Rock flops, drug trips and Bowie stealing his women: As Mick Jagger says he's forgotten writing his memoirs, if only he could wipe all this from his memory! 

This week it was claimed that Mick Jagger had shelved plans to publish a 75,000-word memoir. 

Though the Rolling Stone is said to have written it in the Eighties, publisher John Blake said the rocker now ‘had no memory’ of doing so and has gone off the idea.

In case amnesiac Jagger wants to resuscitate the script, ALISON BOSHOFF recounts some of the most outrageous episodes in the singer’s colourful life to jog his memory — though Jagger might prefer them to stay forgotten . . .

 

CAUGHT ON CAMERA SNORTING COCAINE  

Mick likes to play down his one-time fondness for drugs, happy to let Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards act as the cheerleader for chemical excess. But viewers of a notorious 1972 documentary about the band know the singer has taken cocaine — he’s on camera snorting it.

According to Keith’s drug dealer Tony Sanchez, Mick’s drug use was not a one-off.

In 1972 Mick Jagger was caught on camera snorting copious amounts of cocaine

In 1972 Mick Jagger was caught on camera snorting copious amounts of cocaine

Sanchez claimed in his book Up And Down With The Rolling Stones that ‘Jagger snorted quantities of coke before every show; he felt he couldn’t get up there to dance and scream without the high of the drug tearing through his body’.

In 1970, he added, Mick and his then wife Bianca became close friends with oil heir Paul Getty and his model wife Talitha Pol when they lived next to each other in Chelsea.

‘They were all passionate users of cocaine and frequently the four of them would go on and on snorting until they were so wired I had to give them heroin (or some of the “naughty stuff” as they called it) to calm them down again.’

Ex-wife Jerry Hall has said often that Mick quit all drugs after falling for her. According to the model: ‘He was dabbling with heroin. He wasn’t a real addict, but I said to him: “I can’t be with someone who takes drugs. I can’t do that.” ’

 

HIS LSD ‘TRIP’ WITH PRINCE PHILIP

The strangest revelation in Mick’s unpublished memoir is that he bought the country house Stargroves in 1970 while tripping on LSD. But it wasn’t his first experience.

Four years earlier, in 1966, he had become stoned on LSD at a party he attended with his then girlfriend Christine Shrimpton, the sister of model Jean.

She said that he took some ‘sparkle’ just before driving her home from the party, down a narrow, winding mountain road. ‘He became convinced a medieval pike had materialised inside the car and the Duke of Edinburgh’s severed head was grinning at him from the end of it.’

 

TOXIC SEXUAL RIVALRY WITH DAVID BOWIE

David Bowie delighted in sleeping with Jagger’s women, counting Mick’s girlfriend Marianne Faithfull and first wife Bianca Jagger among his conquests.

He also dallied with model Claudia Lennear, who had a fling with Mick as a teenager.

All of which would be extraordinary enough, but singer Ava Cherry said that she slept with both men simultaneously. ‘I’m not going to say that I didn’t make love to the both of them, because I did,’ she said.

David Bowie delighted in sleeping with Jagger's ex-girlfriends, including model Marianne Faithfull (pictured)

David Bowie delighted in sleeping with Jagger's ex-girlfriends, including model Marianne Faithfull (pictured)

‘It’s called a cookie. I was the tasty filling. It was wonderful, just like it should have been — everybody on their respective side doing whatever they do. We were friends.’

A 2012 biography claimed that Bowie and Jagger separately enjoyed some kind of liaison. Ava Cherry said that the men were ‘sexually obsessed with each other’.

 

DAY HE WAS TOO OUT OF IT EVEN TO MIME

Video producer Jon Roseman had trouble capturing the magic of Jagger’s performance in a shoot for the song Fool To Cry while the band were touring Europe.

He recalled in his autobiography: ‘In 1976, we travelled to Kiel in West Germany to film the Rolling Stones . . . Mick Jagger and Charlie Watts made me feel about as welcome as a fly buzzing around horse manure.’

Roseman’s dislike for Mick increased when he attempted to film the Stones miming to their songs at a Kiel auditorium. ‘They turned up at gone midnight, more than four hours late, by which time the whisky had obviously been flowing and other substances were also clearly taking their effect,’ he said.

Mick Jagger, pictured here in Oslo, once mimed a performance so badly that even technology couldn't save it -  a feat video producer Jon Roseman described as 'genius'

Mick Jagger, pictured here in Oslo, once mimed a performance so badly that even technology couldn't save it -  a feat video producer Jon Roseman described as 'genius'

The entire performance had to be re-recorded in a darkened studio in London to match the footage.

‘When most artists mime, they can never get it right on the button, so in the edit you can “pull” the sound up by a second or so to sync it with the pictures,’ said Roseman.

‘It takes a real genius to mime so badly that technology can’t save it, but Mick Jagger managed it.’

 

A SLAP IN THE FACE FROM CARLY SIMON

Jagger would likely omit from any autobiography his affair with singer Carly Simon, which has led to speculation that he is the subject of her song You’re So Vain.

Simon has said that part of the pop classic is about the womanising actor Warren Beatty, her former lover. However, it turns out that while Mick was married to Bianca, he met Carly Simon, who had dumped Beatty and was engaged to musician James Taylor.

Jagger found Carly irresistible, and his wife Bianca found love notes between them, provoking her to phone Taylor to rage: ‘My husband and your fiancée are having an affair.’ She was said to have ripped Jagger’s shirts to shreds with her teeth in a fury.

But the romance didn’t last, and Jagger callously told Simon that he didn’t love her, hence the bitterness of the lyrics.

 

SLURS ABOUT HIS CROWN JEWELS

Though it nearly destroyed the Stones, Jagger will never address what Keith said about him in his 2010 autobiography Life.

The guitarist accused his friend of having a ‘tiny todger’ and went on to claim he had enjoyed a sexual affair with Mick’s girlfriend Marianne Faithfull in 1960 — delighting in burying his head in her ‘beautiful jugs’ during an afternoon sex session.

The Stones had not shied away from sharing women. Anita Pallenberg was the girlfriend of late band member Brian Jones, before she took up with Keith, then had a fling with Mick — before going back to Keith.

But what amazed everyone was the casual way that Keith chose to make such a deeply personal slur about Mick, who has long gloried in his reputation as the ultimate womaniser.

After claiming Mick had given Marianne ‘no fun’, Keith said: ‘I know he’s got an enormous pair of balls — but it doesn’t quite fill the gap.’ He made a public apology two years later: ‘I know that some parts of it, and some of the publicity, really offended Mick and I regret that.’

The two men — who were at primary school together in Dartford, Kent — managed to get back together for a 50th anniversary tour in 2012 and 2013, but had separate managers, dressing rooms and transport. They seemed to barely be able to bring themselves to look at each other on stage.

 

A LOVE AFFAIR WITH A BALLET LEGEND

Rumours have long circulated of a dalliance with ballet legend Rudolf Nureyev (pictured right) in the early Seventies.

Journalist Geraldo Rivera told Jagger’s biographer Christopher Andersen he was sure there was something between the two men in the summer of 1972.

Journalist Geraldo Rivera said he was sure there was a dalliance between Mick Jagger and ballet legend Rudolf Nureyev (pictured)

Journalist Geraldo Rivera said he was sure there was a dalliance between Mick Jagger and ballet legend Rudolf Nureyev (pictured)

Rivera recalled Jagger and Nureyev were his guests in Manhattan, smoking cannabis and dancing, when he went into the kitchen. ‘Someone snuggled up behind me . . . It was Nureyev.

‘He was being playfully suggestive, overtly sexual, and before I had a chance to even think how to respond, Jagger approached me from the front and started doing the same thing.’

The dancer apparently told the Rolling Stone: ‘He’s a virgin, you know.’ Jagger laughed back: ‘Oh, well, we can break him in.’

 

HIS DAYS AS A CHOIR BOY

A hero of the counter-culture, Jagger is from an impeccably middle-class family and his mother Eva was active in the local Tory party. Dad Basil, known as Joe, was a PE teacher and Eva was a hairdresser.

Jagger grew up in a middle-class family in Kent, where his mother Eva, a hairdresser was active in the local Tory party

Jagger grew up in a middle-class family in Kent, where his mother Eva, a hairdresser was active in the local Tory party

The young Mick (pictured, above) sang in the school choir and had aspirations to be a journalist or a politician. He began, but did not finish, a degree at the London School of Economics.

 

RUNNING FROM THE TAXMAN

In 1971, the Rolling Stones left the UK on the advice of their new financial manager Prince Rupert Loewenstein.

As Mick said: ‘After working for eight years I discovered at the end that no one had ever paid my taxes and I owed a fortune. So then you have to leave the country.’

The band decamped to the South of France and Mick has been peripatetic to some extent ever since — his first wife Bianca complained she had spent their married life living out of a suitcase ‘in his quest to avoid income taxes’.

Keith Richards said recently: ‘The business side of it is how come the Stones aren’t living in England together.

‘Half the time, Mick’s in New York and I’m in Switzerland.’

Prince Rupert — whom Jerry Hall teasingly called Rupie the Groupie — even insisted on the Stones axing the UK leg of their Bridges To Babylon tour in 1998 after he worked out it would cost them £10 million in tax alone.

 

MORE DIVA THAN TINA TURNER

The consummate performer is not beyond using cheap tricks to win over the audience.

Promoter Bill Graham put on the Stones U.S. tour in 1969. He said: ‘They went on 45 minutes late. Jagger told the crowd it was because no one had picked them up at the airport, but the truth was Tina Turner had killed the audience to such a degree the Stones did not want to play right after her.’

 

THE MARRIAGE THAT WASN'T

Mick's marriage to Jerry Hall was a Hindu ceremony performed on a beach in Bali in 1990. When she threw him out in 1999 after he fathered a child by Brazilian model Luciana Morad, he argued that the wedding had no legal status — meaning Jerry was in line for only a tiny slice of his fortune.

Jerry Hall threw Mick Jagger out in 1999 after it emerged he'd fathered a child with Brazilian model Luciana Morad

Jerry Hall threw Mick Jagger out in 1999 after it emerged he'd fathered a child with Brazilian model Luciana Morad

She’s said to have got £10 million while he is worth £280 million — a display of parsimony that won him no fans.

Jerry said: ‘I didn’t like the idea of annulling after 23 years and four children. It seemed a bit rude.’ Jagger even hung on to joint ownership of the marital home in Richmond, Surrey.

 

SIR MICK’S SNUB FROM THE QUEEN

Jagger’s knighthood in 2003, after he was recommended for the honour by Tony Blair, raised eyebrows — not least among the Stones.

Keith Richards said: ‘I told Mick it’s a paltry honour . . . It’s not what the Stones are about, is it?’ The Queen, whom Jagger once referred to as ‘chief witch’, was also rumoured to be unhappy.

Jagger’s biographer Christopher Andersen claimed Her Majesty ‘did not have the stomach’ to hand the award to him on account of his anti-establishment views.

She also disliked the star’s relationship with her sister, the late Princess Margaret, and thought he used her to climb the social ladder. So she asked Prince Charles to give Jagger the knighthood instead.

 

THE FLOPS HE’D RATHER FORGET

Not everything that Mick touches turns to gold. His group SuperHeavy, formed with Eurythmics’ Dave Stewart and singer Joss Stone in 2009, was not a success.

Keith Richards (pictured) reportedly called Mick's 2001 solo project 'dog**** in the doorway'

Keith Richards (pictured) reportedly called Mick's 2001 solo project 'dog**** in the doorway'

Their album reached No 13 in the UK and No 26 in the U.S.; the single, Miracle Worker, struggled to No 136 in the UK. Not so super after all.

His solo career has been patchy, too, featuring four so-so albums.

His last attempt in 2001 was Goddess In The Doorway, which Keith Richards reputedly called ‘dog**** in the doorway’. It reached No 44 in the UK album chart.

 

 WHAT A SAUSAGE   

Mick would surely rather forget his unsuccessful campaign to be cast as transsexual Dr Frank-N-Furter in the 1975 film version of The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Producers picked actor Tim Curry, who’d impressed in its West End run.

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