Pretty sad story about Mick Taylor
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/ar ... y-car.html
The Rolling Stone who's stony broke: Why Mick Taylor lives in a rundown Suffolk semi with a shabby car
[img][448:500]http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b33/mcaputo/article-1213013-0667015A000005DC-6_.jpg[/img]
It is a curious effect of the passage of time that The Rolling Stones are now as much admired for their business acumen as for their rock and roll. Nearly half a century after their rebellious beginnings, the Stones remain the world’s highest-earning rock stars.
Their albums have made them £250million and their spectacular tours have grossed upwards of £1.8billion.
Mick Jagger, whose androgynous sneer was once so feared by The Establishment, is now canny Sir Mick with a £225million fortune and palatial homes on three continents.
Even guitarist Ronnie Wood, a relative newcomer who was only made a full member of the band in 1990, was estimated to be worth £70million during his recent divorce.
All of which is a source of bitter amusement to the shambling figure in a dark grey duffel coat, stopping to light his umpteenth cigarette of the day as he walks from his ramshackle cottage in rural Suffolk to the village shop.
Mick Taylor is Ronnie Wood’s direct predecessor and the musical virtuoso behind the Rolling Stones’ golden age.
When the band announced six weeks ago that it was switching record labels from EMI to Universal, much was made of the continuing selling power of classic albums such as Exile On Main Street, Let It Bleed and Sticky Fingers – all made in an astonishingly productive five-year period between 1969 and 1974, when Taylor was the Stones’ lead guitarist.
Taylor, who replaced the erratic Brian Jones, played guitar on Honky Tonk Women, Wild Horses, Angie, It’s Only Rock And Roll and a host of other classic tracks.
He was present at the height of the band’s decadent excess at Nellcote in the South of France in the summer of 1971 and on the legendary tours of America in 1969 and 1972-73.
Yet Taylor walked away from the band at the height of its musical powers.
And while Jagger, Keith Richards, Bill Wyman and Charlie Watts have become fabulously wealthy on the back of music he helped make, Taylor scrapes a hand-to-mouth existence by playing pub gigs and hasn’t seen a penny in royalties from the Rolling Stones since 1982.
Rolling in it: Mick Jagger and Mick Taylor together on stage in 1972
Rolling in it: Mick Jagger and Mick Taylor together on stage in 1972
For years, he has refused to discuss his time as a Stone and has brushed off the two questions that have dogged him ever since: why did he leave, and does he regret it?
Now, 61-year-old Taylor has broken his silence in an extraordinary interview with The Mail on Sunday.
It is clear that the scruffy, two-bedroom semi where he has lived for the past 20 years hardly fits the image of a former Rolling Stone. The tiny house in a Suffolk country lane is in serious need of repair and redecoration.
‘Yeah, I know it needs doing,’ he said dismissively. ‘I just don’t feel up for it right now.’
Even less edifying is the unopened stack of bills and threats to cut off the water, electricity and gas. The uncut grass, empty cans in the kitchen sink and the ancient car parked in the driveway with weeds growing through its wheels also tell a tale.
The thick-set Taylor has none of the dandyish elegance of Jagger or the outlaw chic of Keith Richards. His once-golden mane of hair is streaked with grey. He is jowly and far heavier than in his prime – the legacy, he admits, of years of drug abuse.
‘People are always asking me whether I regret leaving the Rolling Stones,’ he said. ‘I make no bones about it – had I remained with the band, I would probably be dead.
'I was having difficulties with drug addiction and couldn’t have lasted. But I’m clean now and have been for years.
‘My life is so much better now than being a drug-ravaged member of the Stones. So no, I don’t regret leaving.
‘But people who really know me ask another question – whether I regret joining the Stones. To me, that’s far more astute.’
In truth, Taylor has always been ambivalent about the Stones – a fact that explains in part why he has never pursued what he believes may be millions of pounds in unpaid royalties.
For all his undoubted virtuosity on the electric guitar, he was never a huge fan of the band and found their brand of bar-room rock and roll musically limited.
Mick Taylor's old car decays in the overgrown garden
Mick Taylor's old car decays in the overgrown garden
‘When they asked me to come to the studio in 1969, I thought they just wanted me to play a session,’ he recalled. ‘I sort of liked them, but was never passionate about the Stones. In some ways I liked The Beatles more.
‘At the first session, I overdubbed the guitar on Honky Tonk Women, but I thought they were all a little bit vain and full of themselves.
‘After doing guitar parts on three songs, I said to Mick and Keith, “If you guys are just going to sit and mess around, I’m going home. I’ve got things to do.â€
