little cigarette ash from his black and white patterned scarf, then lights up another. He\u2019s rocking the headband, but that piratical chic of Keef legend is dialled down these days in favour of more sober, albeit no less idiosyncratic, apparel: combining wedge trainers and black trousers with a flesh-coloured top and a navy blue shirt adorned with red hearts; more a blouse, really, quite possibly from the \u2018old lady\u2019s drawer, as per longtime tradition.<\/p>\n For an electric person less than a week away from turning 75, Keith Richards is in remarkable shape. This could very well be related to the fact that his birthday also marks the 35th anniversary of his marriage to Patti Hansen.<\/p>\n How do you feel about birthdays?<\/strong><\/p>\n I bury the birthday bit these days in lieu of the anniversary. Or I try to. The family will be arriving in the next few days. So I shall have to pretend<\/em> to be happy to be 75. Actually I don\u2019t mind. It\u2019s just weird to be 70-odd. You wait until you try it on, spring chicken!<\/p>\n Has age brought wisdom?<\/strong><\/p>\n Oh, to a certain extent I think it has to. I mean, you didn\u2019t get all this far by learning nothing. *(Leans in, conspiratorially) I said some of the wisest things when I was very young. Heheheh.<\/p>\n What might be an example of that young man\u2019s wisdom?<\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cNot guilty, your honour\u201d *(laughs) \u2013 and getting away with it. Wisdom? Hmm. *Experience. Obviously you collect it, but probably the best way of dealing with that is not to get totally locked into your own generational time frame. Luckily for me, I\u2019ve always had kids and now grandkids. I know what the little buggers are up to. So I\u2019m always getting feedback from loads of different ages, about what\u2019s happening.<\/p>\n Children can be useful \u2013 they instinctively know how the TV remote control works.<\/strong><\/p>\n Oh yeah, on that technical end, I\u2019m pretty illiterate. I rely upon my kids or the wife to\u2026 just look it up! Google it or something! I don\u2019t touch those things.<\/p>\n So Keef don\u2019t tweet?<\/strong><\/p>\n (Grimaces)<\/em> I\u2019ve never liked phones, you see. Maybe that\u2019s just because, being so-called famous since I\u2019ve been 19, the phone is always ringing and it\u2019s always somebody that wants something. So with the phone, I would only ever phone out. So when they brought in mobile phones, I\u2019m like, Oh no\u2026! At least before I could say, \u2018I wasn\u2019t in!\u2019 But now\u2026 Everybody who knows me knows I don\u2019t have a phone.<\/p>\n What\u2019s the secret to a long, happy marriage?<\/strong><\/p>\n I found somebody that could put up with me, man! You don\u2019t run away from that. Bless her heart.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”pull-quote” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_text_color=”#111111″ header_2_font_size=”46px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider color=”#111111″ module_class=”custom-divider” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_divider][et_pb_text module_class=”text-with-dropcap” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Upon release in October 1988, Talk Is Cheap<\/em> was warmly received, amid relief that at least one member of The Rolling Stones still knew how a Rolling Stones album ought to sound. Where Dirty Work<\/em> had fruitlessly aped the era\u2019s synthetic approximation of rock\u2019n\u2019roll, here was the real gristle and spit, an emphatic return to the source. Richards used his abrasive voice as a textural adjunct to his riffs, jabbing out bare phrases like a prize fighter revelling in the grind. But it was a collection of great performances rather than great songs. Just as Mick Jagger\u2019s solo albums offered surface melody but no edge, in favouring feel over function Talk Is Cheap<\/em> proved the only thing Keith Richards really lacked was what only his estranged partner could provide.<\/p>\n \u201cI think that\u2019s probably true,\u201d he says. \u201cAlso, I got a much better understanding of what Mick does and how the front man feels. You gotta be out there singing every goddamn line. I can always duck and dive, given my role in the Stones, but it certainly woke me up to how much the frontman feels pressure. Working with the Winos, I realised that I needed a kick up the arse. There was more to do than just riding the Stones bus all the time.\u201d<\/p>\n Evidently, the lessons learned, and the respect, were mutual. Just three months after releasing his solo album, Richards met Jagger for peace talks at Eddy Grant\u2019s studio in Barbados. Within weeks The Rolling Stones were recording Steel Wheels<\/em>. It would be the last album with Bill Wyman, but in every other aspect, especially its accompanying megatour, this set the template for all subsequent Stones activity. Interestingly, the reflective ballad Almost Hear You Sigh featured the writing credit \u2018Jagger\/Richards\/Jordan\u2019: a relic from the Talk Is Cheap<\/em> sessions now became fuel for the rebirth of The Rolling Stones. Had Richards deliberately held this song back, to show Jagger just what he\u2019d been missing?<\/p>\n \u201cI think with the Winos I wasn\u2019t sure how to sing Almost Hear You Sigh,\u201d he says, carefully. \u201cSo that gave me extra time, to pass it on to Mick and say, \u2018Hey \u2013 it goes like this.\u2019 With Mick and I, sometimes it\u2019s the friction \u2013 it\u2019s like the oyster and the little bit of sand. Maybe the time apart had given us both time to think. Also, the fact that we\u2019d each done something by ourselves spurred us to see what we could make out of that together. *Steel Wheels was a damn good album.\u201d<\/p>\n It was during the Steel Wheels tour that the Stones first performed Some Girls<\/em>\u2019 much-loved Keith vocal showcase Before They Make Me Run. Written in the wake of his Toronto bust, the song was Keith\u2019s roistering but rueful adieu to the junked up life that had been his reality for the best part of a decade: \u201cBooze and pills and powders, you can choose your medicine\/Well here\u2019s another goodbye to another good friend.\u201d It\u2019s stayed there or thereabouts in the sets ever since \u2013 on the No Filter tour\u2019s 2018 European leg, alternating with Happy, his most celebrated frontman spot. But while the latter song\u2019s guileless hedonism buffs up the \u2018Keef\u2019 horse brass, the Keith Richards who sits before us today surely owes more to Before They Make Me Run\u2019s survivor\u2019s wisdom.<\/p>\n \u201cIt holds a special place in my heart,\u201d he acknowledges. \u201cThere\u2019s several reasons, one of them quite mechanical: it\u2019s so easy, and such a groove to play on-stage, that you always wanna play it. You can feel the band loving it. At the same time, it\u2019s one of my best songs, I really enjoy singing it, and it still seems fresh to me.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s you collecting your medal and walking away, bidding farewell to a life that you knew was no longer tenable?<\/p>\n \u201cIt is. It was all part of getting that monkey off the back.\u201d Richards seems thoughtful for a moment. \u201cBut I\u2019m always bidding farewell, ever since \u2018This could be the last time\u2019.\u201d He smiles. \u201cIt\u2019s a refrain that runs through this band \u2013 it promises to say farewell, but never says goodbye.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”pull-quote” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_text_color=”#111111″ header_2_font_size=”46px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider color=”#111111″ module_class=”custom-divider” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_divider][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Have you ever tried to stop smoking cigarettes?<\/strong><\/p>\n I have tried. So far, unsuccessfully!<\/p>\n Lou Reed claimed nicotine was harder to quit than heroin. Would you concur?<\/strong><\/p>\n Yes, actually. It is. Quitting heroin is like hell, but it\u2019s a short hell. I mean, the actual process. Cigarettes are just always there, and you\u2019ve always done it. I just pick \u2019em up and light \u2019em up without thinking about it. But lately, in fact \u2013 spread the news! \u2013 I\u2019ve managed to cut it down by a substantial amount every day, and I\u2019m still working on it. Because I realised I don\u2019t need it. I realised it\u2019s just a useless habit. But hey, when you\u2019re 75, habits are pretty ingrained.<\/p>\n You\u2019ve played music professionally for 60 years \u2013 do you ever find yourself faking the emotions?<\/strong><\/p>\n You can\u2019t do it. Could be one night on-stage, a song is taking off onto new heights and then the next night it\u2019s deflated again. Every now and again, when you hit the right stride and everybody knows it, this sense of levitation goes on. Which is pretty good. I\u2019m only five foot nine. Another three feet does wonders! (laughs)<\/em><\/p>\n You\u2019ve known some very dark moments, yet you seem a sunny character at heart.<\/strong><\/p>\n Essentially. Yeah, at certain times in life it doesn\u2019t look so rosy. But I always figure there\u2019s a way out, it just takes a little bit of willpower, or maybe just a little bit of optimism to get you through it. Nobody said it was easy.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n Down the corridor from Studio 1 at Germano, in a small lounge area, sits Jane Rose, the woman who has been in Keith Richards\u2019 corner for the past 40 years. \u201cMy whole life is basically in her hands,\u201d he chuckles. Rose hands him a pen: having finished his sit-down with MOJO, Keith now has to sign some blow-ups of the Talk Is Cheap<\/em> artwork, as promo for the album\u2019s imminent 30th anniversary reissue. Richards and Rose are an old-fashioned class act: he throws some mock \u2018woe is me\u2019 shapes, she rolls her eyes, and of course, the job gets done.<\/p>\n A month later, over the phone, Richards removes his MOJO Guest Editor\u2019s hat to offer us another scoop. Seems those get-togethers with Mick Jagger have borne fruit: The Rolling Stones are about to start recording their new album.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re in the studio in a couple of weeks, the whole kit and caboodle. The Stones with Don Was producing, in LA. We\u2019ll have it done this year, at some point. We\u2019ll put down as much as we can for a week or so, and then we\u2019re on the road. So we\u2019ll see what happens after that. Y\u2019know, Mick and I, the way we\u2019ve reacted to things over the years, we\u2019ve both been very critical of each other. But at the same time, here we are. I just spoke to him yesterday, talking to him about a song we\u2019re about to record, and so it goes on. It\u2019s an overriding love.\u201d<\/p>\n We can all drink to that.<\/p>\n Keith Richards \u2013 husband, father, grandfather, Rolling Stone, X-Pensive Wino, the 75-year-old electrified adolescent \u2013 offers one last laugh.<\/p>\n \u201cSo will I, man!\u201d<\/p>\n This article originally appeared in issue 305 of MOJO<\/em>\u00a0<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider color=”#111111″ module_class=”custom-divider” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_divider][et_pb_text module_class=”credit-names” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font_size=”14px” text_orientation=”center” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Images: <\/strong>Getty; Alamy<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" THE RIGHT STUFFBack in April 2019, Keith Richards, MOJO\u2019s fourth ever Guest Editor, was 75 (just) and a walking, riffing advert for keeping young at heart, bursting to talk stimulants, electromagnetism and Talk Is Cheap, the solo album that shocked himself, and the Stones, back to life. All this and \u2013 what\u2019s this? \u2013 a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":1298,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1188","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mojo-presents"],"acf":[],"modified_by":"kschwarz","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1188","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1188"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1188\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1319,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1188\/revisions\/1319"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1298"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1188"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1188"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1188"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n\u00a0<\/p>\n“I\u2019ve knocked hard booze on the head. It\u2019s like heroin \u2013 the experiment is over.”<\/h2>\n
“If you give me 80,000 people, I feel right at home. It\u2019s the harmless joy in turning loads of other people on.”<\/h2>\n
“On Talk Is Cheap I\u2019m pissed off with Mick and I couldn\u2019t hide it! I was venting, basically.”<\/h2>\n
“I\u2019ve never liked phones. It\u2019s always ringing and it\u2019s always somebody that wants something.”<\/h2>\n
“I got a much better understanding of what Mick does. You gotta be out there singing every goddamn line.”<\/h2>\n
“I\u2019ve been bidding farewell since \u2018This could be the last time\u2019. It\u2019s a refrain that runs through this band.”<\/h2>\n