“HE’S A TRUE HERO”
KEITH was a total hero to me as a kid. I loved his guitar-playing, but it was more his ideology, really. I just saw him as someone with ultimate integrity. He was a massive influence on me for his philosophy more than anything. When I was in The Smiths, I felt like I was in my own Rolling Stones. We had a very interesting, idiosyncratic frontman and I was able to take care of just the music, taking the Keith Richards philosophy of being behind the scenes, but also being the engine of the band.
He seemed to me to be on a total mission, not to self-destruct, but to find something in music that he loved. Almost a crusade. “Gimme Shelter” has the best guitar solo that’s ever been on record. I think there’s only about six notes in total, but it’s played with pure feeling and is totally appropriate. Keith invented a complete guitar style and genre all his own, which is no mean feat. He didn’t just invent a sound, but a whole new guitar style, possibly the coolest style since Robert Johnson or Hubert Sumlin. It strips out any unnecessary intellectualising or technical nonsense and just gets to the heart of it.
I think it’s very easy to get carried away with the whole junkie martyr nonsense that used to surround him. I’ve met Keith a few times now and, when you get to the core of it and find out what he’s really like, he’s someone who just won’t be told how to live his own life. In that way, he’s a true hero in the same way that Muhammad Ali was, standing up for his principles and not being beaten down by uninformed authority. So I don’t think Keith was standing up for drugtaking, he was standing up for his own life.