ALL I KNEW when I went to work on Thursday, May 1, 1975, was that sometime during the lunch hour of my ten A.M. to two P.M. radio show, I would be handing the baton to DJ Scott Muni for remote coverage of a press conference announcing the upcoming Tour of the Americas by the Rolling Stones. As always, rumors and anticipation of a forthcoming Stones sighting were generating a lot of buzz (was that term in use in 1975?) and rabid fan interest. A press event to address the facts about all of this was scheduled for noontime at the Fifth Avenue Hotel. At the appointed hour, I turned on the mic after playing “It’s Only Rock ’n’ Roll,” and informed the audience that we would be switching over to our live, remote coverage of the event.
To my surprise, and I’m sure to the surprise of my listeners and most of the people in attendance at the actual press conference, noted comedian Professor Irwin Corey (who billed himself as “The World’s Foremost Authority”) strolled to the podium and proceeded to deliver one of his patented, incomprehensible monologues. His shtick was familiar enough to generate some laughs, but it did leave the roomful of hard-nosed journalists scratching their heads, wondering what the hell was going on. Until a voice from the back of the room announced that everyone there should spill out onto Fifth Avenue for a “surprise.”
Scott Muni took to the air outside the hotel and sputtered (from an actual air check of the event):
SCOTT MUNI: Dave Herman is here . . . and here comes the truck now into view . . . and they’re going to be . . . Yep, they are! There’s Mick Jagger . . . and the Stones . . . They’re all here! Now YOU hear the sound! Let’s pick it up!
The music had already started in the background, but now it was coming through loud and clear. The Rolling Stones were playing live on a flatbed truck rolling slowly south on Fifth Avenue in New York City! They performed an elongated version of “Brown Sugar” with Billy Preston on electric piano and a new face (no pun intended) playing guitar. As the song ended, Muni returned to the air.
SCOTT MUNI: Alright, the truck is pulling away. And we’re being crushed! Literally crushed! Mick Jagger has just thrown out the announcement of the tour . . .
DAVE HERMAN: The New York dates will be on . . . Five days in New York . . .
SCOTT MUNI: We’re out on the street now, and it is raining, and has been . . .
DAVE HERMAN: [incredulous] The Rolling Stones playing on Fifth Avenue . . . on Fifth Avenue!
SCOTT MUNI: The Rolling Stones playing on Fifth Avenue . . . and did you notice who the new member was? I think that’s most significant. Ron Wood was on guitar . . . Now let’s go back to Pete in the studio.
I was flabbergasted. I’m sure people actually there couldn’t believe their eyes, and I know people listening to the radio couldn’t believe their ears—because I was one of them! They say radio is theater of the mind—what could be a better example? I could “see” and hear Mick Jagger and the Stones in my imagination, and it was all quite special and wonderful.
But here’s another perspective from the eye of the hurricane:
BILL WYMAN: The truck, yeah (laughs). I don’t know whose idea it was. Probably Mick’s—he always comes up with these bad ideas that work. But it was quite fun to do. The sad thing was, when it came on TV they said we obviously weren’t playing live—we were miming to a record. Now that was very annoying because we were playing live! It was raining and we were taking the risk of being electrocuted to death!
After all was said and done, Mick gave full credit for the stunt to Charlie Watts.
MICK JAGGER: I think it was actually Charlie’s idea. Jazz in the old days in Harlem . . . they used to do promotions for their gigs on flatbed trucks.
PERSONAL ESSAY: ROCK N ROLL HIGH SCHOOL
While I was on the radio on May 1, 1975, my coauthor Bernie Corbett was stuck at Stoneham Junior High School outside Boston. Here’s his story from that day:
A life worth living has a soundtrack. And from the moment I opened my ears, the Rolling Stones have provided the background to my mortal journey. Nineteen seventy-five was to be my year to roll with the Stones in concert. The rumor mill was rife with Stones tour speculation. And then, it happened. The same day the Stones took their trip on a flatbed truck down Fifth Avenue in New York, an article appeared in the Boston Globe.
I grabbed the paper and learned the Stones would be at the Garden on June 11 and 12. The last line of the story proclaimed, “Tickets go on sale today.” That line encored in my head: TODAY!?!? There was no way I could get tickets. All was lost. I ran to the pay phone and I called my father’s law office. My late father, God bless him, sensed the extreme urgency of the situation. I nervously repeated the Ticketron on-sale locations. Soon after, he immediately dropped the Foley divorce or whatever mundane case he was supposed to be working on and proceeded to address my case. Off he went to a couple of Sears stores. No luck. I got the news that evening. My teenage life was ruined.
Later that evening, he vowed he would find tickets. A friend at a local ad agency owed him a favor. Weeks passed with no resolution. And then one day after school, while I was occupying the third base coach’s box during a Stoneham-Melrose freshman baseball game, I heard a voice. I looked over my shoulder and saw my dad. “We got two for the Stones!” By the end of the inning, my score—not the game score—was the talk of the dugout.
On June 11 my father and I witnessed the spectacle of the Greatest Rock ’n’ Roll Band in the World in all their glory from Loge II, up close and personal. I can still close my eyes and hear the strains of Aaron Copland’s “Fanfare for the Common Man” giving way to the signature opening chords of “Honky Tonk Women.” At the end of the two-and-a-half-hour performance, I was exhilarated. In my state of rock ’n’ roll ecstasy I turned to my father and asked him what he thought. “It was underpriced,” he observed, clearly pleased. It would not be the last time we got to experience the pure adrenaline of the Stones in concert together.
To my father, attorney Mitchell B. Corbett, may you rest in peace. You delivered and shared the greatest night of your eldest son’s young life.
