What would Keith Richards do_ - Jessica Pallington West [65]
October 1962 – Keith’s parents separate and divorce.
December 1962 – Bill Wyman, aka Bill Perks, joins the band.
Older than the others (but presented to the public with a false younger age), he comes from a childhood of poverty and is the only one with the shockingly square credentials of marriage and military service. However, he has some great amplifiers.
January 1963 – Band changes name to the Rolling Stones from the Rollin’ Stones.
January 1963 – Charlie Watts joins as drummer.
He is working as a graphic artist and still living with his parents. When the band members insist that he signs on, his response is, “Yeah, all right then, but I don’t know what my dad’s gonna say.” He imagines the stint will last about a year.
January 14, 1963 – First Stones gig in Soho, at the Flamingo.
February 24, 1963 – First gig at the Crawdaddy Club, London.
They soon become the house band.
April 1963 – First write-up on the band: a thumbs-up from the Richmond and Twickenham Times.
April 14, 1963 – Beatles come to the club to see the Stones play.
April 24, 1963 – The Stones are turned down by the BBC.
April 28, 1963 – Andrew Loog Oldham, an assistant to the Beatles’ Brian Epstein, sees the Stones perform.
His tycoon antenna goes up, and days later he signs an exclusive deal for management. Ian Stewart is taken out of the lineup about three days later for being too square, and is given what will become a lifelong job as road manager and occasional pianist. Oldham sets to work pumping up the bad-boy image. A typical concoction fed to the press, one that Keith doesn’t much care for: The Stones don’t wash or change clothes for a week.
May 1963 – Decca signs the Stones and they record their first single the next day.
The executive who signs them is Dick Rowe, who infamously turned down the Beatles. George Harrison suggested he rectify his mistake by going to see the Stones.
June 7, 1963 – Decca releases the first Stones single, “Come On”/“I Wanna Be Loved.”
July 1963 – First TV appearance, on Thank Your Lucky Stars.
Among the letters to the TV station: “I have seen today the most disgusting sight I can remember in all my years as a television fan."
July 1963 – The official Rolling Stones fan club now has three hundred members.
September 1963 – John Lennon and Paul McCartney write “I Wanna Be Your Man” for the Stones.
September 1963 – Keith moves with Mick into new apartment
at 33 Mapelsbury Road, London, at nine pounds a week. “We can get together there on songwriting in the sort of atmosphere that suits us best. It’s chaos, but our sort of chaos."
September 29, 1963 – First major Stones tour beings, with Bo Diddley and the Everly Brothers.
November 1963 – “I Wanna Be Your Man” reaches number nine on U.K. chart.
December 1963 – The Stones do soundtracks for Rice Krispies commercials.
January 1964 – The Stones tour as headline act with the Ronettes.
January 24, 1964 – Debut U.K. album The Rolling Stones becomes instant hit.
Opens with “Not Fade Away” and includes “Route 66.” Debuts in the U.S. two months later.
March 1964 – Marianne Faithfull enters the picture.
She’s a “convent girl” whom they meet at a party. She eventually sleeps with Brian, Keith, and Mick, and settles on bachelor number three. Years later, she claims Keith provided “the best night of [her] life.” She brings a literary influence to the band’s songs and glamour to their image. Plus a good deal of trouble.
1964 – Model Linda Keith is “arranged” by Oldham to be Keith’s first swank public girlfriend.
“I thought it was time that Keith went out with something other than his guitar,” notes Oldham. She lives the Keith Richards life before he does. The relationship lasts several years, until Keith calls her parents and tells on her for overuse of drugs. She is later confined to a psychiatric hospital.