Keith Richards - Under the Influence (2015) Movie Script
Life's a funny thing, you know.
But I've always thought 30 was about it.
Beyond that would be
horrible to be alive.
Until I got to be 31.
Then, "Why, I ain't so shabby," you know.
[laughs]
"I'll hang in a while."
As you go along, you realize that
this whole concept of growing up is...
You're not grown up until the day
they put you six feet under.
You're never grown up.
["Blue and Lonesome" playing]
I'm blue and lonesome
As a man can be
I'm blue and lonesome
Whoa-oh
As a man can be
You don't get bluer than that.
Man, that's bad stuff.
I don't have headaches over myself
[Richards] The power of the blues
was a mind blower.
My love is gone away from me
Anybody who could make a sound like that
is all right with me.
[chuckles] You know what I mean?
For me, music is like
the center of everything.
It's something that binds people together
through centuries, through millennium.
It's undefinable.
And nobody's ever
going to have the answer to it,
but it's great fun exploring.
[Richards chuckles]
-Anthony, how are you?
-How are you?
-[Richards] Cool, man.
-Once again.
Once more into the breach.
[Richards] How you been, Anthony?
-I'm very well, thank you.
-Yeah.
So, Keith, I've been enjoying
your new music.
Why don't you tell me a little bit
about getting it going?
You know, what made you
decide to jump back in?
I've been thinking about that.
You know,
I think it coincided with the fact
that I was doing the book, you know...
-Second only to the Bible.
-[both chuckle]
You know...
And The Stones had one of their...
where they suddenly go into hibernation
for about five years.
'Cause we... The Stones had been
working a lot until about 2007.
And I was kind of itching
to get back in the studio.
I love recording, you see.
Any studio,
I feel totally at home there.
Everywhere else, you know, is, you know...
there's the bags.
[Steve Jordan] Should we get
another mic in there?
-Or should we just move the ribbon closer?
-[Richards] No, listen...
Play a couple things.
[guitar playing]
That's better, right?
[Richards] And the next thing I know,
Steve Jordan came to me, and he said,
"How about just the two of us
go in the studio,
you know, just you and me,
and we'll cut a couple of tracks?
Just, you know, see what happens."
[Jordan] He said something
and it was kind of shocking.
And I asked him
never to say that again.
He said, "Well, you know,
I've done all of this...
and now the book and everything."
He hadn't been playing.
And he was like, "You know, maybe
I should, like, retire," kinda thing.
-Yeah.
-At which I completely freaked out.
[laughing] I said,
"What are you talking about?"
I was talking in my sleep.
I said,
"What are you talking about?"
[man 1] Can you get it? Yeah.
[man 2] Yep.
[man 1] Yeah, it's a little boomy.
[man 2] Uh-huh.
[Tom Waits] Musically, what I noticed
about Keith, is he's really big on detail.
And you have to be if you're...
an archeologist and you're,
you know...
You insist on locality data, you know.
Not only where something came from,
but what are the principles
and the properties of it.
And he...
He's like a... like a London cabbie
who has The Knowledge.
-[man] Yeah, yeah.
-Only he has that in music, you know.
[Richards] I realized,
as I was doing this stuff,
how much steeped I am
in American folk music,
in jazz and blues.
That's the stuff that America
has given the rest of the world.
You know, far bigger than H-bombs.
[chuckles]
I love my sugar
But I love my honey, too
I'm a greedy motherfucker
And I don't know what to do
I've got a crosseyed heart
[Richards] Crosseyed Heart, I'm doing
a lot of the tipping of the hat to people.
And this was to Robert Johnson.
Ooh, she's so sweet
And she drives me
round the bend
I go in the corner, baby
And find another friend
I got a crosseyed heart
[Richards] I grew up listening
basically to American music,
even though I was in England.
And through that,
I guess I realized that an awful lot
of American music, blues included,
relied a lot upon old Celtic melodies,
Irish, Scottish, English, Welsh,
that became part of this country,
you know.
So to me, it was translatable easily.
When I first heard
Robert Johnson and Lead Belly,
and I'm hearing an echo...
You know, I'm hearing...
In my bones, I'm hearing
an echo that I shouldn't be hearing
because it's not within earshot.
Which is one of the reasons
I wanted to start this thing off
with the blues, you know.
I mean, I ain't a pop star no more,
you know.
I don't wanna be.
[laughs]
See, I swore... You know,
I thought it was in E, for Christ's sake.
I mean, I swore...
I would have gone to the grave saying
that I played this in E, man, until today.
[radio tuning]
[Richards] My mum was a beautiful
music freak with incredible taste.
We only had, like, two radio stations
in the whole country, you know.
And she was a wizard of the dial.
If there was anything worth listening to,
she would find it.
[jazz playing on radio]
Sarah Vaughan and Ella Fitzgerald
were her two top thrushes.
[laughs]
I liked Billie Holiday.
Billie had more edge on it for me.
But still, that's what I grew up with.
You know what I mean?
Louis Armstrong...
Billy Eckstine...
and a little dash of Mozart
here and there.
And then all the usual rubbish.
Whatever they played on radio.
You know, the stuff
you couldn't avoid, you know.
I'm a pink toothbrush
You're a blue toothbrush
[man singing]
You're a pink toothbrush
And I think, toothbrush,
that we met by the bathroom door
[Richards] All of that crap, you know?
I mean, the '50s,
which is, all right,
great rubbish, in retrospect.
Growing up in England,
just after the war,
there was rubble everywhere.
I was not aware that there was any
other world apart from bombed out ruins.
["Baby Let's Play House" playing]
And then, suddenly, Elvis.
He hit like a bombshell.
"Baby Let's Play House" was around then,
and it really cooked me.
The world went from black-and-white
to Technicolor.
Well, you may go to college
You may go to school
You may have a pink Cadillac
But don't you be nobody's fool
Now baby, come back, baby, come
Come back, baby,
I wanna play house with you
[Richards] America looked very attractive.
[laughs]
All the movies.
We got what you guys saw,
like, a year before.
Especially if you're into music.
That was basically our lifeline
in those days,
that sense of,
there's something happening,
and you just wanna
be part of it, you know,
and you jumped in with both feet.
At least, I did.
Come back, baby,
I wanna play house with you
[playing gentle melody]
[Richards] Jim Hall.
[Jordan] We love Jim Hall.
-Jim, motherfucker.
-[laughs]
[Richards] My grandfather, Gus,
he kinda teased me, man,
over years, into becoming a guitarist.
He was one of those guys
that always thought
everybody was a musician
if they got the chance to be and...
So I think he just left
the instruments lying about
just to see if it caught the eye.
And then he probably watched me
for a couple of years, you know,
talking to him
and looking at the guitar and...
'Cause I remember him saying,
"It's a pretty one, isn't it?
It's nice, that.
Yeah, when you can reach it...
I'll let you play it," you know.
Once he did give me the guitar,
he said the best exercise
is the Spanish malaguena,
because it's got a lot of moves in it
that make it great for the fingers.
[playing malaguena]
You're expanding yourself
without even knowing.
And he was quite right,
because, you know, from learning that...
'Cause I had to learn that
in order to get the guitar, you know.
I mean...
That meant I could walk into the house,
pick up the guitar and play with it.
Until then, it would have to be
at invitation only.
-[man] The story with the guitar...
-Oh, it's a...
It's a late '50s Gibson ES-355.
So, kind of a hot rod.
He's always been known
for playing a black Gibson.
For me, it looks like Keith.
And as I just showed you,
when I opened the case,
he said, "I'll have it." He didn't...
Nope. Just... He knew right away.
I've been working with Keith
now since the '80s.
I have full access to his guitar lockers
and can do what I want.
I do often get to see guitars
and bring them to him.
This is what Robert Johnson
would have played, the model and year.
This is a 1928 L-1 Gibson, you know.
And the scale length and the flat neck
and the width of the nut...
It was a style of playing.
So you can do
the finger style blues on this.
It almost takes you there.
It makes you play that way.
The notes last
the right amount of time.
The balance between the high strings
and what's going on
in the low-end, the snap...
In the locker, unfinished project.
National Guitar, right here,
in my inventory book of Keith's guitars.
It says here,
"To be rebuilt and then maybe used."
And I wrote a note,
"Kinda reminds me of Jimmy Reed."
Dig it out, put some strings on it.
And sometimes
I pick up an instrument
and the sound
will take you to a different place.
It's like a flavor.
Steve and Keith walk in.
They think we're doing something else.
We open the case.
Keith looks at it, "Oh, great. Hmm."
"Check this out, Keith.
This has been yours
since before I worked for you.
It's never had strings on it.
I found it in the locker,
I put strings on it."
Next thing you know,
he's out there trying it.
Steve's like, "Okay, if he's in, I'm in."
They start playing, but the control room
is set for, you know...
for a mix or something.
There's no mic set.
People aren't ready for this.
["Blues in the Morning" playing]
"Blues in the Morning,"
that feeling...
That was just him picking up the guitar.
There was no second takes, no other tries.
It was just where we were going.
[Richards singing]
Got the blues in the morning
I feel that's far too long
Got the blues in the morning
My baby
It's still too long
It's hardcore, baby
but I gotta sing this song
[Richards] To us, in England,
people like Mick and myself
and many others...
Chuck arrived...
At the time, we were starving for music.
The way that man hit us...
I'm still recovering.
Incredible lyrics,
an incredible devil-may-care attitude.
He's influenced just about
every guitar player,
even if they don't know it.
You know, I mean...
not a lot of guys wanna play like Chuck
because it's like taking on the devil.
I'll take it on, you know.
[laughs]
Yeah, this is the beginning
of the Rolling Stones, you know.
Yeah, and I'm holding
a full deck here, pals.
That was the one
Mick had on the train, you know.
I got on my morning train
to go to art school.
I happened to hit the carriage
that Mick had just gotten into,
and I hadn't seen him in years.
And then I noticed,
tucked under his arm, like this, was...
"Oh, yeah. Get out of here.
Chuck Berry...
What you got there, man?"
And then I said, "Come here!"
You know, I thought
I was the only other guy in...
you know, in the southeast of England
that even knew anything
about this stuff, you know, and...
So, I mean, by the time
we got off the train, you know,
we've made a deal, you know.
I'm gonna... [chuckles]
And that's how The Stones hooked,
because of these very two records.
And that's it.
Muddy, I had only heard, you know,
very few tracks of at the time.
So this was a mind blower
to me, you know.
[Muddy Waters singing]
I don't want you to be no slave
I don't want you to work all day
I don't want you to be true
I just want to make love to you
[Richards] When I first heard
The Best of Muddy Waters,
it was the most powerful music
I'd ever heard.
The most expressive.
And I had listened to Mozart and,
you know, I had listened to Beethoven.
This is on a par
with the best music in the world.
The Stones, in their early days,
all we wanted to do
was to turn other people on to this.
[Mick Jagger singing]
I don't want you to be no slave
I don't want you to work all day
I don't want you to be true
I just wanna make love to you, baby
[Richards] We knew we're never gonna
be able to play it like Muddy.
So let's just, like, juke it up.
We sped it up, we did it real fast.
And everybody got into it.
I can see by the way that,
baby, you talk
And I know by the way
that you treat your man
I could love you, baby,
it's a cryin' shame
I don't want you to cook my bread
[Richards] We've never wanted
to make pop music.
Our puritanical mission
was to turn other people on to the blues.
At the same time, we realized
that we turned America
back on to its own music,
which was, like, far beyond the agenda.
[laughs]
I wanna make love to you
[audience clapping and cheering]
The Rolling Stones.
Aren't they great?
[audience laughing]
Unbelievable.
-[Richards] Hey, guys.
-What's up, boss?
How are you guys?
How're we doing?
-Alright?
-Thank you, Keith.
Awesome.
-How you doing?
-Great show the other...
-I'm doing fabulous.
-Yes, sir. Great show.
-Alright. Yeah, yeah.
-Great book, brother.
Cool, brother.
How you doing, Keith?
-We're doing alright, man.
-Good.
-Right on. Thank you.
-We're all alright, you know.
[Richards] On the road, I feel at home.
Being backstage or being onstage,
you know, it's... familiar.
[man] Thank you.
[Richards] There you go, pal.
-Okay.
-[woman] Can I get a high five?
Hi, baby. [laughs]
I left home at 17
in a cloud of disgrace,
without getting, you know,
my dad's okay.
And so the road became
a second home to me, you know.
[man 1] You brought the sun out.
[man 2] Ronnie, how are you?
[Richards] And I'm looking forward
still to some great gigs.
I mean, I really enjoyed
playing in the heartland.
They're the places we used to drive around
in the station wagon 50 years ago.
[laughs]
["It's All Over Now" playing]
America is the biggest market
in the goddamn world.
It was a fucking crowning glory
to break there.
Well, baby used to stay out
all night long
She made me cry, she done me wrong
She hurt my eyes open, that's no lie
[Richards] I was amazed
by the warmth of the welcome.
Especially with the first hit
being New York City.
Because I used to love her,
but it's all over now
[Richards] I mean, the buildings,
the feel and the smell of the place.
But it's all over now
[Richards] That night, I remember
writing to my mum there,
"Mum, I'm in New York City.
I'll tell you more later."
[laughs]
She spent all my money,
playing her high class game
[Richards] God knows what
they were expecting.
In some places, I mean...
I do remember The Stones being arrested
for topless bathing in Georgia
at a Holiday Inn swimming pool,
which was in sight of this highway.
And some freaked out locals thought,
because of the hair,
that there was a load of chicks
jumping in the pool, naked, you know...
So the cop car drives up to the pool.
[laughing]
We're looking at them,
the cops are looking at us, you know,
and it was like culture shock.
In those days, if you went
further south than Washington,
it was a different kind of America then.
It was still strictly segregated.
You'd pull in to a joint, a whole bus
of us, black and white, all mixed...
Anyway, you'd pull over
and dying for a pee.
So I'd join in with the brothers,
and then they'd laugh at me
and point above the door,
and it said "Colored only."
I asked them,
"And where am I supposed to go?" you know.
And they said, "Try the bushes"
or, "The white men's around the corner."
But there were plenty of signs of it,
yeah. Chain gangs, too. Yeah.
To get the last taste of that bullshit
was amazing to behold.
But I think that black America sort of
took us a little more to their hearts
because we were different.
And we had no contact with the problems
that they usually had with white people.
[blues guitar playing]
[indistinct chatter]
Now that's the shit.
-[Jordan] You're gonna do it?
-Only if you want me to.
But there's a Les Paul Jr. behind you.
[Waits] When you walk into his studio...
He says his first home is the stage.
I think his second home
would be the studio.
So that's where you
have to really start listening.
[Jordan] We're not...
We're not using any of this.
[Waits] Everybody's tuning up
and you know,
that's when things
start to really happen,
uh, because no one thinks it's music yet.
Yeah, it's like an orchestra
tuning up, you know. It's thrilling.
Because it's a piece of music
they will never play again,
and no one called it that.
[playing blues music]
Yeah, you don't wanna be looking
at the frame and then realize
that the most interesting thing
going on in the frame
is happening outside of the frame.
[blues music continues]
[Richards] Living in England, all you knew
about Chicago was Al Capone.
And then I found out that there's
something about the stock markets...
and I mean, meat.
[chuckling] I mean, the cattle yards.
The next time
I really thought about Chicago
is when I heard the blues coming out of
this building we're just about to bypass.
Chess Records,
2120 South Michigan.
We recorded there in '64.
It was a magical room, sound-wise.
How many addresses I've forgotten,
that one I'll never forget, you know.
We arrived at Chess Studios.
Somebody's walking us
through the corridor,
and there's a black guy
on a ladder painting the ceiling.
As we pass by,
the engineer from Chess said,
"Oh, by the way,
this is Mr. Muddy Waters."
So this is my first meeting.
I'm shaking hands with Muddy Waters
who's got whitewash dripping.
[muttering]
And he just said...
"Thank you for what you guys are doing."
I had to digest the image later.
I mean, I'm shocked on a personal level
to have met the very man
who I've been listening to
and trying to fathom out.
It said a lot about black and white.
[laughs]
But that's what
I always said about Muddy.
He was a gentleman
in no matter what position you found him.
Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf,
Bo Diddley, Buddy Guy...
All these guys were out in Chicago
recording in the same studios.
And everybody is like, "What do you
wanna go to Chicago for?"
Hey, there's a reason.
[Buddy Guy] One, two, three.
[band playing "Let Me Love You Baby"]
[inaudible]
Well, now, baby when you walk
You know you shake like a willow tree
Well, now, baby when you walk
You know, you shake
just like a willow tree
Well, it's a girl like you
I would love to make a fool of me
How are you doing, Buddy?
-You wanna get a drink?
-Yeah.
-You drink corn liquor?
-Yeah.
Wait a minute.
-I could have them set you up.
-Yeah.
[bartender] All right,
white lightning coming at ya.
All right.
[both chuckle]
It's got a kick, man.
[Guy] Well, you go first.
You go first, then I'll...
There we go.
I gotta shoot on that one, right?
[Richards] Whoa.
[Guy] I think I can make this one, Keith.
-[laughs]
-Then I scratch.
[both laughing]
[Guy] Came here September the 25th, 1957.
They had a thousand blues clubs.
Some of them didn't hold but 22 people.
Hardly wasn't no air-conditioning
this time of year,
and they kept the doors open
so if you walked by,
you would hear these harmonicas and drums.
And I found out that,
if you played good,
you got a good drunk,
and you got a good-looking woman
if you sounded all right.
[both laugh]
[Guy] Yes, sir.
[Richards] Yep.
I don't know if you remember there was
a television show here called Shindig.
And they was trying to get you on...
[Richards] Yeah, Howlin' Wolf
was in there.
Yeah, they was trying to get you all
to play it. And Mick said...
They said... I think Mick said,
"Let us bring Muddy Waters."
And they said,
"Who in the hell is Muddy Waters?"
And he said, "You mean to tell me
you don't know who Muddy Waters is?
We named ourselves after one
of his famed records, Rollin' Stone."
And I even cried about that, man.
And sure enough,
that's when they brought
Howlin' Wolf and Muddy.
And that's the first time
I'd ever seen 'em on television.
It was thanks to these people here, man.
Tell us something about him, Brian.
Well, when we first
started playing together,
we started playing because
we wanted to play rhythm and blues.
And Howlin' Wolf
was one of our greatest idols.
And it's a great pleasure to find
he's been booked on this show tonight.
-Really is a pleasure.
-Thanks to Howlin'.
So I think it's about time
that you shut up
-and we had Howlin' Wolf on stage.
-[host] Yeah! I agree.
Okay! Let's get him on.
Howlin' Wolf! Bring him up.
[audience cheering]
How many more years
Have I got to let you dog me around?
How many more years
Have I got to let you dog me around?
I would rather be dead
Sleeping six feet in the ground
[Richards] I knew him very well.
Chester, I think, was his real name.
Big man. The gentle giant.
When you're that big and intimidating,
you don't really have to do
anything about it.
You know what I mean?
[chuckles]
These guys were gentlemen
in the true meaning of the word.
I mean, I've no doubt
they could be as mean as, you know...
And I didn't wanna know.
But there was
an innate politeness about them.
They were in awe
that we'd even heard of them.
And we were in awe
of meeting them.
And so you have this
mutual appreciation society going on,
which still goes on to this day.
[Guy] Ah! There you go!
I used to go into Chess
and try to turn my amplifier up, out loud,
and they would run me out saying,
"Don't nobody wanna hear that."
But when they started playing
and it got back to Leonard, he said,
"The British are playing it,
and it's getting over."
So I turned my amp up
like these British guys.
Do you have to live that life
to be a blues player?
Do you have to be black or white
to play the blues?
Hell no, man!
The bottom line,
it's about the good and the bad times.
And if you haven't had a bad time in life,
just keep living.
[Richards] All right.
[Richards] Oh.
Oh...
-[Guy laughing] I give up, man.
-[Richards laughing]
All right. All right.
Ah, that's where I left it.
[playing piano]
Why did I bother to play piano?
A guy called Ian Stewart, you know.
He started The Stones,
and he was one of the best
boogie pianists I had heard.
I mean, especially in England.
There was one thing he played.
I said, "Look,
I gotta learn how to do that."
Just show me, you know,
just the basics.
[playing piano]
For me, in the right mood,
and at the right instrument,
there's a certain feeling
of being an antenna,
receiving and then transmitting.
I'll sit down at the piano
and pick up the guitar
and happily play
Buddy Holly or Otis Redding.
And then, somewhere,
with a bit of luck,
you realize that something
you'd thought that you'd played wrong
was actually...
a start of a whole different song.
I said, "I gotta learn this, man."
I wrote a lot of stuff on piano.
I wrote "Let's Spend The Night Together,"
"Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby,"
but I don't consider
myself a piano player.
I use it as a paint box,
you know, just to...
A touch here, a touch there.
Usually just the right hand.
[laughs]
She, she's got a mind of her own
And she use it well
Actually, I piss about a lot.
And then it's...
And it's like, whatever strikes me.
But I've always loved playing the piano.
I think one of the reasons...
Being a guitar player, you know, your
instrument is in a strange, you know...
a different position.
But the piano, to me,
it's, like, laid out like a chess game.
[playing "Sing Me Back Home"]
-See, I love my country shit.
-[man chuckles]
Oh, won't you sing me back home?
To the songs my mama sang
Make my old memories come alive
Please take me away
Yeah, turn back all those years
Sing me back home before
I die
See, country music...
I was listening to Porter Wagoner
in 1953, man. I mean, yeah,
Johnny Cash, Hank Williams...
We didn't get a lot of it in England,
but, yeah, well aware of it.
My mother made sure of that.
Country music, I mean, to me,
I heard stories
that you're never quite sure,
you know, how nasty it can get.
Someone stole some money
Who it is,
it ain't quite clear
Stolen from my honey
She holds my stash 'round here
The cops, you know
I can't involve them
They'd only interfere
So I hit the usual suspects
But I drew a blank round here
I'm robbed blind
Robbed blind
[song continues]
Beautiful woodwork.
The boards, the hallowed boards, yeah.
[Richards] I've only played here once,
with Willie Nelson.
It was built as a church.
And now it's a temple to country music.
What's the difference, you know?
We all come here to worship
and pray to the best, you know.
And God knows everybody's been on here.
I first heard country music
on a pirate radio station.
[Marty Robbins singing]
Out in the West Texas town of El Paso
I fell in love with a Mexican girl
[radio stations switching]
[Richards] Reception was dodgy.
That required a lot of maneuvering
around the room
with the antenna, you know?
[laughs]
But country music immediately, like,
pulled chimes within me, you know.
I mean, it was the melodies, I think,
and also the guitars, you know.
You know, that pedal steel's
a heartbreaker, man.
Sometimes the songs are really dopey.
But then sometimes the dopiest song
would have the best melody.
And at the same time
there was a certain edge on certain guys.
Hank Williams, particularly.
You measure country music
by this cat.
[Hank Williams singing]
Hear that lonesome whip-poor-will
He sounds too blue to fly
[Richards] Hank Williams, Johnny Cash,
Merle Haggard...
They were pretty tough guys.
The reality of country music
on the road is something else.
Rock and roll's got nothing on those guys.
The Stones once turned up at a Holiday Inn
in Fresno, something like that.
And there's this
smell of paint everywhere.
They go, "There's your room."
And, "What's going on?"
And they said, "Well...
[chuckling] Johnny Cash and Luther Perkins
were here two nights ago
and painted the whole damn room orange.
Drapes and all," he says.
If I'd have known,
I would've brought some paint cleaner.
I'm so lonesome I could cry
[man] You never had
any Nudie suits, did you?
[Richards] I'll tell you what,
Gram Parsons used to
pass his cast-offs to me, yeah.
I did have one of Gram's Nudie suits.
It was made by a tailor in
San Fernando Valley called Nudie.
We used to go around there, yeah.
What a madman.
[laughs]
Gram Parsons taught me so much about
this mystique of the "country."
I was very much drawn to him,
and he was the big influence.
[man singing]
She's a devil in disguise
You can see it in her eyes
She's telling dirty lies
She's a devil in disguise
[Richards] Gram hung with us
when we were cutting
Exile On Main Street and "Wild Horses."
Meeting Gram,
I got fully immersed in country music.
But as much as he was a country boy
and loved his country music,
his idea of America
was very bizarre, you know?
And, uh...
So, I said, "That's bizarre."
And he said,
"You wanna see how bizarre? Look at this."
This guy has got longhorns
on the end of his Cadillac.
So, to me, all of this temple for
a Stetson and some rhinestones is like...
But that says the other side
of what country music is about.
It's the razzle-dazzle.
It's Colonel Parker
and the dancing chickens.
Me, I didn't see the Stetson
and the rhinestones.
I just heard the music.
And I always knew
that this is the heartland.
This is where American music
was put in the crucible
and came out as, you know,
pretty much pure silver.
["Sweet Virginia" playing]
This was rock and roll.
That's where country music
and the blues sort of collided.
I always felt myself fortunate
to be in a spot where, in America,
these few forms of music
were somehow merging
and creating something else, you know?
So, it was great to watch
and be a part of,
and now be the king of.
[laughs]
[Jagger singing]
Wadin' through the waste stormy winter
And there's not a friend
to help you through
Tryin' to stop the waves
behind your eyeballs
Drop your reds
Drop your greens and blues
But come on,
come on down, Sweet Virginia
Got to scrape the shit
right off your shoes
And you find yourself
on the streets again
That was it. Yeah, all right.
Mind you, I don't go around searching
for songs, you know, with a butterfly net.
Because I think, basically,
songs have to come to you.
You know, going around, like, trying
to winkle them out with a sharp stick,
going, "Come here,
you little son-of-a-bitch."
Just because you find yourself
on the streets again
That don't mean I'm
That I'm just your friend
Baby, trouble is your middle name
I wrote a sort of country song,
roaming around the hallways of this house.
And it's not often, my old lady
suddenly came out of the bedroom,
and looked over and said,
"That's a good song."
Hey, if the wife says so...
It was very Hank Williams.
And then I thought,
"No, it's too Hank Williams.
Let's give it a kick. Let's push it up."
[band playing "Trouble"]
Just because you find yourself
Off the streets again
And I loved working with the drummer.
It's a one-on-one thing.
And it's an amazingly
uncomplicated way to deal with...
Especially playing rock and roll.
And the other thing, too,
I mean, just as a fan...
I love the way he plays bass.
[playing "Trouble" bassline]
[Jordan] That was very exciting for me,
to have Keith play
as many instruments as possible.
Because those are some of
my favorite Stones records,
when he played the bass
and all the guitars.
[Richards] I've done some bass tracks
in my time. I do love playing bass.
I'm probably a better bass player
than I am guitar, actually. [laughs]
-[man] Look at you!
-I love this shit. I love this shit.
Well, that goes back to
Steve Jordan saying to me,
"Hey, man," you know, in his
sweet, shy, unassuming manner...
Um...
He went,
"How did you cut 'Jumpin' Jack Flash'?"
You know?
"How did you cut 'Street Fighting Man'?"
In those days, you know, you'd say,
roughly, what time you're, you know,
"What time at the studio?"
You can say 8:00 or 9:00
in the evening, you know,
and the band would turn up
around midnight.
[laughs] You know.
Sometimes I would deliberately
go in early, you know, and...
Or if, you know, I was with Charlie,
for instance, I would say,
"Let's go in early and..."
And, basically, I'd go in just to
sort of chop a few ideas about.
But now and again,
you'd actually find out this is the track.
[Richards on recording] One, two.
One, two, three, four.
["Street Fighting Man" playing]
"Street Fighting Man," I think,
was the first one that occurred that way.
Charlie and I were just fiddling about.
And, in there, it sounds like
a couple of people busking, you know.
Charlie's playing this tiny,
little traveling drum kit,
and I'm playing an acoustic, you know.
"Yeah, well, let's just build up on it."
There's not an electric guitar
on that one, no.
It's all overloaded acoustics.
I realized that I could use
a cassette machine basically as a pick-up.
And I play an acoustic guitar through it
and, like, slam it through so loud
that it was totally overloaded.
The 1967 Norelco, the same one that
you would carry around with you. Found it.
Again. Play.
[playing "Street Fighting Man" riff]
That's as much as you're gonna get.
Let's see what comes out. [chuckles]
[tape recorder playing]
Then they'd put a microphone on that
and put it into the studio.
Basically, you have an electric guitar,
but with the feel of an acoustic.
[Richards on tape] That's as much
as you're gonna get.
[laughs]
[Richards] Basically starts there,
and Mick would finish it off.
[Jagger singing] Hey!
Said my name is called disturbance
I'll shout, I'll scream,
I'll kill the king
I'll rail at all his servants
Well, what can a poor boy do
Except to sing
for a rock and roll band
'Cause in sleepy London town
There's just no place
for a street fighting man
No
[Richards] We were working
so hard in those days
that you couldn't write 'em fast enough.
I'll throw the bass on and,
you know, put another guitar on,
and we sort of finished
the track in two hours.
But sometimes, you never know.
You're in a recording, you can go in there
with everything sort of planned...
and it just doesn't click.
[indistinct chatter]
[Richards] "Sympathy"
was a whole different set-up.
I think that was a good 35 takes.
I was around when Jesus Christ
Had his moment of doubt and pain
[man] Sounds really good together.
[Richards] And that song, also,
through those takes,
went from being a sort of
Dylan-esque sort of ballad,
you know, really...
to just an acoustic guitar and
a very, sort of... a lament, almost.
Made damn sure that Pilate...
And we did that for a bit and went...
"This song could take
a little more juice." You know? [laughing]
And, slowly, it built up...
Yeah, I took the bass in on that,
with Charlie,
and we brought it up
to a sort of samba thing.
And then suddenly, everybody looked,
and he said, "Yeah.
Yeah, all right, okay."
I laid traps for troubadours
Who get killed
before they reached Bombay
Oh
Pleased to meet y'all, now, now
Hope you guessed my name
You never know quite when
the magic bit's gonna come in.
[band playing "Trouble"]
Just because you find yourself
Off the streets again
That don't mean that I can help you
Or I ain't your friend
Baby, trouble is your middle name
The trouble is that that's your game
[Waits] Every song has at least
ten songs inside of it
that can be released from the song
and you can make, you know...
You put two songs together in a room,
they'll have offspring, you know?
If you want to start writing songs,
you have to start thinking like one.
You're trying to
break into the ritual of music.
It's kinda like Houdini
in reverse, you know.
It's not you're trying to escape.
You're trying to be let in.
[Richards singing]
Trouble
[man] The story I'd heard
about you meeting him...
I think you were doing Rain Dogs.
Well, my wife, she said,
"Who would you like?"
And I told her,
"Oh, Keith Richards."
I was, like, saying, "Lenny Bruce..."
Uh, you know...
"Muddy Waters," you know.
And she went ahead and started calling.
It was like a prank call.
-And then he picked up, you know.
-[man chuckles]
[Richards] We bumped into each other
30 years ago.
I loved him from the minute I met him.
When he came, he came in a semi
with about 300 guitars.
So I wasn't ready for that,
either, you know.
And he had a guitar valet
who was, like, bringing guitars over
like beverages and desserts, you know.
And it was just...
It was a little overwhelming for me.
[Richards] Tom's an eccentric.
The first time I met him,
he had a room full of instruments
of the most bizarre kinds.
He had a Mellotron, but it
only played train noises. [laughing]
[Richards laughs]
Yeah, there's a couple of spots.
I just lost the frame,
but I don't think it really matters,
'cause you can just, you know...
If it gets in the way, you can just
drift it off and then put it back up.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That first time, we'd been jamming for
an hour or so, and then,
I didn't even... You know...
And there were beverages involved.
I must admit, I was trying to match him,
which you must never try to ever do.
But... And so after an hour or so,
I was... I didn't know where I was.
And then, I say, "What did we just get?
What, do we have anything?"
And then, he says...
[hoarsely] "Scribe."
And then I realized I was the scribe.
I was supposed to be
keeping track of everything.
I'm the last leaf on the tree
Yeah, something like that.
I'm really happy to have been able
to write songs with him, actually.
Because it took me a long time
to realize that he never wrote songs
except with Kathleen, his wife,
you know.
And so, to me, it was a real...
I realized, a real privilege.
I'll be here through eternity
If you want to know how long
If they cut down this tree
I'll show up in a song
I'm the last leaf on the tree
And the autumn took the rest
But they won't take me
I'm the last leaf on the tree
I'm the last leaf on the tree
[playing chords on piano]
[Jordan] You know, we could strike that...
[man] You got "Love Overdue."
Could you talk about that track?
Hats off, yeah.
That was another tip of the hat to...
I've always loved that song
and Gregory Isaacs.
I love nearly all of Gregory's work.
There's a certain urgency about it,
a truth about it.
And so, we knew we were gonna do it.
"Let's do it." You know?
"Give me a reggae beat, Steve." You know?
Who's gonna hold and squeeze me tight
Now that she's gone out of my life
Who's gonna make me feel
the way she used to do
Now that my love is overdue
I've always loved reggae.
Basically, I happened
to start living in Jamaica
in '71, '72,
just as reggae was
catching fire, you know.
In fact, Catch a Fire had just
come out, Bob Marley, and...
Jimmy Cliff, The Harder They Come.
There was a whole explosion that year.
And I'm living there.
[all singing]
He's the alpha, he is our light
I don't need no candlelight
[Richards] It felt like the early days
of rock and roll.
I felt the same sort of energy and joy
and sense of discovery amongst people,
that they'd found their voice.
Rasta, me say love, love, love
Love, love, love, love, love
[Richards] Jamaica provided
an amazing burst of talent and energy.
It was very refreshing to me.
Yeah, yeah.
And, so, you're sort of back in
the beginning of something again.
[playing upbeat music]
What I really love about reggae,
it's all so...
natural, you know.
There's none of this forced stuff.
And at that time,
I was getting really sick of rock music.
Rock and roll, I never get sick of.
But there was less and less of that
and more rock music,
which is actually a white man's version.
It turns out to be like...
They'll turn it into a march, basically,
you know...
We are rockin', yeah!
Yeah, I mean, eventually, that's what...
That's their version of rock.
You know, it's like,
"Excuse me, I prefer the roll."
And that's when the cats,
the Jamaican guys, came in with the horns.
Luckily, Steve's very well connected.
[DeCurtis] Yes.
So, I was like, "What we need here is
a sort of Jamaican horn section."
Man, we need some more smoke.
Get some weed going in this, man.
-Come on, man.
-[Richards] I can do that.
-Yeah.
-[both laughing]
[Jordan] You got a red, black and green
scarf or something?
Can we get Keith's headband?
No, you're not going to dress me, man.
Okay, okay. I will.
[band playing upbeat music]
Whose voice is gonna say goodnight
Now that she's gone out of my sight
Who's gonna tell me lies
and let me think they're true?
And now that my love is overdue
Now that my love is overdue
[Richards chuckles]
[man] So, how did you start
recording solo in the first place?
I was very reluctant to start going solo.
I mean, my thing has always been
The Stones and you know...
You'd leave at your peril.
[laughs]
But things had...
Circumstances had worked out
in the late '80s, that, you know...
obviously, we were not going to...
Mick and I were not going to be
working together for a while.
I called 1985 to '89,
that was actually World War III.
In a 50-year relationship
doing this stuff,
of course, guys have fights,
brothers have fights.
You know, we're brothers.
There was no sign of The Stones, like,
poking their nose above the horizon.
And I was at, really, a loose end.
Suddenly, I get a call to do
the Chuck Berry movie,
Hail! Hail! Rock 'n' Roll.
I mean, obviously, I gotta get into this.
Life wouldn't be complete.
I mean, the circle would be unbroken.
[Berry] That slur is started right here.
[strumming guitar]
Starts on the upper one.
Listen.
All right.
[man] Was he grateful that you guys
were taking the stage?
Chuck... Chuck has his own way
of showing appreciation.
[laughing]
-Why it was being done?
-[Richards] Yeah.
Well, don't touch my amp.
Then it won't be done.
He already said he didn't.
-Well, he says why it's being done.
-[man] All right.
Why it's being done
is because it's not recording well.
[Berry] Okay.
And that's what's gonna
end up on the film.
If it winds up on the film,
that's the way Chuck Berry plays it.
You understand?
-I understand, man. I understand.
-Well, I was talking to Andy about it.
But you've got to live with it afterwards.
They're trying to--
I've been living for 60 years with it!
-I know that. I know that.
-Okay, well, then realize it!
But this is going to be here
after we're all dead and gone.
I was in his dressing room...
and the guitar case was open,
guitar was lying there.
So, I was waiting for him. They said,
you know, "He's coming in a minute."
So, I was just leaning over
and I was just touching the strings.
He came in and slammed me.
[laughs]
That was Chuck...
One of Chuck's greatest hits.
-[band playing "Nadine"]
-[audience cheering]
I saw her from the corner
when she turned and doubled back
And started walkin' toward
a coffee-colored Cadillac
Pushin' through the crowd
trying to get to where she's at
Campaign shouting
like a southern diplomat
Nadine
Is that you?
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa
Nadine
Is that you?
Every time I see you,
you've got something else to do
[Richards] No problems
could really interfere
with the fact that this was just fun.
[audience cheering]
[Richards] And that's where I started
to work with Steve Jordan.
Steve and I were just like,
"We're in rock and roll heaven."
[audience cheering]
One...
One word from Keith Richards!
Goodnight, ladies and gentlemen.
Tonight's star.
[Richards] Suddenly, I've got this
incredible band together.
Hand for the band!
[Richards] And Steve and I find it
quite natural to write songs.
We said, "Well, let's..."
You know, "Here, let's cut some stuff."
Ladies and gentlemen, Keith Richards.
[audience cheering]
Giving up lovin'
It's easy to do
People so pitiful
[Waddy Wachtel] When Keith and I
first started to play together,
I knew we were simpatico just by hearing
what he had done all the years
and hearing the hands
touching those strings.
But, yeah, we bonded
pretty extremely, right away.
You shouldn't take it so hard
Yeah
[Richards] In a way, I thought, "Okay,
obviously, I'm supposed to do this,"
because it was organic.
You'd think one great band in a lifetime
is already a miracle.
To put two together,
I mean, it's weird, in a way.
I also understood more of Mick's job...
by being the frontman.
You shouldn't take it so hard
Yeah
You shouldn't take it so hard
Yeah
You shouldn't take it so hard
Yeah
[audience cheering]
[Richards] To be right on top
of everything,
from the first note till the end,
gave me a bit of discipline, actually,
I probably sorely needed.
[laughs]
But working outside of The Stones,
I realized that The Stones,
that's my home.
We set them up and gave 'em to people,
and now we belong to the people.
And I can't let them down.
[crowd cheering]
[reporter 1] The Rolling Stones are back
on their first tour in almost a decade.
[reporter 2] This will be their 13th
major US tour since 1964.
[reporter 3] The Rolling Stones launched
their Bigger Bang world tour last night,
with dates in Canada, the US,
South America, Europe, and Asia.
[Richards] About 2007, The Stones had been
on the road for a long time.
And we'd come to a natural gasper,
you know, like...
[exhales sharply]
And it occurred to me,
maybe this is the time to do a book.
I didn't really take it that seriously
to start with.
But as it went on, I understood that...
I know who I am and people who know me
know basically who I am.
But I realize that 999 of them out there
still think Keith Richards is
smoking a joint, bottle of Jack Daniel's
in his hand, like, walking down the road,
you know, cursing the fact that
the liquor store is closed.
An image, man.
Image like a ball and chain.
It's not like a shadow,
because it's there 24/24.
When the sun goes down,
it don't disappear.
[playing guitar]
[Waits] A lot of this
has to do with persona.
You have to have some type of armor
so that you can continue to also develop
as a human being, you know.
It's like you have a recipe,
and you have a beverage,
and you have a...
a sandwich named after you, pretty much.
It's like, what it comes down to, right?
But you're still able within,
inside that...
you're able to still grow and change.
It's kind of a ventriloquist act
a lot of the time, you know.
But it's much safer than
putting your own ass out there,
like Judy Garland, you know,
and melting every night.
[Richards] You can't buy a persona.
You can either make it up,
or you can be it.
My idea of actual heaven is to be a
rock and roll star that nobody ever sees.
[laughing] Totally anonymous.
You know, you gotta go out
and do this thing sometimes.
And so after the book came out,
the next thing I knew,
Steve came to me and said...
"Let's get away from the chicks."
[imitates playing guitar]
And then he's like, "Say we're working,
you know what I mean?"
There's fates of rock and roll, you know.
And to do that,
you eyeball each other and say...
"One, two... let's go!"
[playing rock and roll music]
This is what rock and roll is about.
You feel like you're levitating.
And when all of the guys around you
are playing, and you're saying,
"They're feeling it too.
I know it, I know it."
And you go for those moments
where you actually, you know, fly.
And you just hang on to it
as long as you can,
because it is one of
the best feelings in the world.
It may be only rock and roll, but...
I'm telling you what...
that's the shit.
["Mannish Boy" playing]
Now when I was a young boy
At the age of five
Of all of the people I have ever met,
Muddy Waters, he was a father to me.
[man] Yeah, that's right!
[Waters] What about Keith?
[Richards] He took me under his wing.
It was just amazing
to finally play together.
Was I honored by that?
Man, I had died and gone to heaven.
- I have lots of fun
-Yeah!
I'm a man
Yeah!
I spell "M"
"A," child
"N"
That represents "man"
For the first time ever...
A Stones' show,
"What are you gonna wear?"
"We don't give a shit,"
you know what I mean?
For the Checkerboard show, Ronnie and I
were like, "What are we gonna wear, man?"
"White shirts, black vests." You know?
[laughs]
We actually talked about what
we were gonna wear before we go on.
This is the only time, ever,
I can remember doing that.
The line I shoot
Hell, I'll never miss
When I make love to a woman
She can't resist
I think I'll go down
To old Kansas Stew
I'm gonna bring back the second cousin
- That little Johnny Cocheroo
-Yeah, baby!
All you little girls
Sittin' at that line
I can make love to you, baby
In five minutes' time
[mouthing]
Ain't that a man?
Yes, man
I spell "M"
[Jagger] Yeah!
"A," child
"N"
Oh, man.
[Richards] Muddy's house.
[chuckles]
Wow. You would've thought Chicago could do
something more for the man, you know?
It was a lot more vibrant
the last time I was here.
It was a party.
I mean, it was night time.
I think Willie Dixon brought me over.
It was rocking when I got here,
I remember that.
It's leaving I don't remember.
I crashed out here.
But I woke up in Howlin' Wolf's house.
I don't know what happened.
I got carried away.
The party continued, and I went with it.
-[Richards laughing]
-[crowd cheering]
[Waters] Get Mickey a towel, will ya?
Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen.
We'll keep the show moving.
Mr. Muddy Waters! Give it to him!
Give it to Mr. Muddy Waters.
[man] You know, Muddy was younger
then than you are now.
I mean, it seems like you,
when you were young,
kind of wanted to be one of those guys.
And now, in a way,
you kind of are one of those guys.
Yeah, I know.
Life's a funny thing, you know.
And nobody wants to get old,
but they don't wanna die young either.
You know, and you just gotta follow
this thing down the path, you know.
Well, Irene, good night
Irene
Irene, good night
After I left home,
my dad and my mother split up.
And then I lost touch
with my dad for 20 years.
I'll see you in my dreams
Maybe, 'cause I was thinking about,
"God, what he must've thought of me?"
I mean, he was a straight-up guy.
I mean, a hardworking man and all that.
You know, I mean, the idea of his son
being busted for drugs.
I could think of him saying...
"Well, he'd never come to any good."
Sometimes I take that great notion
To jump in that river and drown
After about 20 years,
I wrote him a note and got one back.
And we set up a meeting
at my house in England.
I took Ronnie Wood with me for protection.
That's how scared I was.
The door opens and
out comes out this little old guy.
You know, his legs have gone a bit
and he's like...
But it was Dad, you know, and it was...
It was so easy. Within a few minutes,
we sorted it all well out.
And he became, for the next 20 years,
my best mate.
For another 20 years,
he came on every trip, every show,
come around the world with me.
And I loved to show him the world.
And he didn't mind seeing it either.
[inaudible]
Oh. [chuckles]
Poor old boy.
He's older than I am.
Right, babe?
So, Irene, goodnight
My family, they're incredibly important,
you know.
When you see offspring of offspring,
then something else hits home.
I mean, it's one thing having a kid.
But when you get the grandsons
and the granddaughters,
well, that is...
that's an amazing feeling.
I don't know of what. Accomplishment?
I don't know. Or continuity?
But basically, love.
Goodnight, Irene
Goodnight, Irene
I'll see you in my dreams
[Richards] I've been blessed, man.
I'll play as long
as I can get away with it.
And that's all I can do.
I'm not getting old.
I'm evolving.
[singers vocalizing]
[upbeat music playing]
[indistinct chatter and laughter]
[man 1] Right on.
-Right on.
-[man 2] That was a fine piece of work.
[Richards] Once again, Larry,
great to see you, man.
[man 3] All right.
[man 4] Oh, yeah. I like this stuff.
[man 5] Yeah, balls to the walls,
gentlemen.
[Richards laughing]
But I've always thought 30 was about it.
Beyond that would be
horrible to be alive.
Until I got to be 31.
Then, "Why, I ain't so shabby," you know.
[laughs]
"I'll hang in a while."
As you go along, you realize that
this whole concept of growing up is...
You're not grown up until the day
they put you six feet under.
You're never grown up.
["Blue and Lonesome" playing]
I'm blue and lonesome
As a man can be
I'm blue and lonesome
Whoa-oh
As a man can be
You don't get bluer than that.
Man, that's bad stuff.
I don't have headaches over myself
[Richards] The power of the blues
was a mind blower.
My love is gone away from me
Anybody who could make a sound like that
is all right with me.
[chuckles] You know what I mean?
For me, music is like
the center of everything.
It's something that binds people together
through centuries, through millennium.
It's undefinable.
And nobody's ever
going to have the answer to it,
but it's great fun exploring.
[Richards chuckles]
-Anthony, how are you?
-How are you?
-[Richards] Cool, man.
-Once again.
Once more into the breach.
[Richards] How you been, Anthony?
-I'm very well, thank you.
-Yeah.
So, Keith, I've been enjoying
your new music.
Why don't you tell me a little bit
about getting it going?
You know, what made you
decide to jump back in?
I've been thinking about that.
You know,
I think it coincided with the fact
that I was doing the book, you know...
-Second only to the Bible.
-[both chuckle]
You know...
And The Stones had one of their...
where they suddenly go into hibernation
for about five years.
'Cause we... The Stones had been
working a lot until about 2007.
And I was kind of itching
to get back in the studio.
I love recording, you see.
Any studio,
I feel totally at home there.
Everywhere else, you know, is, you know...
there's the bags.
[Steve Jordan] Should we get
another mic in there?
-Or should we just move the ribbon closer?
-[Richards] No, listen...
Play a couple things.
[guitar playing]
That's better, right?
[Richards] And the next thing I know,
Steve Jordan came to me, and he said,
"How about just the two of us
go in the studio,
you know, just you and me,
and we'll cut a couple of tracks?
Just, you know, see what happens."
[Jordan] He said something
and it was kind of shocking.
And I asked him
never to say that again.
He said, "Well, you know,
I've done all of this...
and now the book and everything."
He hadn't been playing.
And he was like, "You know, maybe
I should, like, retire," kinda thing.
-Yeah.
-At which I completely freaked out.
[laughing] I said,
"What are you talking about?"
I was talking in my sleep.
I said,
"What are you talking about?"
[man 1] Can you get it? Yeah.
[man 2] Yep.
[man 1] Yeah, it's a little boomy.
[man 2] Uh-huh.
[Tom Waits] Musically, what I noticed
about Keith, is he's really big on detail.
And you have to be if you're...
an archeologist and you're,
you know...
You insist on locality data, you know.
Not only where something came from,
but what are the principles
and the properties of it.
And he...
He's like a... like a London cabbie
who has The Knowledge.
-[man] Yeah, yeah.
-Only he has that in music, you know.
[Richards] I realized,
as I was doing this stuff,
how much steeped I am
in American folk music,
in jazz and blues.
That's the stuff that America
has given the rest of the world.
You know, far bigger than H-bombs.
[chuckles]
I love my sugar
But I love my honey, too
I'm a greedy motherfucker
And I don't know what to do
I've got a crosseyed heart
[Richards] Crosseyed Heart, I'm doing
a lot of the tipping of the hat to people.
And this was to Robert Johnson.
Ooh, she's so sweet
And she drives me
round the bend
I go in the corner, baby
And find another friend
I got a crosseyed heart
[Richards] I grew up listening
basically to American music,
even though I was in England.
And through that,
I guess I realized that an awful lot
of American music, blues included,
relied a lot upon old Celtic melodies,
Irish, Scottish, English, Welsh,
that became part of this country,
you know.
So to me, it was translatable easily.
When I first heard
Robert Johnson and Lead Belly,
and I'm hearing an echo...
You know, I'm hearing...
In my bones, I'm hearing
an echo that I shouldn't be hearing
because it's not within earshot.
Which is one of the reasons
I wanted to start this thing off
with the blues, you know.
I mean, I ain't a pop star no more,
you know.
I don't wanna be.
[laughs]
See, I swore... You know,
I thought it was in E, for Christ's sake.
I mean, I swore...
I would have gone to the grave saying
that I played this in E, man, until today.
[radio tuning]
[Richards] My mum was a beautiful
music freak with incredible taste.
We only had, like, two radio stations
in the whole country, you know.
And she was a wizard of the dial.
If there was anything worth listening to,
she would find it.
[jazz playing on radio]
Sarah Vaughan and Ella Fitzgerald
were her two top thrushes.
[laughs]
I liked Billie Holiday.
Billie had more edge on it for me.
But still, that's what I grew up with.
You know what I mean?
Louis Armstrong...
Billy Eckstine...
and a little dash of Mozart
here and there.
And then all the usual rubbish.
Whatever they played on radio.
You know, the stuff
you couldn't avoid, you know.
I'm a pink toothbrush
You're a blue toothbrush
[man singing]
You're a pink toothbrush
And I think, toothbrush,
that we met by the bathroom door
[Richards] All of that crap, you know?
I mean, the '50s,
which is, all right,
great rubbish, in retrospect.
Growing up in England,
just after the war,
there was rubble everywhere.
I was not aware that there was any
other world apart from bombed out ruins.
["Baby Let's Play House" playing]
And then, suddenly, Elvis.
He hit like a bombshell.
"Baby Let's Play House" was around then,
and it really cooked me.
The world went from black-and-white
to Technicolor.
Well, you may go to college
You may go to school
You may have a pink Cadillac
But don't you be nobody's fool
Now baby, come back, baby, come
Come back, baby,
I wanna play house with you
[Richards] America looked very attractive.
[laughs]
All the movies.
We got what you guys saw,
like, a year before.
Especially if you're into music.
That was basically our lifeline
in those days,
that sense of,
there's something happening,
and you just wanna
be part of it, you know,
and you jumped in with both feet.
At least, I did.
Come back, baby,
I wanna play house with you
[playing gentle melody]
[Richards] Jim Hall.
[Jordan] We love Jim Hall.
-Jim, motherfucker.
-[laughs]
[Richards] My grandfather, Gus,
he kinda teased me, man,
over years, into becoming a guitarist.
He was one of those guys
that always thought
everybody was a musician
if they got the chance to be and...
So I think he just left
the instruments lying about
just to see if it caught the eye.
And then he probably watched me
for a couple of years, you know,
talking to him
and looking at the guitar and...
'Cause I remember him saying,
"It's a pretty one, isn't it?
It's nice, that.
Yeah, when you can reach it...
I'll let you play it," you know.
Once he did give me the guitar,
he said the best exercise
is the Spanish malaguena,
because it's got a lot of moves in it
that make it great for the fingers.
[playing malaguena]
You're expanding yourself
without even knowing.
And he was quite right,
because, you know, from learning that...
'Cause I had to learn that
in order to get the guitar, you know.
I mean...
That meant I could walk into the house,
pick up the guitar and play with it.
Until then, it would have to be
at invitation only.
-[man] The story with the guitar...
-Oh, it's a...
It's a late '50s Gibson ES-355.
So, kind of a hot rod.
He's always been known
for playing a black Gibson.
For me, it looks like Keith.
And as I just showed you,
when I opened the case,
he said, "I'll have it." He didn't...
Nope. Just... He knew right away.
I've been working with Keith
now since the '80s.
I have full access to his guitar lockers
and can do what I want.
I do often get to see guitars
and bring them to him.
This is what Robert Johnson
would have played, the model and year.
This is a 1928 L-1 Gibson, you know.
And the scale length and the flat neck
and the width of the nut...
It was a style of playing.
So you can do
the finger style blues on this.
It almost takes you there.
It makes you play that way.
The notes last
the right amount of time.
The balance between the high strings
and what's going on
in the low-end, the snap...
In the locker, unfinished project.
National Guitar, right here,
in my inventory book of Keith's guitars.
It says here,
"To be rebuilt and then maybe used."
And I wrote a note,
"Kinda reminds me of Jimmy Reed."
Dig it out, put some strings on it.
And sometimes
I pick up an instrument
and the sound
will take you to a different place.
It's like a flavor.
Steve and Keith walk in.
They think we're doing something else.
We open the case.
Keith looks at it, "Oh, great. Hmm."
"Check this out, Keith.
This has been yours
since before I worked for you.
It's never had strings on it.
I found it in the locker,
I put strings on it."
Next thing you know,
he's out there trying it.
Steve's like, "Okay, if he's in, I'm in."
They start playing, but the control room
is set for, you know...
for a mix or something.
There's no mic set.
People aren't ready for this.
["Blues in the Morning" playing]
"Blues in the Morning,"
that feeling...
That was just him picking up the guitar.
There was no second takes, no other tries.
It was just where we were going.
[Richards singing]
Got the blues in the morning
I feel that's far too long
Got the blues in the morning
My baby
It's still too long
It's hardcore, baby
but I gotta sing this song
[Richards] To us, in England,
people like Mick and myself
and many others...
Chuck arrived...
At the time, we were starving for music.
The way that man hit us...
I'm still recovering.
Incredible lyrics,
an incredible devil-may-care attitude.
He's influenced just about
every guitar player,
even if they don't know it.
You know, I mean...
not a lot of guys wanna play like Chuck
because it's like taking on the devil.
I'll take it on, you know.
[laughs]
Yeah, this is the beginning
of the Rolling Stones, you know.
Yeah, and I'm holding
a full deck here, pals.
That was the one
Mick had on the train, you know.
I got on my morning train
to go to art school.
I happened to hit the carriage
that Mick had just gotten into,
and I hadn't seen him in years.
And then I noticed,
tucked under his arm, like this, was...
"Oh, yeah. Get out of here.
Chuck Berry...
What you got there, man?"
And then I said, "Come here!"
You know, I thought
I was the only other guy in...
you know, in the southeast of England
that even knew anything
about this stuff, you know, and...
So, I mean, by the time
we got off the train, you know,
we've made a deal, you know.
I'm gonna... [chuckles]
And that's how The Stones hooked,
because of these very two records.
And that's it.
Muddy, I had only heard, you know,
very few tracks of at the time.
So this was a mind blower
to me, you know.
[Muddy Waters singing]
I don't want you to be no slave
I don't want you to work all day
I don't want you to be true
I just want to make love to you
[Richards] When I first heard
The Best of Muddy Waters,
it was the most powerful music
I'd ever heard.
The most expressive.
And I had listened to Mozart and,
you know, I had listened to Beethoven.
This is on a par
with the best music in the world.
The Stones, in their early days,
all we wanted to do
was to turn other people on to this.
[Mick Jagger singing]
I don't want you to be no slave
I don't want you to work all day
I don't want you to be true
I just wanna make love to you, baby
[Richards] We knew we're never gonna
be able to play it like Muddy.
So let's just, like, juke it up.
We sped it up, we did it real fast.
And everybody got into it.
I can see by the way that,
baby, you talk
And I know by the way
that you treat your man
I could love you, baby,
it's a cryin' shame
I don't want you to cook my bread
[Richards] We've never wanted
to make pop music.
Our puritanical mission
was to turn other people on to the blues.
At the same time, we realized
that we turned America
back on to its own music,
which was, like, far beyond the agenda.
[laughs]
I wanna make love to you
[audience clapping and cheering]
The Rolling Stones.
Aren't they great?
[audience laughing]
Unbelievable.
-[Richards] Hey, guys.
-What's up, boss?
How are you guys?
How're we doing?
-Alright?
-Thank you, Keith.
Awesome.
-How you doing?
-Great show the other...
-I'm doing fabulous.
-Yes, sir. Great show.
-Alright. Yeah, yeah.
-Great book, brother.
Cool, brother.
How you doing, Keith?
-We're doing alright, man.
-Good.
-Right on. Thank you.
-We're all alright, you know.
[Richards] On the road, I feel at home.
Being backstage or being onstage,
you know, it's... familiar.
[man] Thank you.
[Richards] There you go, pal.
-Okay.
-[woman] Can I get a high five?
Hi, baby. [laughs]
I left home at 17
in a cloud of disgrace,
without getting, you know,
my dad's okay.
And so the road became
a second home to me, you know.
[man 1] You brought the sun out.
[man 2] Ronnie, how are you?
[Richards] And I'm looking forward
still to some great gigs.
I mean, I really enjoyed
playing in the heartland.
They're the places we used to drive around
in the station wagon 50 years ago.
[laughs]
["It's All Over Now" playing]
America is the biggest market
in the goddamn world.
It was a fucking crowning glory
to break there.
Well, baby used to stay out
all night long
She made me cry, she done me wrong
She hurt my eyes open, that's no lie
[Richards] I was amazed
by the warmth of the welcome.
Especially with the first hit
being New York City.
Because I used to love her,
but it's all over now
[Richards] I mean, the buildings,
the feel and the smell of the place.
But it's all over now
[Richards] That night, I remember
writing to my mum there,
"Mum, I'm in New York City.
I'll tell you more later."
[laughs]
She spent all my money,
playing her high class game
[Richards] God knows what
they were expecting.
In some places, I mean...
I do remember The Stones being arrested
for topless bathing in Georgia
at a Holiday Inn swimming pool,
which was in sight of this highway.
And some freaked out locals thought,
because of the hair,
that there was a load of chicks
jumping in the pool, naked, you know...
So the cop car drives up to the pool.
[laughing]
We're looking at them,
the cops are looking at us, you know,
and it was like culture shock.
In those days, if you went
further south than Washington,
it was a different kind of America then.
It was still strictly segregated.
You'd pull in to a joint, a whole bus
of us, black and white, all mixed...
Anyway, you'd pull over
and dying for a pee.
So I'd join in with the brothers,
and then they'd laugh at me
and point above the door,
and it said "Colored only."
I asked them,
"And where am I supposed to go?" you know.
And they said, "Try the bushes"
or, "The white men's around the corner."
But there were plenty of signs of it,
yeah. Chain gangs, too. Yeah.
To get the last taste of that bullshit
was amazing to behold.
But I think that black America sort of
took us a little more to their hearts
because we were different.
And we had no contact with the problems
that they usually had with white people.
[blues guitar playing]
[indistinct chatter]
Now that's the shit.
-[Jordan] You're gonna do it?
-Only if you want me to.
But there's a Les Paul Jr. behind you.
[Waits] When you walk into his studio...
He says his first home is the stage.
I think his second home
would be the studio.
So that's where you
have to really start listening.
[Jordan] We're not...
We're not using any of this.
[Waits] Everybody's tuning up
and you know,
that's when things
start to really happen,
uh, because no one thinks it's music yet.
Yeah, it's like an orchestra
tuning up, you know. It's thrilling.
Because it's a piece of music
they will never play again,
and no one called it that.
[playing blues music]
Yeah, you don't wanna be looking
at the frame and then realize
that the most interesting thing
going on in the frame
is happening outside of the frame.
[blues music continues]
[Richards] Living in England, all you knew
about Chicago was Al Capone.
And then I found out that there's
something about the stock markets...
and I mean, meat.
[chuckling] I mean, the cattle yards.
The next time
I really thought about Chicago
is when I heard the blues coming out of
this building we're just about to bypass.
Chess Records,
2120 South Michigan.
We recorded there in '64.
It was a magical room, sound-wise.
How many addresses I've forgotten,
that one I'll never forget, you know.
We arrived at Chess Studios.
Somebody's walking us
through the corridor,
and there's a black guy
on a ladder painting the ceiling.
As we pass by,
the engineer from Chess said,
"Oh, by the way,
this is Mr. Muddy Waters."
So this is my first meeting.
I'm shaking hands with Muddy Waters
who's got whitewash dripping.
[muttering]
And he just said...
"Thank you for what you guys are doing."
I had to digest the image later.
I mean, I'm shocked on a personal level
to have met the very man
who I've been listening to
and trying to fathom out.
It said a lot about black and white.
[laughs]
But that's what
I always said about Muddy.
He was a gentleman
in no matter what position you found him.
Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf,
Bo Diddley, Buddy Guy...
All these guys were out in Chicago
recording in the same studios.
And everybody is like, "What do you
wanna go to Chicago for?"
Hey, there's a reason.
[Buddy Guy] One, two, three.
[band playing "Let Me Love You Baby"]
[inaudible]
Well, now, baby when you walk
You know you shake like a willow tree
Well, now, baby when you walk
You know, you shake
just like a willow tree
Well, it's a girl like you
I would love to make a fool of me
How are you doing, Buddy?
-You wanna get a drink?
-Yeah.
-You drink corn liquor?
-Yeah.
Wait a minute.
-I could have them set you up.
-Yeah.
[bartender] All right,
white lightning coming at ya.
All right.
[both chuckle]
It's got a kick, man.
[Guy] Well, you go first.
You go first, then I'll...
There we go.
I gotta shoot on that one, right?
[Richards] Whoa.
[Guy] I think I can make this one, Keith.
-[laughs]
-Then I scratch.
[both laughing]
[Guy] Came here September the 25th, 1957.
They had a thousand blues clubs.
Some of them didn't hold but 22 people.
Hardly wasn't no air-conditioning
this time of year,
and they kept the doors open
so if you walked by,
you would hear these harmonicas and drums.
And I found out that,
if you played good,
you got a good drunk,
and you got a good-looking woman
if you sounded all right.
[both laugh]
[Guy] Yes, sir.
[Richards] Yep.
I don't know if you remember there was
a television show here called Shindig.
And they was trying to get you on...
[Richards] Yeah, Howlin' Wolf
was in there.
Yeah, they was trying to get you all
to play it. And Mick said...
They said... I think Mick said,
"Let us bring Muddy Waters."
And they said,
"Who in the hell is Muddy Waters?"
And he said, "You mean to tell me
you don't know who Muddy Waters is?
We named ourselves after one
of his famed records, Rollin' Stone."
And I even cried about that, man.
And sure enough,
that's when they brought
Howlin' Wolf and Muddy.
And that's the first time
I'd ever seen 'em on television.
It was thanks to these people here, man.
Tell us something about him, Brian.
Well, when we first
started playing together,
we started playing because
we wanted to play rhythm and blues.
And Howlin' Wolf
was one of our greatest idols.
And it's a great pleasure to find
he's been booked on this show tonight.
-Really is a pleasure.
-Thanks to Howlin'.
So I think it's about time
that you shut up
-and we had Howlin' Wolf on stage.
-[host] Yeah! I agree.
Okay! Let's get him on.
Howlin' Wolf! Bring him up.
[audience cheering]
How many more years
Have I got to let you dog me around?
How many more years
Have I got to let you dog me around?
I would rather be dead
Sleeping six feet in the ground
[Richards] I knew him very well.
Chester, I think, was his real name.
Big man. The gentle giant.
When you're that big and intimidating,
you don't really have to do
anything about it.
You know what I mean?
[chuckles]
These guys were gentlemen
in the true meaning of the word.
I mean, I've no doubt
they could be as mean as, you know...
And I didn't wanna know.
But there was
an innate politeness about them.
They were in awe
that we'd even heard of them.
And we were in awe
of meeting them.
And so you have this
mutual appreciation society going on,
which still goes on to this day.
[Guy] Ah! There you go!
I used to go into Chess
and try to turn my amplifier up, out loud,
and they would run me out saying,
"Don't nobody wanna hear that."
But when they started playing
and it got back to Leonard, he said,
"The British are playing it,
and it's getting over."
So I turned my amp up
like these British guys.
Do you have to live that life
to be a blues player?
Do you have to be black or white
to play the blues?
Hell no, man!
The bottom line,
it's about the good and the bad times.
And if you haven't had a bad time in life,
just keep living.
[Richards] All right.
[Richards] Oh.
Oh...
-[Guy laughing] I give up, man.
-[Richards laughing]
All right. All right.
Ah, that's where I left it.
[playing piano]
Why did I bother to play piano?
A guy called Ian Stewart, you know.
He started The Stones,
and he was one of the best
boogie pianists I had heard.
I mean, especially in England.
There was one thing he played.
I said, "Look,
I gotta learn how to do that."
Just show me, you know,
just the basics.
[playing piano]
For me, in the right mood,
and at the right instrument,
there's a certain feeling
of being an antenna,
receiving and then transmitting.
I'll sit down at the piano
and pick up the guitar
and happily play
Buddy Holly or Otis Redding.
And then, somewhere,
with a bit of luck,
you realize that something
you'd thought that you'd played wrong
was actually...
a start of a whole different song.
I said, "I gotta learn this, man."
I wrote a lot of stuff on piano.
I wrote "Let's Spend The Night Together,"
"Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby,"
but I don't consider
myself a piano player.
I use it as a paint box,
you know, just to...
A touch here, a touch there.
Usually just the right hand.
[laughs]
She, she's got a mind of her own
And she use it well
Actually, I piss about a lot.
And then it's...
And it's like, whatever strikes me.
But I've always loved playing the piano.
I think one of the reasons...
Being a guitar player, you know, your
instrument is in a strange, you know...
a different position.
But the piano, to me,
it's, like, laid out like a chess game.
[playing "Sing Me Back Home"]
-See, I love my country shit.
-[man chuckles]
Oh, won't you sing me back home?
To the songs my mama sang
Make my old memories come alive
Please take me away
Yeah, turn back all those years
Sing me back home before
I die
See, country music...
I was listening to Porter Wagoner
in 1953, man. I mean, yeah,
Johnny Cash, Hank Williams...
We didn't get a lot of it in England,
but, yeah, well aware of it.
My mother made sure of that.
Country music, I mean, to me,
I heard stories
that you're never quite sure,
you know, how nasty it can get.
Someone stole some money
Who it is,
it ain't quite clear
Stolen from my honey
She holds my stash 'round here
The cops, you know
I can't involve them
They'd only interfere
So I hit the usual suspects
But I drew a blank round here
I'm robbed blind
Robbed blind
[song continues]
Beautiful woodwork.
The boards, the hallowed boards, yeah.
[Richards] I've only played here once,
with Willie Nelson.
It was built as a church.
And now it's a temple to country music.
What's the difference, you know?
We all come here to worship
and pray to the best, you know.
And God knows everybody's been on here.
I first heard country music
on a pirate radio station.
[Marty Robbins singing]
Out in the West Texas town of El Paso
I fell in love with a Mexican girl
[radio stations switching]
[Richards] Reception was dodgy.
That required a lot of maneuvering
around the room
with the antenna, you know?
[laughs]
But country music immediately, like,
pulled chimes within me, you know.
I mean, it was the melodies, I think,
and also the guitars, you know.
You know, that pedal steel's
a heartbreaker, man.
Sometimes the songs are really dopey.
But then sometimes the dopiest song
would have the best melody.
And at the same time
there was a certain edge on certain guys.
Hank Williams, particularly.
You measure country music
by this cat.
[Hank Williams singing]
Hear that lonesome whip-poor-will
He sounds too blue to fly
[Richards] Hank Williams, Johnny Cash,
Merle Haggard...
They were pretty tough guys.
The reality of country music
on the road is something else.
Rock and roll's got nothing on those guys.
The Stones once turned up at a Holiday Inn
in Fresno, something like that.
And there's this
smell of paint everywhere.
They go, "There's your room."
And, "What's going on?"
And they said, "Well...
[chuckling] Johnny Cash and Luther Perkins
were here two nights ago
and painted the whole damn room orange.
Drapes and all," he says.
If I'd have known,
I would've brought some paint cleaner.
I'm so lonesome I could cry
[man] You never had
any Nudie suits, did you?
[Richards] I'll tell you what,
Gram Parsons used to
pass his cast-offs to me, yeah.
I did have one of Gram's Nudie suits.
It was made by a tailor in
San Fernando Valley called Nudie.
We used to go around there, yeah.
What a madman.
[laughs]
Gram Parsons taught me so much about
this mystique of the "country."
I was very much drawn to him,
and he was the big influence.
[man singing]
She's a devil in disguise
You can see it in her eyes
She's telling dirty lies
She's a devil in disguise
[Richards] Gram hung with us
when we were cutting
Exile On Main Street and "Wild Horses."
Meeting Gram,
I got fully immersed in country music.
But as much as he was a country boy
and loved his country music,
his idea of America
was very bizarre, you know?
And, uh...
So, I said, "That's bizarre."
And he said,
"You wanna see how bizarre? Look at this."
This guy has got longhorns
on the end of his Cadillac.
So, to me, all of this temple for
a Stetson and some rhinestones is like...
But that says the other side
of what country music is about.
It's the razzle-dazzle.
It's Colonel Parker
and the dancing chickens.
Me, I didn't see the Stetson
and the rhinestones.
I just heard the music.
And I always knew
that this is the heartland.
This is where American music
was put in the crucible
and came out as, you know,
pretty much pure silver.
["Sweet Virginia" playing]
This was rock and roll.
That's where country music
and the blues sort of collided.
I always felt myself fortunate
to be in a spot where, in America,
these few forms of music
were somehow merging
and creating something else, you know?
So, it was great to watch
and be a part of,
and now be the king of.
[laughs]
[Jagger singing]
Wadin' through the waste stormy winter
And there's not a friend
to help you through
Tryin' to stop the waves
behind your eyeballs
Drop your reds
Drop your greens and blues
But come on,
come on down, Sweet Virginia
Got to scrape the shit
right off your shoes
And you find yourself
on the streets again
That was it. Yeah, all right.
Mind you, I don't go around searching
for songs, you know, with a butterfly net.
Because I think, basically,
songs have to come to you.
You know, going around, like, trying
to winkle them out with a sharp stick,
going, "Come here,
you little son-of-a-bitch."
Just because you find yourself
on the streets again
That don't mean I'm
That I'm just your friend
Baby, trouble is your middle name
I wrote a sort of country song,
roaming around the hallways of this house.
And it's not often, my old lady
suddenly came out of the bedroom,
and looked over and said,
"That's a good song."
Hey, if the wife says so...
It was very Hank Williams.
And then I thought,
"No, it's too Hank Williams.
Let's give it a kick. Let's push it up."
[band playing "Trouble"]
Just because you find yourself
Off the streets again
And I loved working with the drummer.
It's a one-on-one thing.
And it's an amazingly
uncomplicated way to deal with...
Especially playing rock and roll.
And the other thing, too,
I mean, just as a fan...
I love the way he plays bass.
[playing "Trouble" bassline]
[Jordan] That was very exciting for me,
to have Keith play
as many instruments as possible.
Because those are some of
my favorite Stones records,
when he played the bass
and all the guitars.
[Richards] I've done some bass tracks
in my time. I do love playing bass.
I'm probably a better bass player
than I am guitar, actually. [laughs]
-[man] Look at you!
-I love this shit. I love this shit.
Well, that goes back to
Steve Jordan saying to me,
"Hey, man," you know, in his
sweet, shy, unassuming manner...
Um...
He went,
"How did you cut 'Jumpin' Jack Flash'?"
You know?
"How did you cut 'Street Fighting Man'?"
In those days, you know, you'd say,
roughly, what time you're, you know,
"What time at the studio?"
You can say 8:00 or 9:00
in the evening, you know,
and the band would turn up
around midnight.
[laughs] You know.
Sometimes I would deliberately
go in early, you know, and...
Or if, you know, I was with Charlie,
for instance, I would say,
"Let's go in early and..."
And, basically, I'd go in just to
sort of chop a few ideas about.
But now and again,
you'd actually find out this is the track.
[Richards on recording] One, two.
One, two, three, four.
["Street Fighting Man" playing]
"Street Fighting Man," I think,
was the first one that occurred that way.
Charlie and I were just fiddling about.
And, in there, it sounds like
a couple of people busking, you know.
Charlie's playing this tiny,
little traveling drum kit,
and I'm playing an acoustic, you know.
"Yeah, well, let's just build up on it."
There's not an electric guitar
on that one, no.
It's all overloaded acoustics.
I realized that I could use
a cassette machine basically as a pick-up.
And I play an acoustic guitar through it
and, like, slam it through so loud
that it was totally overloaded.
The 1967 Norelco, the same one that
you would carry around with you. Found it.
Again. Play.
[playing "Street Fighting Man" riff]
That's as much as you're gonna get.
Let's see what comes out. [chuckles]
[tape recorder playing]
Then they'd put a microphone on that
and put it into the studio.
Basically, you have an electric guitar,
but with the feel of an acoustic.
[Richards on tape] That's as much
as you're gonna get.
[laughs]
[Richards] Basically starts there,
and Mick would finish it off.
[Jagger singing] Hey!
Said my name is called disturbance
I'll shout, I'll scream,
I'll kill the king
I'll rail at all his servants
Well, what can a poor boy do
Except to sing
for a rock and roll band
'Cause in sleepy London town
There's just no place
for a street fighting man
No
[Richards] We were working
so hard in those days
that you couldn't write 'em fast enough.
I'll throw the bass on and,
you know, put another guitar on,
and we sort of finished
the track in two hours.
But sometimes, you never know.
You're in a recording, you can go in there
with everything sort of planned...
and it just doesn't click.
[indistinct chatter]
[Richards] "Sympathy"
was a whole different set-up.
I think that was a good 35 takes.
I was around when Jesus Christ
Had his moment of doubt and pain
[man] Sounds really good together.
[Richards] And that song, also,
through those takes,
went from being a sort of
Dylan-esque sort of ballad,
you know, really...
to just an acoustic guitar and
a very, sort of... a lament, almost.
Made damn sure that Pilate...
And we did that for a bit and went...
"This song could take
a little more juice." You know? [laughing]
And, slowly, it built up...
Yeah, I took the bass in on that,
with Charlie,
and we brought it up
to a sort of samba thing.
And then suddenly, everybody looked,
and he said, "Yeah.
Yeah, all right, okay."
I laid traps for troubadours
Who get killed
before they reached Bombay
Oh
Pleased to meet y'all, now, now
Hope you guessed my name
You never know quite when
the magic bit's gonna come in.
[band playing "Trouble"]
Just because you find yourself
Off the streets again
That don't mean that I can help you
Or I ain't your friend
Baby, trouble is your middle name
The trouble is that that's your game
[Waits] Every song has at least
ten songs inside of it
that can be released from the song
and you can make, you know...
You put two songs together in a room,
they'll have offspring, you know?
If you want to start writing songs,
you have to start thinking like one.
You're trying to
break into the ritual of music.
It's kinda like Houdini
in reverse, you know.
It's not you're trying to escape.
You're trying to be let in.
[Richards singing]
Trouble
[man] The story I'd heard
about you meeting him...
I think you were doing Rain Dogs.
Well, my wife, she said,
"Who would you like?"
And I told her,
"Oh, Keith Richards."
I was, like, saying, "Lenny Bruce..."
Uh, you know...
"Muddy Waters," you know.
And she went ahead and started calling.
It was like a prank call.
-And then he picked up, you know.
-[man chuckles]
[Richards] We bumped into each other
30 years ago.
I loved him from the minute I met him.
When he came, he came in a semi
with about 300 guitars.
So I wasn't ready for that,
either, you know.
And he had a guitar valet
who was, like, bringing guitars over
like beverages and desserts, you know.
And it was just...
It was a little overwhelming for me.
[Richards] Tom's an eccentric.
The first time I met him,
he had a room full of instruments
of the most bizarre kinds.
He had a Mellotron, but it
only played train noises. [laughing]
[Richards laughs]
Yeah, there's a couple of spots.
I just lost the frame,
but I don't think it really matters,
'cause you can just, you know...
If it gets in the way, you can just
drift it off and then put it back up.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That first time, we'd been jamming for
an hour or so, and then,
I didn't even... You know...
And there were beverages involved.
I must admit, I was trying to match him,
which you must never try to ever do.
But... And so after an hour or so,
I was... I didn't know where I was.
And then, I say, "What did we just get?
What, do we have anything?"
And then, he says...
[hoarsely] "Scribe."
And then I realized I was the scribe.
I was supposed to be
keeping track of everything.
I'm the last leaf on the tree
Yeah, something like that.
I'm really happy to have been able
to write songs with him, actually.
Because it took me a long time
to realize that he never wrote songs
except with Kathleen, his wife,
you know.
And so, to me, it was a real...
I realized, a real privilege.
I'll be here through eternity
If you want to know how long
If they cut down this tree
I'll show up in a song
I'm the last leaf on the tree
And the autumn took the rest
But they won't take me
I'm the last leaf on the tree
I'm the last leaf on the tree
[playing chords on piano]
[Jordan] You know, we could strike that...
[man] You got "Love Overdue."
Could you talk about that track?
Hats off, yeah.
That was another tip of the hat to...
I've always loved that song
and Gregory Isaacs.
I love nearly all of Gregory's work.
There's a certain urgency about it,
a truth about it.
And so, we knew we were gonna do it.
"Let's do it." You know?
"Give me a reggae beat, Steve." You know?
Who's gonna hold and squeeze me tight
Now that she's gone out of my life
Who's gonna make me feel
the way she used to do
Now that my love is overdue
I've always loved reggae.
Basically, I happened
to start living in Jamaica
in '71, '72,
just as reggae was
catching fire, you know.
In fact, Catch a Fire had just
come out, Bob Marley, and...
Jimmy Cliff, The Harder They Come.
There was a whole explosion that year.
And I'm living there.
[all singing]
He's the alpha, he is our light
I don't need no candlelight
[Richards] It felt like the early days
of rock and roll.
I felt the same sort of energy and joy
and sense of discovery amongst people,
that they'd found their voice.
Rasta, me say love, love, love
Love, love, love, love, love
[Richards] Jamaica provided
an amazing burst of talent and energy.
It was very refreshing to me.
Yeah, yeah.
And, so, you're sort of back in
the beginning of something again.
[playing upbeat music]
What I really love about reggae,
it's all so...
natural, you know.
There's none of this forced stuff.
And at that time,
I was getting really sick of rock music.
Rock and roll, I never get sick of.
But there was less and less of that
and more rock music,
which is actually a white man's version.
It turns out to be like...
They'll turn it into a march, basically,
you know...
We are rockin', yeah!
Yeah, I mean, eventually, that's what...
That's their version of rock.
You know, it's like,
"Excuse me, I prefer the roll."
And that's when the cats,
the Jamaican guys, came in with the horns.
Luckily, Steve's very well connected.
[DeCurtis] Yes.
So, I was like, "What we need here is
a sort of Jamaican horn section."
Man, we need some more smoke.
Get some weed going in this, man.
-Come on, man.
-[Richards] I can do that.
-Yeah.
-[both laughing]
[Jordan] You got a red, black and green
scarf or something?
Can we get Keith's headband?
No, you're not going to dress me, man.
Okay, okay. I will.
[band playing upbeat music]
Whose voice is gonna say goodnight
Now that she's gone out of my sight
Who's gonna tell me lies
and let me think they're true?
And now that my love is overdue
Now that my love is overdue
[Richards chuckles]
[man] So, how did you start
recording solo in the first place?
I was very reluctant to start going solo.
I mean, my thing has always been
The Stones and you know...
You'd leave at your peril.
[laughs]
But things had...
Circumstances had worked out
in the late '80s, that, you know...
obviously, we were not going to...
Mick and I were not going to be
working together for a while.
I called 1985 to '89,
that was actually World War III.
In a 50-year relationship
doing this stuff,
of course, guys have fights,
brothers have fights.
You know, we're brothers.
There was no sign of The Stones, like,
poking their nose above the horizon.
And I was at, really, a loose end.
Suddenly, I get a call to do
the Chuck Berry movie,
Hail! Hail! Rock 'n' Roll.
I mean, obviously, I gotta get into this.
Life wouldn't be complete.
I mean, the circle would be unbroken.
[Berry] That slur is started right here.
[strumming guitar]
Starts on the upper one.
Listen.
All right.
[man] Was he grateful that you guys
were taking the stage?
Chuck... Chuck has his own way
of showing appreciation.
[laughing]
-Why it was being done?
-[Richards] Yeah.
Well, don't touch my amp.
Then it won't be done.
He already said he didn't.
-Well, he says why it's being done.
-[man] All right.
Why it's being done
is because it's not recording well.
[Berry] Okay.
And that's what's gonna
end up on the film.
If it winds up on the film,
that's the way Chuck Berry plays it.
You understand?
-I understand, man. I understand.
-Well, I was talking to Andy about it.
But you've got to live with it afterwards.
They're trying to--
I've been living for 60 years with it!
-I know that. I know that.
-Okay, well, then realize it!
But this is going to be here
after we're all dead and gone.
I was in his dressing room...
and the guitar case was open,
guitar was lying there.
So, I was waiting for him. They said,
you know, "He's coming in a minute."
So, I was just leaning over
and I was just touching the strings.
He came in and slammed me.
[laughs]
That was Chuck...
One of Chuck's greatest hits.
-[band playing "Nadine"]
-[audience cheering]
I saw her from the corner
when she turned and doubled back
And started walkin' toward
a coffee-colored Cadillac
Pushin' through the crowd
trying to get to where she's at
Campaign shouting
like a southern diplomat
Nadine
Is that you?
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa
Nadine
Is that you?
Every time I see you,
you've got something else to do
[Richards] No problems
could really interfere
with the fact that this was just fun.
[audience cheering]
[Richards] And that's where I started
to work with Steve Jordan.
Steve and I were just like,
"We're in rock and roll heaven."
[audience cheering]
One...
One word from Keith Richards!
Goodnight, ladies and gentlemen.
Tonight's star.
[Richards] Suddenly, I've got this
incredible band together.
Hand for the band!
[Richards] And Steve and I find it
quite natural to write songs.
We said, "Well, let's..."
You know, "Here, let's cut some stuff."
Ladies and gentlemen, Keith Richards.
[audience cheering]
Giving up lovin'
It's easy to do
People so pitiful
[Waddy Wachtel] When Keith and I
first started to play together,
I knew we were simpatico just by hearing
what he had done all the years
and hearing the hands
touching those strings.
But, yeah, we bonded
pretty extremely, right away.
You shouldn't take it so hard
Yeah
[Richards] In a way, I thought, "Okay,
obviously, I'm supposed to do this,"
because it was organic.
You'd think one great band in a lifetime
is already a miracle.
To put two together,
I mean, it's weird, in a way.
I also understood more of Mick's job...
by being the frontman.
You shouldn't take it so hard
Yeah
You shouldn't take it so hard
Yeah
You shouldn't take it so hard
Yeah
[audience cheering]
[Richards] To be right on top
of everything,
from the first note till the end,
gave me a bit of discipline, actually,
I probably sorely needed.
[laughs]
But working outside of The Stones,
I realized that The Stones,
that's my home.
We set them up and gave 'em to people,
and now we belong to the people.
And I can't let them down.
[crowd cheering]
[reporter 1] The Rolling Stones are back
on their first tour in almost a decade.
[reporter 2] This will be their 13th
major US tour since 1964.
[reporter 3] The Rolling Stones launched
their Bigger Bang world tour last night,
with dates in Canada, the US,
South America, Europe, and Asia.
[Richards] About 2007, The Stones had been
on the road for a long time.
And we'd come to a natural gasper,
you know, like...
[exhales sharply]
And it occurred to me,
maybe this is the time to do a book.
I didn't really take it that seriously
to start with.
But as it went on, I understood that...
I know who I am and people who know me
know basically who I am.
But I realize that 999 of them out there
still think Keith Richards is
smoking a joint, bottle of Jack Daniel's
in his hand, like, walking down the road,
you know, cursing the fact that
the liquor store is closed.
An image, man.
Image like a ball and chain.
It's not like a shadow,
because it's there 24/24.
When the sun goes down,
it don't disappear.
[playing guitar]
[Waits] A lot of this
has to do with persona.
You have to have some type of armor
so that you can continue to also develop
as a human being, you know.
It's like you have a recipe,
and you have a beverage,
and you have a...
a sandwich named after you, pretty much.
It's like, what it comes down to, right?
But you're still able within,
inside that...
you're able to still grow and change.
It's kind of a ventriloquist act
a lot of the time, you know.
But it's much safer than
putting your own ass out there,
like Judy Garland, you know,
and melting every night.
[Richards] You can't buy a persona.
You can either make it up,
or you can be it.
My idea of actual heaven is to be a
rock and roll star that nobody ever sees.
[laughing] Totally anonymous.
You know, you gotta go out
and do this thing sometimes.
And so after the book came out,
the next thing I knew,
Steve came to me and said...
"Let's get away from the chicks."
[imitates playing guitar]
And then he's like, "Say we're working,
you know what I mean?"
There's fates of rock and roll, you know.
And to do that,
you eyeball each other and say...
"One, two... let's go!"
[playing rock and roll music]
This is what rock and roll is about.
You feel like you're levitating.
And when all of the guys around you
are playing, and you're saying,
"They're feeling it too.
I know it, I know it."
And you go for those moments
where you actually, you know, fly.
And you just hang on to it
as long as you can,
because it is one of
the best feelings in the world.
It may be only rock and roll, but...
I'm telling you what...
that's the shit.
["Mannish Boy" playing]
Now when I was a young boy
At the age of five
Of all of the people I have ever met,
Muddy Waters, he was a father to me.
[man] Yeah, that's right!
[Waters] What about Keith?
[Richards] He took me under his wing.
It was just amazing
to finally play together.
Was I honored by that?
Man, I had died and gone to heaven.
- I have lots of fun
-Yeah!
I'm a man
Yeah!
I spell "M"
"A," child
"N"
That represents "man"
For the first time ever...
A Stones' show,
"What are you gonna wear?"
"We don't give a shit,"
you know what I mean?
For the Checkerboard show, Ronnie and I
were like, "What are we gonna wear, man?"
"White shirts, black vests." You know?
[laughs]
We actually talked about what
we were gonna wear before we go on.
This is the only time, ever,
I can remember doing that.
The line I shoot
Hell, I'll never miss
When I make love to a woman
She can't resist
I think I'll go down
To old Kansas Stew
I'm gonna bring back the second cousin
- That little Johnny Cocheroo
-Yeah, baby!
All you little girls
Sittin' at that line
I can make love to you, baby
In five minutes' time
[mouthing]
Ain't that a man?
Yes, man
I spell "M"
[Jagger] Yeah!
"A," child
"N"
Oh, man.
[Richards] Muddy's house.
[chuckles]
Wow. You would've thought Chicago could do
something more for the man, you know?
It was a lot more vibrant
the last time I was here.
It was a party.
I mean, it was night time.
I think Willie Dixon brought me over.
It was rocking when I got here,
I remember that.
It's leaving I don't remember.
I crashed out here.
But I woke up in Howlin' Wolf's house.
I don't know what happened.
I got carried away.
The party continued, and I went with it.
-[Richards laughing]
-[crowd cheering]
[Waters] Get Mickey a towel, will ya?
Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen.
We'll keep the show moving.
Mr. Muddy Waters! Give it to him!
Give it to Mr. Muddy Waters.
[man] You know, Muddy was younger
then than you are now.
I mean, it seems like you,
when you were young,
kind of wanted to be one of those guys.
And now, in a way,
you kind of are one of those guys.
Yeah, I know.
Life's a funny thing, you know.
And nobody wants to get old,
but they don't wanna die young either.
You know, and you just gotta follow
this thing down the path, you know.
Well, Irene, good night
Irene
Irene, good night
After I left home,
my dad and my mother split up.
And then I lost touch
with my dad for 20 years.
I'll see you in my dreams
Maybe, 'cause I was thinking about,
"God, what he must've thought of me?"
I mean, he was a straight-up guy.
I mean, a hardworking man and all that.
You know, I mean, the idea of his son
being busted for drugs.
I could think of him saying...
"Well, he'd never come to any good."
Sometimes I take that great notion
To jump in that river and drown
After about 20 years,
I wrote him a note and got one back.
And we set up a meeting
at my house in England.
I took Ronnie Wood with me for protection.
That's how scared I was.
The door opens and
out comes out this little old guy.
You know, his legs have gone a bit
and he's like...
But it was Dad, you know, and it was...
It was so easy. Within a few minutes,
we sorted it all well out.
And he became, for the next 20 years,
my best mate.
For another 20 years,
he came on every trip, every show,
come around the world with me.
And I loved to show him the world.
And he didn't mind seeing it either.
[inaudible]
Oh. [chuckles]
Poor old boy.
He's older than I am.
Right, babe?
So, Irene, goodnight
My family, they're incredibly important,
you know.
When you see offspring of offspring,
then something else hits home.
I mean, it's one thing having a kid.
But when you get the grandsons
and the granddaughters,
well, that is...
that's an amazing feeling.
I don't know of what. Accomplishment?
I don't know. Or continuity?
But basically, love.
Goodnight, Irene
Goodnight, Irene
I'll see you in my dreams
[Richards] I've been blessed, man.
I'll play as long
as I can get away with it.
And that's all I can do.
I'm not getting old.
I'm evolving.
[singers vocalizing]
[upbeat music playing]
[indistinct chatter and laughter]
[man 1] Right on.
-Right on.
-[man 2] That was a fine piece of work.
[Richards] Once again, Larry,
great to see you, man.
[man 3] All right.
[man 4] Oh, yeah. I like this stuff.
[man 5] Yeah, balls to the walls,
gentlemen.
[Richards laughing]