The poster for the Rolling Stones 1969 tour of North America
FROM JULY TO August of 1969, the attention of the rock ’n’ roll world shifted from a concert in Hyde Park, London, by the Rolling Stones that was supposed to be free to one in Upstate New York that wasn’t supposed to be free, but turned out that way nonetheless. The Woodstock Music and Art Fair created a sea change in the economics of rock ’n’ roll that would have reverberations right up to this day, and even though the Rolling Stones were not a part of it, they would play a huge role in the ways and means by which the music industry would generate capital from that day forward.
Woodstock became iconic without the participation of the holy trinity of ’60s rock: the Beatles were in the death rattle phase of their existence knocking off one last masterpiece—Abbey Road. Bob Dylan sat home petulantly sixty miles away from the festival, opting instead to perform at the Isle of Wight in September; and the Stones were consumed by a litany of personal and professional obligations and responsibilities. Stones engineer Eddie Kramer ended up doing the sound at Woodstock.
EDDIE KRAMER: I think the Stones would have done enormously well at Woodstock. The competition would have been so fierce. Having Jimi Hendrix, the Who, and the Stones. It doesn’t get much better than that.
During the research phase of my previous book—Back to the Garden: The Story of Woodstock—the question about why the Stones weren’t there came up quite often. The most consistently offered answers were that they were too expensive to sign up and would bust the already fragile budget of the event. And that the group’s dark, demon-riddled simulacrum at the time would have clashed too drastically with the peace, love, and music brand that the event was cultivating.
I think with the wisdom of hindsight, we can see that an appearance by the Rolling Stones would only have enhanced and magnified even further the cachet of Woodstock. More than anything else, pragmatic considerations made that fantasy booking impossible. Certainly Brian Jones’s death was still at the top of the list. And when they weren’t mourning their lost friend or otherwise attending to his passing, finishing up Let It Bleed and preparing for a fall tour of America were the band’s main priorities. On top of all that, Mick Jagger was learning his lines for Ned Kelly, the motion picture he was about to shoot in Australia; and Keith and Anita were having a son, Marlon, who was born on August 10. It was, simply, a lot. It didn’t preclude, however, the band’s thoughts of a big event of their own during the upcoming tour of the US . . .
The Stones regrouped at the end of October in Los Angeles. First up on the agenda was finishing up the work on Let It Bleed that had begun over a year before. Next up was an unexpected journalistic stink bomb hurled at the group by a very respected and influential columnist in San Francisco. It makes me laugh to consider what Ralph J. Gleason, who died in 1975, would think about the totally outrageous ticket prices charged for an “A” list rock concert in the twenty-first century. Gleason, who was also a co-founder of Rolling Stone magazine, wrote the following after details were announced about the Stones tour in 1969: “Can the Rolling Stones actually need all that money? If they really dig the black musicians as much as every note they play and every syllable they utter indicates, is it possible to take out a show with, say, Ike and Tina and some of the older men like Howlin’ Wolf and let them share in the loot? How much can the Stones take back to Merrie England after taxes, anyway? How much must the British manager and the American manager and the agency rake off the top?”
When the issue was raised at a press conference promoting the tour at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel, Mick was clearly stung by it, and responded thusly:
MICK JAGGER: We were offered a lot of money to play some very good dates—money in front in Europe, before we left, really a lot of bread. We didn’t accept because we thought they’d be too expensive on the basis of the money we’d get. We didn’t say that unless we walk out of America with X dollars, we ain’t gonna come. We’re really not into that sort of economic scene. Either you’re gonna sing and all that crap, or you’re gonna be a fuckin’ economist. I really don’t know whether this is more expensive than recent tours by local bands. I don’t know how much people can afford. I’ve no idea. Is that a lot? You’ll have to tell me.
He also left the door open for some kind of “free” event on the West Coast to calm the storm—more on that in chapter 24.
Opening night was set for November 7 at Colorado State University. Based on his triumphant handling of the Hyde Park concert, Sam Cutler was brought on board as the tour manager, which led to a fateful and long-lasting decision by Cutler:
SAM CUTLER: The Rolling Stones had pretty much been away from the music scene for three years. At the height of their fame, their concerts would last for perhaps twenty minutes before the stage was swamped by screaming teenagers and the show would have to be abandoned. Production value seemed to be of little concern. The forthcoming American tour, the Stones soon realized, was going to be different; they were going to have to deliver the goods. In America, people actually listened to music.
It was quite a challenge. How would the Stones reinvent themselves as a live act?
SAM CUTLER: We were rehearsing in LA. Mick Taylor was still learning all the parts and the rehearsals weren’t going very well. I asked a couple of beautiful California blonde sisters who were standing there what they thought of it. They just gushed, “Oh, they’re the greatest rock and roll band in the world.” Well, I didn’t think so.
We eventually left to do our first show in Colorado and we were on the plane and Mick said, “Oh, we have nobody to introduce the band.” He said, “Sam can do it.” I didn’t think any more about it until I went on stage, then it just popped into my mind, “The Greatest Rock ’n’ Roll Band in the World, the Rolling Stones.” Mick was furious. It wasn’t a very good gig. He said, “Don’t say that about us.” Well either you fucking are or you aren’t. What’s it going to be? And that was the end of it. They had that kind of frailty about them. They never knew if they were going to make it. But that’s what makes them a great band and they produce wonderful music. The moniker has stuck ever since.
The tour was under way. Next stop, Los Angeles for two shows on November 8, then up to Oakland for another two shows on November 9. It was here that the group would encounter another formidable figure in rock ’n’ roll with whom they would have an on-again, off-again relationship for the next twenty-two years—rock impresario Bill Graham.
SAM CUTLER: Bill Graham was like a lot of people around the Rolling Stones; it went to their heads. Bill Graham was arrogant to the extreme, a pain in the butt. People were getting really fed up with him. Some girl was trying to get on stage and Bill Graham was pushing her back into the audience and she kept on coming and Bill Graham then started slapping her. Charlie Watts and I were standing backstage and Charlie saw that and said, “Get that guy out of there.” I said, “It’s the promoter.” Charlie didn’t give a fuck who it was. “You can’t be doing that. Get him out of there.”
So I went and told him, “Get off the stage, man.” He said, “Do you know who I am? I’m Bill Graham. This is my stage.” At which point I said, “It’s the Rolling Stones’ stage. Fuck off.” At that point there was a fight. We got separated by security guys. He said that the second show wouldn’t go on unless I was out of the building. He didn’t care how much it would cost, he would cancel the other show. Which was all bullshit. Finally, Mick agreed to see Bill. Bill came in the dressing room while I was standing there. Mick was standing there putting his makeup on. Bill said to me that if I wasn’t out of the building, there wouldn’t be a second show. Mick was very good about it. He said, “First off, Sam works for me, not for you. I decide what happens with Sam. Number two, who are you?” He said, “I’m Bill Graham. I’m the promoter.” Mick said, “Didn’t I speak to you on the telephone from London? Oh yes, you were rude to me. You shouted at me. I hate people who are rude on the telephone. Now listen Bill, we’ll be on in five minutes.” He just turned back around and continued putting his makeup on and that was the end of that.
Bill Graham’s version of the same story is very different:
BILL GRAHAM: The problems started right away during the first show. The Stones went on forty-five minutes late. Jagger told the crowd it was because no one had picked them up at the airport but the truth was that Tina Turner had killed the audience to such a degree that the Stones did not want to play right after her.
When they started doing “Satisfaction” during the first show, all the kids who had been dancing in the aisles rushed the stage. I was under the piano when it happened. I got to my feet and I went to the front edge of the stage to keep the kids from coming up or getting hurt in the crush. Sam Cutler tried to have me removed by a tall black security guard.
“We’d like to know who you are,” Cutler said.
“Get your fucking hands off me!” I screamed at him. “I’d like to know who you think you are. This is my stage.”
I went crazy on him. We grabbed one another and started wrestling right on stage as the Stones played “Satisfaction.” But they broke it up and nothing really came of it. Between shows, I went back into the dressing room to talk to the Stones. I tried to make them understand. “Look,” I said. “We’ve got two shows tonight. Please be ready on time for the second one.”
WE NEVER REALLY GOT IT ON UNTIL DETROIT
Once again on the ’69 tour, the Stones shared the stage with black artists they idolized such as B.B. King and Chuck Berry, and supported up-and-coming black artists like Tina Turner. The Stones saw firsthand the racial divide that was happening in America. Shows in Alabama created concern among the band.
SAM CUTLER: There were a lot more black artists on the stage than there were black guys in the audience. That’s for sure. It was shocking and we hated it. The Stones championed black music the whole of their lives. To have to go to the University of Alabama and go through that was shocking.
The Stones loved playing in Detroit. I think they loved it because it was a black audience. They could play what was essentially black music to black people. Anyone that was anyone in Detroit showed up wearing their bling, looking like a million dollars. Brown sugar wall to wall. Mick loved it; everybody loved it. It was a cracker of a show. Things built up throughout the tour until we did Madison Square Garden which in some respects was the height of it all.
Here’s Keith Richards’s delicious postscript to the Oakland saga:
KEITH RICHARDS: I remember a poster of Bill Graham up in the dressing room. I want to look at Bill Graham in my dressing room? With his finger up, giving me the “fuck you” sign. You know, fuck you. We threw food at it. We trashed the dressing room. At the time, the deal was, “Fine. We won’t work for him again.” And I really didn’t see Bill for a long time after that.
Rock writer and musician Michael Lydon was one of the handful of journalists who covered the tour from Fort Collins to Altamont. His coverage was originally commissioned by editors at the New York Times; but at one hundred pages long, Lydon’s article was ultimately rejected. It first appeared in Ramparts magazine, and was eventually collected in his 1971 seminal rock music anthology Rock Folk. In a follow-up piece about Gimme Shelter, the documentary made about the tour, Lydon offered the following reflection: “As one who was there, I most want Gimme Shelter’s new viewers to know how deeply the disturbing drama of this film sprang from the disturbing drama of the times. Nostalgic journalism has made the sixties an innocent time of love, peace, and flowers, but living through the decade didn’t feel like that to me. Becoming a hippie was fun but at the same time a scary, soul-wrenching process. Altamont was one of many dark and dangerous bummers I, and seemingly everyone else, stumbled into as we reached for new ideals and possibilities.”
Rock critics Dave Marsh and Robert Christgau respectively labeled the ’69 tour, “one of the benchmarks of an era,” and, “history’s first mythic rock and roll tour.” Christgau added: “The most sexually exciting man in rock had always been the most androgynous, deliberately counterposing his almost girlish stage demeanor to Keith’s droogy leer. In fact, all the Stones had posed in drag on a forty-five jacket back in 1966. So even when Mick performed “Midnight Rambler,” that psychotic little showpiece, it could be said that he was merely exposing the petty rape fantasies of his male audience for what they were. Yet no matter what music historians will say, that wasn’t the way his male fans—not to mention his female fans—could be expected to take it. Maybe this was obtuseness, but it was also common sense. After all, the spate of antiwoman songs that appeared between 1965 and 1967 can be passed off as a devastating catalog of sexist stances, but Keith’s explanation ought to be kept in mind: ‘It was a spin-off from our environment . . . hotels, and too many dumb chicks.’
“The 1969 tour was a triumphant exploration of the complexities of the Stones’ stance. All that irony and enigma was magnified into a complete drama of good and evil, aspiration and frustration—a joyous, bitter celebration of what could only be designated The Truth. With an omega emblazoned on his black shirt and an Uncle Sam top hat, Jagger took each of us as far as he or she wanted to go. Contradictions within contradictions—Uncle Mick could always show you one more. The triumphant sexist of ‘Under My Thumb’ became the desolate supplicant of ‘Love in Vain.’ The nasty triumph of ‘Midnight Rambler’ turned into the candid need of ‘Gimme Shelter.’ As for Altamont, it was simply the final contradiction in a long series.”
