(FTV:\u00a0 Brian Jones – February 3, 2021).<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0We have also covered Charlie Watts in the past (<\/span>FTV:\u00a0 <\/span><\/i>Charlie Watts – November 24, 2021).\u00a0 Charlie was a bit older than the other lads and was already in an established band when the Stones recruited him.\u00a0 Being a family guy with bills to pay, they finally lured him with the promise of a steady weekly paycheck and many gigs.\u00a0 To make good on the first enticement they had to dig deep into their own pockets.\u00a0 The \u2018many gigs\u2019 part was a stretch of the truth and it took a little longer to make that happen.\u00a0 Charlie was pretty quiet but not a wallflower.\u00a0 Mick made the mistake of calling Watts, \u2018my drummer\u2019 which resulted in a punch in the nose which Charlie punctuated with, \u201cDon\u2019t ever call me that again.\u00a0 You\u2019re my singer.\u201d\u00a0 Watching Watt\u2019s facial expressions behind some of Mick\u2019s moves in videos and on stage are a small window into what he thought of the whole stardom trip.\u00a0 His death was another solid blow to the band\u2019s kisser but there was never any question about them continuing on when he died (with drummer Steve Jordan taking over the drum throne).\u00a0 Jordan had been Watt\u2019s substitute a few times in the past and also played with Keef\u2019s X Pensive Winos band when the Glimmer Twins were feuding.<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Ian Stewart, the unseen sixth Stone, was also a founding member of the band.\u00a0 His keyboard pounding was a big part of their music but his aesthetics were deemed \u2018too square\u2019 when the band began to flaunt a hipper image.\u00a0 Manager Andrew Loog Oldham felt Ian did not fit the band\u2019s new image so he became the road manager and unseen pianist in May of 1963.\u00a0 In their glory years, Ian may have been a phantom during concerts but his importance can not be ignored.\u00a0 Sadly, Stewart also passed from this mortal coil on December 12, 1985.<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0This brings us to Bill Wyman.\u00a0 If people thought Charlie Watts was the \u2018quiet Stone\u2019 (with the solid right hook), they must have thought Wyman was a statue.\u00a0 He didn\u2019t emote much on stage\u00a0 or in the music press, but there was much more to Bill Wyman than he was willing to show.\u00a0 I read that when Peter Frampton was just a teen, he used to visit the Wyman home. \u00a0 The future guitarist for the Herd \/ Humble Pie\u00a0 \/ and later as a solo star, I discovered Peter got a lot of advice from Bill which showed another side of the bass player.\u00a0 Just because one is content to stay in the shadows when the two front guys hog the spotlight (Keef and Mick – hog the spotlight?), it doesn\u2019t mean they are inert off stage as well.\u00a0 Bill Wyman was a true mentor to Frampton and even got him into Wyman\u2019s former band when Bill went off to join the Stones\u2019 circus.<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0William George Perks was born on October 24, 1936 in Lewisham, London England which would make him 88 years old at this time.\u00a0 His father (William, Sr)\u00a0 was a bricklayer and Bill was one of six children looked after by his mother, Katleen Perks.\u00a0 His early life in wartime was spent mostly in Penge, Southeast London and his childhood was \u2018scarred by poverty\u2019.\u00a0 The family survived The Blitz and an enemy fighter strafing that killed some of their neighbors.\u00a0 His tenure at Grammar School (1947 to Easter of 1953) ended before the GCE exams when his father insisted he take a job for a bookmaker.\u00a0 Bill was called up for his two year national service in the Royal Air Force in January 1955.\u00a0 He signed up for an extra year and spent the last part of his service in the Motor Transport Section at Oldenburg Air Base in North Germany.\u00a0 The dance halls in Germany and American Armed Forces Network radio served as his introduction to rock and roll.\u00a0 When he bought his first guitar, Bill and fellow RAF pal Casey Jones formed a skiffle band on base.<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Between the ages of 10 and 13, Bill took piano lessons.\u00a0 A year after his first marriage (he was 24, she was 18), he bought a Burns electric guitar.\u00a0 He was dissatisfied with his progress and switched to bass after hearing one played at a Barron Knight show.\u00a0 In 1961 he created a fretless bass by removing the frets from the Dallas Tuxedo bass he played in the south London band, The Cliftons.\u00a0 Drummer Tony Chapman let him know that a rhythm and blues band called the Rolling Stones was seeking a bass player.\u00a0 Wyman auditioned at a club in Chelsea on December 7, 1962.\u00a0 When he replaced original bassist Dick Taylor, he became the oldest member of the band.\u00a0 Wyman changed his last name in August of 1964, using a phonetic spelling of another Royal Air Force service friend named Lee Whyman.<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Wyman performed background vocals on early recordings and in concert up through 1967.\u00a0 He was a less prolific writer for the Stones, supplying only two songs;\u00a0 <\/span>In Another Land<\/span><\/i> on which he sang lead vocals and <\/span>Sweet Lisle Lucy<\/span><\/i> which Jagger sang.\u00a0 Without consulting Wyman or the band, manager Alan Klein retitled the latter tune (written about London\u2019s infamous red light district centered on Soho\u2019s Lisle Street) <\/span>Downtown Suzie.\u00a0 <\/span><\/i>Bill was not happy.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Wyman and Jones were close friends and often roomed together on the road.\u00a0 They remained close even after Brian was drifting away from (and then out of) the band.\u00a0 Bill was distraught when Jones died.\u00a0 He and drummer Charlie Watts were the only Stones to attend Brian\u2019s funeral.\u00a0 Wyman also became good friends with Mick Taylor, Jone\u2019s replacement in the Stones.\u00a0 When Taylor also departed from the band in 1974, Bill continued to work with him on various records.<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Wyman has written two books based on the journals he has kept throughout his life.\u00a0 The first was a 1990 autobiography (<\/span>Stone Alone<\/span><\/i>) and a 2002 chronicle of life with the band called <\/span>Rolling with the Stones.<\/span><\/i>\u00a0 Among the revelations in his written work, he states that the riff that <\/span>Jumpin\u2019 Jack Flash<\/span><\/i> was built around was written by Brian Jones, Charlie Watts, and himself.\u00a0 He also revealed that the band’s vote to release <\/span>(I Can\u2019t Get No) Satisfaction<\/span><\/i> as a single was a 3-2 affair.\u00a0 The Jones, Watts, Wyman block voted \u2018yes\u2019 while Mick and Keef voted \u2018no\u2019 feeling it was not \u2018sufficiently commercial\u2019.\u00a0 Sales numbers and the track\u2019s longevity on Classic Rock Radio would certainly prove M & K were wrong.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0While still a Stone, Bill participated in a variety of musical projects.\u00a0 He can be found on 1971\u2019s <\/span>The London Howlin\u2019 Wolf Sessions<\/span><\/i> which also featured Eric Clapton, Charlie Watts, Steve Winwood, and (of course) Howlin\u2019 Wolf himself.\u00a0 He released his first solo single in 1981 (<\/span>(Si Si) Je Suis un Rock Star<\/span><\/i>) which went top twenty in many markets.\u00a0 Wyman also composed the soundtrack for the Ryan O\u2019Neil \/ Omar Sharif film <\/span>Green Ice<\/span><\/i> (1981) and later in the decade, he composed music for a couple of Italian films as well.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0When his friend Ronnie Lane (formerly of Faces and the Small Faces) began battling Multiple Sclerosis in 1983, Bill put together a fundraising campaign.\u00a0 Called <\/span>Action Research into Multiple Sclerosis<\/span><\/i>, it was a concert tour by Willie and the Poor Boys.\u00a0 The group (including a rotating group of musicians that included Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page, Jeff Beck, and Charlie Watts, among others) toured the United States and the United Kingdom.\u00a0 Truly, Bill Wyman was gathering no moss in and out of the Rolling Stones.<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0After their 1989-1990 <\/span>Steel Wheels<\/span><\/i> and <\/span>Urban Jungle <\/span><\/i>Tours, Wyman\u00a0 left the band officially in January of 1993.\u00a0 Another rotating cast of musicians came together in 1997 as \u2018Bill Wyman\u2019s Rhythm Kings\u2019.\u00a0 Described as a \u2018cross-generational group that performs covers of blues, jazz, soul, rock & roll, and occasional Stones songs\u2019, Wyman sticks to playing bass and occasional vocals (like Chuck Berry\u2019s <\/span>You Never Can Tell<\/span><\/i> and the Stones <\/span>Honky Tonk Women<\/span><\/i>).\u00a0 A 2009 reunion show by the Faces found Bill subbing for the late Ronnie Lane (which he had also done in 1986 and 1993).\u00a0 He also performed on two tracks of an Ian Stewart tribute album (<\/span>Boogie for Stu) <\/span><\/i>released in April of 2011.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Wyman and Taylor appeared as special guests for a couple of tracks with the Rolling Stones in 2012.\u00a0 Bill later announced he would not be playing occasional shows with them after 2013.\u00a0 He had previously been inducted into the <\/span>Rock & Roll Hall of Fame<\/span><\/i> as a member of the Stones (1989).\u00a0 Wyman participated in the making of a documentary about him (Oliver Murray\u2019s <\/span>The Quiet One)<\/span><\/i> in 2019.\u00a0 He\u00a0 briefly returned to record <\/span>Live by the Sword <\/span><\/i>with the Stones for their 2023 album <\/span>Hackney Diamonds<\/span><\/i> (his first recording with them since 1991).\u00a0 A ninth solo album (<\/span>Drive My Car<\/span><\/i>) released in August of 2024 shows that Bill Wyman still has an active career.<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Wyman\u2019s personal life was almost as busy (and complicated) as his band life.\u00a0 His first marriage lasted from 1958 until 1969 and produced a son.\u00a0 He later fathered a child with a woman he met on an Australian tour in 1965.\u00a0 Bill was unaware of this daughter until the Stones returned to Australia.\u00a0 At this time he was told the mother and daughter had moved to New Zealand and neither they nor he tried to make contact.\u00a0 His marriage to 18 year old Mandy Smith in 1989 (Bill would have been 52) would only last two years but would take a strange turn.\u00a0 Bill\u2019s son from his first marriage would later wed Smith\u2019s mother, making Wyman, \u201chis own son-in-law, the father-in-law of his ex-mother-in-law, as well as the step-grandfather of his ex-wife.\u201d\u00a0 Yes, it is very confusing.\u00a0 Wife number three, Suzanne Accosta, had been friends with Bill since 1980.\u00a0 In the wake of the short lived marriage to Smith, the couple wed in 1993 with the union adding three daughters to his brood.<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u2018All Stones and no play\u2019 would not have suited Bill Wyman.\u00a0 A man of many interests, it is a certainty he was never bored.\u00a0 He became a lifelong fan of the Crystal Palace football team after attending a match with his father as a birthday present.\u00a0 During a 1990 European tour with the Stones, he faked a toothache, flew back to England to see the dentist, but in reality he went to see Palace play in the 1990 FA Cup at Wembley.\u00a0 After years of touring, he developed a fear of flying soon after the <\/span>Steel Wheels <\/span><\/i>tour (which would have complicated his \u2018zip back to London to watch Crystal Palace play\u2019 scheme).<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0As if he didn\u2019t have enough to keep him occupied, Wyman began selling metal detectors in 2007.\u00a0 The selling bit came about because he was deep enough in the treasure hunting gig that he published an illustrated book about it in 2005.\u00a0 Entitled <\/span>Treasure Islands<\/span><\/i>, it was co-written with Richard Havers.\u00a0 There is no evidence that his hobbies were disrupted at all when he gave up smoking (a 55 year old habit) in 2009.<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Throughout his career, Wyman has been an avid photographer.\u00a0 Retrospectives of his works were launched in 2010 (an exhibition in St. Paul de Vence) and in 2013 (at the Rook & Raven Gallery in London).\u00a0 The London showing featured a selection of Bill\u2019s images that had been reworked by artists.\u00a0 The latter part of the 2010s put a scare in Wyman when he was diagnosed with prostate cancer (2016) but he was projected then to make a full recovery.<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0All in all, Bill Wyman has led the life he wanted to live.\u00a0 He quit the Rolling Stones for a couple of reasons, but mostly it was his desire to spend time on other interests and projects outside the band.\u00a0 In interviews, he was not shy about saying the Stones often felt like a one-man show, not a team effort.\u00a0 Mick Jagger\u2019s need to be in the spotlight kind of pushed everybody else into the background.\u00a0 When Charlie Watts died, he further noted there was no question the band would go on without him because, \u201cThey have nothing else they can do.\u201d\u00a0 With that said, he also claims he left because he felt unappreciated – he just wanted to do other things.<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Is Bill bored with life outside of the Stones?\u00a0 He is keeping himself plenty busy as a published author, an active collector, and a working musician who gets to pick and choose what and when (and with whom) he plays.\u00a0 No, Bill Wyman is doing just fine, thank you.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n
Top Piece Video:\u00a0 Speaking of Willie and the Poor Boys – here is a TV clip from 1984 . . . looks like they are having fun, doesn’t it?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Quick, when you think of the Rolling Stones, whose name(s) come to mind? \u00a0 Mick Jagger and Keith Richard(s), aka Mick and Keef or the Glimmer Twins,\u00a0 of course.\u00a0 The second \u2018(s)\u2019 is present for Keith because early on, Keef was just plain \u2018Keith Richard\u2019.\u00a0 Along the way, the adoring press and\/or fans added […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,11,8,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3523","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bands-musicians","category-education","category-from-the-vaults","category-woas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3523","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3523"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3523\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3526,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3523\/revisions\/3526"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}