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<\/p>\nAnd then there were three. Mick Jagger, Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood are the last Rolling Stones still rolling.<\/p>\n
And yesterday, rock\u2019s unholy trinity announced the release of their new album, Hackney Diamonds.<\/p>\n
Most bands would issue a Press release or perhaps quietly urge a radio station to play a few tracks, but new music from the Stones? This is a major international event. This calls for blanket coverage on Sky News and other stations, with updates across multiple social media platforms.<\/p>\n
On Twitter, Jagger unleashed details across seven time zones, while in London, the band hired the Hackney Empire theatre and flew in U.S. chat show host Jimmy Fallon to interview them on this momentous occasion.<\/p>\n
\u2018Do you guys still love being in the studio together? Was it fun?\u2019 he wondered. \u2018Yeah, yeah, it is still fun,\u2019 they assured him.<\/p>\n
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Right to left: Ronnie Wood, Sir Mick Jagger and Keith Richards at the Rolling Stones Hackney Diamonds launch event in London<\/p>\n
In fact, it is so much marvellous fun they haven\u2019t done it for nearly 20 years \u2014 their last album of new music, A Bigger Bang, came out in 2005.<\/p>\n
\u2018We\u2019ve been lazy,\u2019 said Mick, by way of explanation. Did they worry about how fans will receive their new music, Fallon probed? \u2018Nah, we just cross our fingers,\u2019 shrugged Jagger.<\/p>\n
On stage the three rockers were resplendent in hats and hair dye, sitting on sculpted red armchairs which wrapped around their tiny, frangible hips like cupcake holders.<\/p>\n
Under a canopy of red velvet drapes lit by red table lamps, they talked of their new \u2018melting-pot melodies\u2019 and \u2018lovely riffs\u2019, looking as if they were inside some demented boudoir, a lush crypt for the decrepit.<\/p>\n
\u2018I can tell you straight that I have no idea what it\u2019s about,\u2019 said Keith of one of the new songs, which he quite possibly wrote himself. Ronnie expounded on why making guest appearances playing guitar with other bands helps keep him young.<\/p>\n
\u2018You\u2019ve got to keep your fingers moving when you get to our age. You\u2019ve got to keep everything moving,\u2019 he added, gratified by the ripple of smutty titteration that ran through the audience.<\/p>\n
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Certainly, there is no avoiding the issue of their advanced age, a combined 235 years, but for a few shining moments on stage yesterday, the decades melted away like candle wax, their life force and enthusiasm seemingly undiminished, writes JAN MOIR<\/p>\n
Perhaps part of the Stones\u2019 enduring appeal is to foster the notion amongst their more timid male fans that they too could run off with cocktail waitresses and ballerinas. Or survive honky-tonk wives and falling head first out of coconut trees, whilst still buccaneering through life and loves at the age of 80 and beyond.<\/p>\n
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Perhaps part of the Stones\u2019 enduring appeal is to foster the notion amongst their more timid male fans that they too could run off with cocktail waitresses and ballerinas<\/p>\n
It is a potent myth, even if one wonders how on earth the Stones themselves survive the emotional turmoil.<\/p>\n
\u2018Some are fey, some are tongue-in-cheek, some are a little bit more of a joke,\u2019 said Mick, talking about his long-term relationships with the women who \u2014 sorry, my mistake. He was talking about the 12 new songs on the album.<\/p>\n
Certainly, there is no avoiding the issue of their advanced age, a combined 235 years, but for a few shining moments on stage yesterday, the decades melted away like candle wax, their life force and enthusiasm seemingly undiminished.<\/p>\n
Individually and collectively, they are more on the ball than 80-year-old President Biden \u2014 scant praise, agreed \u2014 but there is something undeniably magnificent about their craggy, ancient presence.<\/p>\n
In profile, today\u2019s Mick, Keith and Ronnie are rock \u2019n\u2019 roll\u2019s Mount Rushmore; Vice President Cadaver, President Wrinkle, King Corpse. Yet in spirit they still drum to a much younger, hipper beat.<\/p>\n
The trio explained that the title of their new album is a slang term that refers to the smashed windscreen of a burgled car in Hackney. What is the significance? \u2018We\u2019re a London band,\u2019 said Keith.<\/p>\n
Or as London as they can be, what with being tax exiles for the past 50 years or so.<\/p>\n
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Fans wish Sir Mick Jagger a happy 80th birthday outside the event in London<\/p>\n
These street-fighting men stopped being street during that chateau-buying spree way back when. But the shameless loquacity of their gor-blimey accents suggests they\u2019d never left the Old Kent Road and partake of regular infusions of jellied eels.<\/p>\n
Drummer Charlie Watts died in 2021, but by the miracle of modern technology he plays on two tracks on the new album.<\/p>\n
Even more surprising is the presence of Bill Wyman, who left the band 30 years ago amid much acrimony and mutual accusations of being \u2018boring\u2019. What was behind this rapprochement? We learn that Mick just rang him up on the dog and bone.<\/p>\n
\u2018Are you still playing, Bill?\u2019 he asked. \u2018Of course I am,\u2019 replied Wyman. And that was that.<\/p>\n
The televised interlude ended with a video performance of the Stones\u2019 new single Angry, in which Mick complains he is not getting enough sex. Strike a light, guv. Some things never change.<\/p>\n