Mick Jagger Lives

“Listen man,” said a very Southern hip but definitely fictitious vioce, “there’s somethin’ you oughta know about the Stones ...”

Oh god, another dude who knows somebody who knows somebody who knows Mick who said, that he would do an interview and did we want it for CREEM . . . But no . . .

“Sure, what’s going on? Riot last night? They didn’t show?”

“Naw, man, this is heavy. Look, uh . . . well, shit, I might as well tell you in front. See, I was s’posed to assassinate Jagger. Now wait, I know what that sounds like but 1 swear it IS true.”

“Well, how can I check it out?”

“That’s just it, you can’t. And I’m not even giving you a nickname. Nothin’ man. You can take this scoop, and get on the presses with it, and just in general deal with the fucker or you can bag it, Jack.”

I had to stop to think. Well, he could be lying ... he probably is . . . but it’s his dime, not mine. Might as well hear it out.

“O.K. What’s the deal? What does ‘I was supposed to assasssinate’ mean, pal?”

“It means I was hired to off the fucker,”

“By who?”

“ . . . I can’t say that either. Let’s just say someone very close to the Stones organization ...”

“Man, I don’t need this shit!! What the fuck would the Stones organization want to off Jagger for?”

“Are you kidding? What good is he alive? He’s more trouble than he’s worth. Those eats run through money like water,, gotta live on the French Riviera to keep their asses out of tax trouble, fucking crushed velvet and cocaine lifestyles, divorces, then they gotta come over here and do a tour, put out a two record set that costs double to try to pay their fuckin’ taxes. Their taxes . . . Can you dig this? There were only twp reasons for this tour. One was business: to pay off their taxes . . . ”

“And the other...”

“To prove they could do it, man. To prove, after Altamont and everything else, that enough people still related to the Rolling Stones to stay up all night, pay a hundred dollars to Scalpatron when Ticketron ran out – and I betcha if you check that one real close you’ll find some pretty suspicious fingers in the pie – to prove to themselves that the press would still run amok for tickets and a fucking Mick Jagger interview. Because they weren’t sure man, they really weren’t.

“This whole goddamn tour was like .. . the resolution of the goddamn Stones’ inferiority complex. I don’t know, I ain’t no shrink but things seem pretty clear to me.”

“And what does that, have to do with assassination?”

“Well, maybe I shouldn’t have said ... I was a sharpshooter in the Marines man, I was just s’posed to wing him. Or' that was the implication. They

never said exactly. They said, if I remember right, ‘Just enough to let people know that the Stones are still bad. *

“But after I heard the record, I knew, I knew fucking well, that it wasn’t no wing job.. I mean, when a hero’s time is done, you can’t let him linger on, like he still had some sort of hope left. And that record .. . Aw fuck, man, that record just made me want to .. . pow! You dig?”

“But you ...”

“Well, I couldn’t.

“I got there in the middle of Stevie’s set and I sat upstairs, like alone, where nobody was. And I waited. It wasn’t that far, because it was behind the stage. So I could use a pistol you know? None of this Lee Harvey Oswald shit.

“And then the Stones came out. I’d seen ’em before, I’d read a lot about this new show, I’d talked about the thing with my contact... It was gonna be in the middle of ‘Midnight Rambler.’ ”

“But you didn’t...”

“I couldn’t. I mean, there was Jagger, doing everything Jagger ever did and... it didn’t get to me, man, it didn’t touch me at ALL. And then they were into ‘Midnight Rambler’ and – this is really bizarre, because that song always made me feel real blood .. . lusty, you know? And all I felt this time was pity, for this poor dude up there, whamming around, imitating himself imitating 1964. Just this wave of pity, that was all

“I just stood up and walked away, out into the night. And went home and tore the poster of Brian off my door. ‘Cause the Rolling Stones concert was over. Over.

“I just wanted to let you know.”

“Wait a minute . . . Just one more question?” I had to get some kind of confirmation. It might be true.

“Sure.”

“How’d you get into the concert?”

“Oh that... it was easy, man. My old lady works for Ticketron.”