What would Keith Richards do_ - Jessica Pallington West [2]
“It’s not just about living forever, Jackie. The trick is living with yourself forever.”—Captain Teague, Sparrow’s father, played by Keith Richards
“He was one of the people I admired for what he’s done and how he’s handled it. Forty-whatever years of being this god. And he’s just cool.”—Johnny Depp, talking about how he based his rendition of Jack Sparrow on Keith You can imitate all you want, but you always come back home to yourself. You can put on a Halloween costume, but it only covers up so much. You can run, but you can’t hide. At the end of the marathon, you are still there. The buck stops with you. Always follow what you know is right—morally, ethically, aesthetically.
2. WE ARE ALL THE SAME UNDER THE SKIN.
“The skull—it has nothing to do with bravado and surface bullshit … Beauty is skin-deep. This is what we are all like under the flesh, brother. Take off the hair, pull off the skin, you’re looking at the I and I.”
Look at a photo of Keith Richards, and, besides the lit cigarette, you’ll always see two things: the handcuff bracelet and the skull ring. Both are always there, as reminders. With the handcuff, it is a reminder that freedom is something not to be taken for granted. With the skull ring: it’s that we’re all the same underneath the skin. And that there is no time for bullshit. We’re all the same.
This concept has been expressed through time by great minds in both high art and low. To take a view from the low road: there’s an old episode of the TV show The Brady Bunch, in which an authority-shy Marcia can’t pass her driving test unless she envisions the instructor in his T-shirt and boxers. The Brady Bunch lesson and secret learned is this: When you’re intimidated by someone, imagine them in their underwear. It works. The intimidation goes up in smoke. The skull is the same basic concept of the Brady Bunch underpants—just a little more chilling. But the message, at bottom, isn’t to say, “Screw you.” It’s to inspire compassion. As Keith’s soul-brother Plato wrote: “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.” As Keith has said, “Skulls remind us that underneath it all, we are all the same.”
3. THERE ARE NO SECRETS.
“I’ve got nothing to hide. Nothing’s a state secret with me.”
It’s not a bad rule to live by. There’s a similar principle in Alcoholics Anonymous: “You’re only as sick as your secrets.” And you’ve heard this well-known maxim: “The truth will set you free.” Or, from Mark Twain: “If you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember anything.” Truth is stranger than fiction, and it’s far more interesting. Truth is a fine wine; lies are Boone’s Farm. Why not enjoy the best? Life is too short.
Keith has always maintained that if you want to look into his windows, he’ll pull the curtain farther open for you so you can get a better view.
“Anything you put on your front page, I can top it. Because I’ll give you the real lowdown, which is far more interesting … I don’t want anybody to think it’s worth snooping around in my backyard thinking they’re gonna pick up anything that they wouldn’t learn by asking me. ”
Be the aggressor. When you’re completely candid, nobody can snoop in your closet.
“There’s nothing that can be said about me that everybody doesn’t know. You can’t have a worse reputation than mine. I realized in the seventies that I had no reason to lie, that everyone was going to believe far worse anyway. I had nothing left to cover up … There’s nothing worth lying about. ”
Don’t be afraid of inquiry. As much as you can, let any subject be up for discussion. Bring it on, and take it on. You can decide whether or not you want to answer it, but its okay for them to ask.
There’s just one exception: anything having to do with Elton John. Leave that one alone. Anything else. Just not Elton. That’s a portal to trouble.
4. ACCEPT THE ROLLING STONES AS YOUR METAPHORICAL OVERLORD.
“There’s the sun, there’s the moon, there’s the air we breathe, and there’s the Rolling Stones.”