The Rolling Stones legend is a big fan of incense, a “nice cup of tea” and hitting people over the head with his guitar. Just don’t make him listen to Mick Jagger’s last solo album. Or eat any cheese …
8. RICHARDS GIVES INVALUABLE TIPS. INVALUABLE TIP #1: HOW TO CUSTOMIZE A
HOTEL ROOM.“Put some Arabic music on, throw some material around and get
the incense out. You’ve got to make it personal, or even the most luxurious
hotel room becomes a cell. Especially these days, when you can’t open the
fucking windows.”
7. NINE DAYS: THAT’S THE LONGEST RICHARDS HAS EVER GONE WITHOUT
SLEEPING.He finally gave up when he fell face-first onto a hi-fi. His
nose broke the fall (it still bears a small scar near the bridge). “I was doing
a lot of blow,” he admits, perhaps unnecessarily, “and everything was just
too interesting for me to go to bed. I was quite lucid. Then I hit the
speaker. I even remember the make — it was a JBL.”
6. HE LOST HIS VIRGINITY IN A VAN.“Oh, Christ, it was great. I
couldn’t believe she was letting me do it. I was 15, and we were in the back of
a van in a seaside town in the south of England. I remember I was very good at
the foreplay, but a little hasty when it came to the actual deed. She was a
lovely girl, though. They always are, aren’t they? Wonder what happened to her.
How’re you doing, darling?”
5. HE’S RESPONSIBLE FOR THE LITTLE-KNOWN CONNECTION BETWEEN PHYSICS AND ROCK
& ROLL.While reading a physics thesis as a schoolboy, Richards
became convinced he probably wasn’t cut out for academia. “I thought,
I don’t
understand a fucking word of this. I’d better concentrate on the guitar
playing. Next thing I knew, I was wearing orange socks and looked like Elvis
Presley.”
4. HARD TO BELIEVE: HE WAS THROWN OUT OF THE SCHOOL CHOIR.Harder to
believe: His dismissal wasn’t for bad behavior. “My voice broke,” he complains.
“I was a soprano, and we’d sung for the queen in 1956 in Westminster Abbey on
Christmas Eve. We were a top-notch choir and did all the big gigs. Then the
balls dropped, and I was suddenly sitting in physics class.”