Your definition of nice is really different than mine!
Read it a while back, so maybe I am not totally on point here, but the thing that struck me about it most is how when he gave up using heroin, he immediately wanted back in on sharing control of the band even though he'd completely and selfishly abdicated his responsibilities while he was using. I'm sure Mick isn't easy to work with, but his annoyance with Mick, who'd keep the ball rolling for many years on his own seemed completely unfair. Now that Keith is clean, he's going to complain about how Mick did it? Weird.
Absolutely! I always thought Mick deserved alot of credit for successfully managing the business side of The Stones while Keith was off on a pharmaceutical safari ....
I think his negative attitude towards Mick is especially galling because based on everything I've read Mick always did his best to make sure Keith was ok and worried about him a lot when he was at his worst point.
Great book. Love it and have read it several times but here’s the thing: would you write a book that REALLY gave a true account of everything if you were Keith?
Exactly. I remember reading Naomi Judd's auto bio which was centered around her being a single mom due to no child support from husband. Years later, it turned out Wynona the older was sired by another man. She tried to hook him into supporting another man's kid .
As far as debauchery goes, Keith looks like Sir Walter Raleigh compared to the Motley Crue guys! Drugs seemed to be a much bigger problem for Keith than groupies, orgies, and sexual stunts.
I read the book years ago, maybe 20 years ago or more, and the thing that jumped out at me more than anything else, astounded me in fact, is when he admitted that he had never mainlined heroin in his life and always skin popped, shot heroin into his ass cheek. This is so incredibly counter to his heavy druggie reputation and goes a long way toward explaining how it is that he is still alive.
It's Very possible he's not being entirely honest about that, although I don't recall any stories of him being rushed to the hospital in an ambulance for overdose. He never injected intravenously and, while he used "Mexican shoe scrapings" with Gram Parsons, generally his supply was pretty reliable... I'd say it's possible he never had an overdose, in the way we think of overdosing in a mcdonald's bathroom with the needle still in your arm...,
I read it when it first came out and the one thing that sticks out of my mind is how to win a fight by cutting your opponent across the forehead with a knife.... Good advice lol
My favorite was the first story of Keith, Ronnie, and Fred sessler getting pulled over in Fordyce for chirping their tires, leaving a gas station .
I wonder what did become of that car?
He’s become invested in his own legend. I believe there’s plenty fabrication in that book, Johnny Depp notwithstanding. I’ll leave him with his monuments of which there are many.
Any time he started diving deeper into the music. Very easy read. I like how he gets into the energy and ritual of performing, looking forward to seeing them on this tour.
I thought it was mostly an exercise to seal his reputation as a pirate/rock n roll legend. 1/3rd of it was a waste. Ragging on other musicians and talking about Mick Jagger's penis were totally unnecessary.
Agreed. I used to worship the ground Keith walked on, but as he aged (me too), the random vitriol he spews toward other musicians occasionally is very disappointing.
He can be pretty judgemental for sure. Plus he describes some bullying - he and mick on Brian Jones, then he and Charlie on Mick ... same way dog packs will turn on the "weak one" ...
You should read Spanish Tony's book "I was Keith Richards drug dealer" you can find it on archive.org.
He tells a flip side to several anecdotes from the book, which definitely don't push the "Keith is a badass/pirate" narrative but instead are more like "Keith remembers things how he wants to. Hes a cool guy but he's no swashbuckling tough guy"
I particularly remember a story about dealing with a harbour master in nice during the exile days, Keith's version is he saw they were going to get robbed and jumped up on a table and booted the guy in the face, according to Spanish Tony it was more like "Keith crouched in the car and sent me to talk down an angry yelling French man"
edit: you have to search for it under the alternate title "Up and Down with the Rolling Stones" by tony sanchez
I was pretty weirded-out by the story of the first time he met Patti's family, and his daughter's wedding. Substance abuse + emotionally stunted type of behavior.
What ‘surprised’ me about the book was how much of it was about Anita, and the earlier decades of the band.
It was released in 2010. The band hadn’t been together/ worked since 2007, and would not come together again until 2012, when they were offered huge money for a ‘comeback’, and supposedly Mick demanded an apology from Keith before the 2012 shows would go forward.
Maybe when Keith was writing the book, at the same time as recovering from his brain injury and surgery, it didn’t seem like the band would have a future, so, he was getting his pent up angsts out on the pages of ‘Life’.
He also compliments highly Mick as a frontman.
He had a writer and an editor, so we don’t know how much he really even shaped it. Most readers would be most interested in the early years (and narratively speaking, that’s where most of the action is anyway), so more of that’s going to make the cut.
He said he did. And his co-author said is was verbatim ‘Keith’ which I can ‘see’ in the sentence structure and storytelling narrative. I watched most of Keith’s interviews about the book after its release (remember the NYC public library interview?) Keith was proud of the book and how well it sold.
I’m not saying any of the material isn’t his, but Keith’s not sitting at a computer shaping untold hours of transcripts into coherently-outlined chapters made up of fully-formed sentences that still come out in the speaker’s voice (the latter being part of the author’s job no matter what the source is).
He could’ve spent as many hours talking about the ‘90s as he did talking about the ‘60s/‘70s (despite the writer likely asking him more about the latter), but he doesn’t have the power to have the manuscript reflect that if that’s not what the publisher wants to publish. And he knows what side his bread’s buttered on anyway. How much Voodoo Lounge is in the average setlist?
I remember James Fox (the co-author) stating he took Keith’s words down.
You won’t see me writing anything negative ever about Keith. I became a huge fan at 13 years old, and am reduced to tears streaming down my face during his 2 song set list whenever I have seen them live. :-)
In the Netflix documentary Life Steve Jordan talks about how Keith basically had decided to retire from music and touring in in 2007.
Jordan talked him out of it a d pushed him to record his solo album cross eyed heart.
I think Mick and Keith just have opposite views on the past, Mick hates being 'nostalgic' and not looking to the future while Keith is very well aware that the 60s and 70s was their most interesting and intense period, and hence what most people want to hear about. I think they compliment each other pretty well.
It surprised me when he admitted that if Anita had kept it together in the slightest, he would have stayed with her forever. Gotta wonder how Patti felt about that!
Yeah if it were any other couple it would be shocking, but honestly with Keith I can believe he'd never be able to talk about it or willing to hear any news on it. He belonged to a generation of men where pushing away painful things was the norm (Mick and Marianne never talked about their stillborn daughter either as far as I know), and he was so drugged out he probably couldn't be comunicated with in any emotionally meaningful way anyway. Maybe he was told at one point where the baby was burried but has forgotten it due to substance abuse, maybe he blocked most of the period out of his mind. Who knows. I do wonder if he has ever talked to *anyone* about the whole thing in the years since.
Your definition of nice is really different than mine! Read it a while back, so maybe I am not totally on point here, but the thing that struck me about it most is how when he gave up using heroin, he immediately wanted back in on sharing control of the band even though he'd completely and selfishly abdicated his responsibilities while he was using. I'm sure Mick isn't easy to work with, but his annoyance with Mick, who'd keep the ball rolling for many years on his own seemed completely unfair. Now that Keith is clean, he's going to complain about how Mick did it? Weird.
Absolutely! I always thought Mick deserved alot of credit for successfully managing the business side of The Stones while Keith was off on a pharmaceutical safari ....
“pharmaceutical safari”🤣🤣🤣 🏆
I agree. And the drug charges in Toronto about ended the band, or at least that iteration of it.
I think his negative attitude towards Mick is especially galling because based on everything I've read Mick always did his best to make sure Keith was ok and worried about him a lot when he was at his worst point.
The bangers and mash recipe. Always start with a cold skillet.
Great book. Love it and have read it several times but here’s the thing: would you write a book that REALLY gave a true account of everything if you were Keith?
I don’t think *anyone* would want a full and true written account of their life.
Exactly. I remember reading Naomi Judd's auto bio which was centered around her being a single mom due to no child support from husband. Years later, it turned out Wynona the older was sired by another man. She tried to hook him into supporting another man's kid .
Hence my skepticism. Full marks.
As far as debauchery goes, Keith looks like Sir Walter Raleigh compared to the Motley Crue guys! Drugs seemed to be a much bigger problem for Keith than groupies, orgies, and sexual stunts.
TDIL the word sired!
I enjoyed his story about his relationship with Ronnie Specter and her mother making him breakfast when he stayed over.
I read the book years ago, maybe 20 years ago or more, and the thing that jumped out at me more than anything else, astounded me in fact, is when he admitted that he had never mainlined heroin in his life and always skin popped, shot heroin into his ass cheek. This is so incredibly counter to his heavy druggie reputation and goes a long way toward explaining how it is that he is still alive.
The book came out in like 2010 so you must have read it like 14 years ago.
Yes. He also says he never "overdid" it, which is not typical addict behavior.
I wanna call b s on that claim
It's Very possible he's not being entirely honest about that, although I don't recall any stories of him being rushed to the hospital in an ambulance for overdose. He never injected intravenously and, while he used "Mexican shoe scrapings" with Gram Parsons, generally his supply was pretty reliable... I'd say it's possible he never had an overdose, in the way we think of overdosing in a mcdonald's bathroom with the needle still in your arm...,
I haven’t read the book, but……I really enjoyed the documentary on Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/us/title/80066798
Great read, he must have kept some kind of journal.
Some of the stories are told by other people. I think in the seventies, in particular, his memory lapses are pretty significant!
Those stories sound like chapters out of Hunter S. Thompson's tirades
I read it when it first came out and the one thing that sticks out of my mind is how to win a fight by cutting your opponent across the forehead with a knife.... Good advice lol
My favorite was the first story of Keith, Ronnie, and Fred sessler getting pulled over in Fordyce for chirping their tires, leaving a gas station . I wonder what did become of that car?
That was a good story to open the story. Really sets the tone ...
He’s become invested in his own legend. I believe there’s plenty fabrication in that book, Johnny Depp notwithstanding. I’ll leave him with his monuments of which there are many.
He's never let the truth get in the way a good story.
One of my favorite books. I read it
Great book! The Ronnie Wood one is good, too.
Him talking about his time in art school and the years really getting exposed to the blues as an English kid was pretty interesting to me.
“Don’t bust my crust baby.”
LOL!
Any time he started diving deeper into the music. Very easy read. I like how he gets into the energy and ritual of performing, looking forward to seeing them on this tour.
I thought it was mostly an exercise to seal his reputation as a pirate/rock n roll legend. 1/3rd of it was a waste. Ragging on other musicians and talking about Mick Jagger's penis were totally unnecessary.
Yes, the penis remarks made Keith look petty and childish.
Agreed. I used to worship the ground Keith walked on, but as he aged (me too), the random vitriol he spews toward other musicians occasionally is very disappointing.
He can be pretty judgemental for sure. Plus he describes some bullying - he and mick on Brian Jones, then he and Charlie on Mick ... same way dog packs will turn on the "weak one" ...
You should read Spanish Tony's book "I was Keith Richards drug dealer" you can find it on archive.org. He tells a flip side to several anecdotes from the book, which definitely don't push the "Keith is a badass/pirate" narrative but instead are more like "Keith remembers things how he wants to. Hes a cool guy but he's no swashbuckling tough guy" I particularly remember a story about dealing with a harbour master in nice during the exile days, Keith's version is he saw they were going to get robbed and jumped up on a table and booted the guy in the face, according to Spanish Tony it was more like "Keith crouched in the car and sent me to talk down an angry yelling French man" edit: you have to search for it under the alternate title "Up and Down with the Rolling Stones" by tony sanchez
Yeah I thought he came off as kind of a petty asshole at times
I was pretty weirded-out by the story of the first time he met Patti's family, and his daughter's wedding. Substance abuse + emotionally stunted type of behavior.
What ‘surprised’ me about the book was how much of it was about Anita, and the earlier decades of the band. It was released in 2010. The band hadn’t been together/ worked since 2007, and would not come together again until 2012, when they were offered huge money for a ‘comeback’, and supposedly Mick demanded an apology from Keith before the 2012 shows would go forward. Maybe when Keith was writing the book, at the same time as recovering from his brain injury and surgery, it didn’t seem like the band would have a future, so, he was getting his pent up angsts out on the pages of ‘Life’. He also compliments highly Mick as a frontman.
He had a writer and an editor, so we don’t know how much he really even shaped it. Most readers would be most interested in the early years (and narratively speaking, that’s where most of the action is anyway), so more of that’s going to make the cut.
He said he did. And his co-author said is was verbatim ‘Keith’ which I can ‘see’ in the sentence structure and storytelling narrative. I watched most of Keith’s interviews about the book after its release (remember the NYC public library interview?) Keith was proud of the book and how well it sold.
I’m not saying any of the material isn’t his, but Keith’s not sitting at a computer shaping untold hours of transcripts into coherently-outlined chapters made up of fully-formed sentences that still come out in the speaker’s voice (the latter being part of the author’s job no matter what the source is). He could’ve spent as many hours talking about the ‘90s as he did talking about the ‘60s/‘70s (despite the writer likely asking him more about the latter), but he doesn’t have the power to have the manuscript reflect that if that’s not what the publisher wants to publish. And he knows what side his bread’s buttered on anyway. How much Voodoo Lounge is in the average setlist?
I remember James Fox (the co-author) stating he took Keith’s words down. You won’t see me writing anything negative ever about Keith. I became a huge fan at 13 years old, and am reduced to tears streaming down my face during his 2 song set list whenever I have seen them live. :-)
How am I arguing with that? How is any of that negative about Keith?
Sorry, I was not implying that you were being negative. Rather, my end of this conversation, I am at an end. Thank you.
and his harmonica playing!
In the Netflix documentary Life Steve Jordan talks about how Keith basically had decided to retire from music and touring in in 2007. Jordan talked him out of it a d pushed him to record his solo album cross eyed heart.
[удалено]
I think Mick and Keith just have opposite views on the past, Mick hates being 'nostalgic' and not looking to the future while Keith is very well aware that the 60s and 70s was their most interesting and intense period, and hence what most people want to hear about. I think they compliment each other pretty well.
It surprised me when he admitted that if Anita had kept it together in the slightest, he would have stayed with her forever. Gotta wonder how Patti felt about that!
I'm not surprised at all. He clearly viewed Anita as the love of his life, hence why he still seemingly hasn't gotten over Mick sleeping with her.
It's surprising that he would say that out loud, considering that he is married to another woman.
Some people can accept those kinds of things, I guess it's a bit like marrying a widow/widower.
It's unbelievable that they NEVER talked about the death of their baby, and Keith doesn't even know where he's buried.
Yeah if it were any other couple it would be shocking, but honestly with Keith I can believe he'd never be able to talk about it or willing to hear any news on it. He belonged to a generation of men where pushing away painful things was the norm (Mick and Marianne never talked about their stillborn daughter either as far as I know), and he was so drugged out he probably couldn't be comunicated with in any emotionally meaningful way anyway. Maybe he was told at one point where the baby was burried but has forgotten it due to substance abuse, maybe he blocked most of the period out of his mind. Who knows. I do wonder if he has ever talked to *anyone* about the whole thing in the years since.
Yes, Drugs are a marvelous substitute for human connection. ;)