Give him shelter: Jagger ‘devastated’ by loss
Singer and the Stones regroup after suicide of ‘lover, best friend’ L’Wren Scott
It is time to show some sympathy for an old devil.
Mick Jagger was the guy who looked like he might have got away with it, the superstar who really had it all, a lifetime filled to the brim with riches, sex and adventure buoyed by the kind of gifts money can’t buy: love, family, health, adoration and respect. There he was at 70, rocking it up in stadiums to enthralled multitudes, still yelping about how he couldn’t get no satisfaction with the winking energy of someone who had had his cake, eaten it, and was coming back for more. Then events took a terrible turn.
The suicide of L’Wren Scott is a private tragedy, thrown harshly into the public arena by dint of her 13-year relationship with The Rolling Stones frontman. Since the 49-year-old American fashion designer took her own life, against a backdrop of multimillion-dollar debt for her failing business, there have been speculative stories casting aspersions on their relationship and age difference, with unattributed sources trying to apportion blame by innuendo, as if anyone can comprehend what motivates such an act of personal desperation.
Describing himself as “completely shocked and devastated,” Jagger has been uncharacteristically open in expressing his feelings. His official statement may be brief but, for a man notoriously guarded about his inner life, it leaves no doubt about his sorrow. “I am still struggling to understand how my lover and best friend could end her life in this tragic way. … I will never forget her.”
The image of a devastated Jagger is not one we are used to. Indeed, it was considered so novel that several newspapers devoted their front pages this week to photos of “Mick’s grief,” featuring a surreptitiously snapped shot of the hollow faced and deadeyed star.
The sensitive response of his bandmates, however, served as a timely reminder that The Stones have always represented something a great deal more than superficial escapist entertainment. “No one saw this coming,” said Keith Richards, perhaps better known for teasing his musical partner than supporting him. “Mick’s always been my soul brother and we love him. We’re thick as thieves and we’re all feeling for the man.”
Announcing the postponement of seven shows in Australia and New Zealand, Charlie Watts and Ronnie Wood were equally clear that their priority is (as Wood put it) “pulling together to offer Mick our support,” helping him through what Watts referred to as “this awful time.”
The Stones were the first real gang in rock ’n’ roll, and 50 years on, they still carry themselves with the tightknit loyalty of the last gang in town, a group of old friends who have stuck together through thick and thin.
Because even after all their well-documented troubles, friendship is one of their defining characteristics. When you think of the decades they have spent in each other’s company, on the road, in rehearsal and recording studios, onstage and backstage, their continued existence seems almost miraculous. How many of us still hang out on a daily basis with the same people we did in our teens?
Most groups break up after a few years citing musical and personal differences, and The Stones have had plenty of those, framed in the dynamics of a love-hate relationship between two powerful personalities, Mick and Keith. Many thought indiscreet comments about Jagger in Richards’s 2010 autobiography Life might finally spell the end for the long-running saga, but the Stones returned in fighting form for their 50th anniversary in 2012, playing some of the most thrilling concerts of their lives.
Indeed, it has been one of the joys of recent dates to watch the rekindling of this legendary bromance, gradually warming body language and eye contact revealing glimmers of life in the Glimmer Twins.
Their survival as a dysfunctional, yet still functioning, entity has increasingly taken on a symbolic aspect. When they disembarked from their private jet in Perth, before the awful events of March 17, they looked as enthusiastic. For the baby boomer generation that spawned them, they have come to represent the notion that age is no bar to having fun, that music is for life and not just for kids, and maybe it’s OK to grow old disgracefully. Over the decades, their self-indulgent lifestyle has left plenty of wreckage in its wake, but they have rolled on through it all, like the proverbial stone that gathers no moss.
Original member Brian Jones drowned in his swimming pool. His replacement, Mick Taylor, joined the band a sweet-faced young virtuoso and left a few years later a disgruntled, boozy addict. Richards’ great love Anita Pallenberg squandered her beauty on heroin, while a young man died in her bed at Richards’ New York home in 1979, shooting himself through the head with one of the guitarist’s guns.
Richards himself has been in and out of rehab and threatened with jail, while new boy Ronnie Wood, a member for a mere 39 years, has battled his own drink and drug demons.
“We intend to be back out on that stage as soon as we can,” said Wood. It may well be that singing songs like Gimme Shelter is the best way for Jagger to find shelter.