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| Ten Thousand Motels |
Rolling Stones rolls to Shanghai
www.chinaview.cn 2006-04-02 12:48:05
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2006-04/02/content_4374246.htm
BEIJING, April 2 -- Next weekend China makes yet another spectacular pirouette on the international stage of the 21st century as the world's greatest rock band, the Rolling Stones, play their first Chinese mainland concert.
The band's inimitable front man Mick "The Lips" Jagger and original axe man Keith "I'm Still Alive" Richards took time out just ahead of their Tokyo Dome concert to talk with Shanghai Daily.
So the phone goes and it's Cheryl who's working with the Stones in Tokyo, and she says: "Right, are you ready? I'm going to hand you over to Mick."
I say "yes" and the next thing it's: "Awight?" Textbook, trademark Jagger - the man who for more than four decades has fronted the Rolling Stones the band which right from the get go, and all the way ever since, has been one of the biggest on the planet.
Official figures for 2005 have them once again crowned as the biggest grossing band of the year with ticket sales in North America alone worth a staggering US$162 million.
So how is the man, for whom the adjective swagger was invented, feeling about coming to Shanghai?
"I'm really excited. We all know that Shanghai is a big important city so we wanted to make sure it's on our itinerary. We don't want to leave it out," says Jagger. "Although China as an economic force has been around ... well forever really ... as a place for us to play it's not really been on the map for that long."
Speaking to "Keef" Richards a little later he says: "Shanghai? I've always wanted to get there. We're very grateful for being allowed in, we'll stick our noses in and see what's happening."
What does he want to do whilst in Shanghai?
"I want to buy some of my own bootlegs ... I just want to get a whiff of it and look around and see what's happening, it's all brand new to me ... China will be a bit of an adventure for us, we've never been there before, it's a first and by now we don't get many firsts," he says.
The band has been on the road since August with their Bigger Bang tour which ends at the Millennium Stadium in Wales on August 29 after 120 concerts.
That's a gig every three days for an entire year (the Tokyo Dome gig lasted a full two hours and included 21 songs) ¡ª the Rolling Stones are far from work shy.
I put it to Richards that they can hardly be doing it for the cash. ¡¡
"You wouldn't get any of us doing it for the money, I'll tell you that," he says. Pressed as to why then, he offers: "There's a sense of mission. There are millions of people out there who want to see it. You know it takes a bit to put this stuff on, we come away with a bit and we give a lot away," he says in his home counties, eccentric and slightly squiffy uncle voice.
So how does Jagger explain the enduring appeal of the band that formed in 1963 and has just played to the biggest crowd in history, 1.2 million people on Copacabana beach in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil?
"People have written essays trying to pinpoint our enduring appeal, it's very hard for me, I don't really know.
"A big part of it is basically our longevity, people like us because we are still around after all this time, we're still here so people like that -- we're kind of a connection with the past for them and yet we are still here in the present.
"We try to do our bit to avoid being just a nostalgia band. Of course part of our appeal is nostalgia, but not all of it. There's definitely longevity in our songs — people like to hear them over and over again."
Richards expounds: "What's nuts is that in those days (the 1960s) we wrote a song on Monday, on Friday we recorded it and by the next Wednesday it was in the shops. And there it is — it's stuck for all time and you realize that you hardly know the thing. It's like something that has just broken through the egg and you spend the next 40 years learning the thing you wrote.
"If I knew what our appeal was, I'd bottle it and I wouldn't tell you ... There's some sort of chemistry that goes on with this bunch, I don't know, maybe it's addictive, quite possibly knowing this bunch. At the same time it's one of those great imponderables. It's a suspension of disbelief," he adds.
On the Rio concert Jagger says: "I've been playing these kind of stadium things for a long time now and it takes a lot to faze me but at the end of that gig I bowed and I thought as I was doing it, 'mmm, I've never done that before, bowed in front of quite so many people,' that was an interesting one."
Richards puts it slightly more colorfully: "It was just as well we couldn't see all the crowd or we'd just have been running to the john, man!"
On the business of performing the famously athletic football and cricket nut, Jagger says: "It's a bit like going out to play in a cup final or something, you soak up the energy from the crowd."
As to how long they will continue playing, Richards is candid. "You can actually play this stuff until you croak and you can get better at it," he says. "We just love doing it."
Jonathan Krane, the tour promoter, says: "Tickets for this concert have sold not only to fans all over China but all around the world -- Italy, South America, Japan and the United States. This is a real international, historic, milestone event and people want to be able to say they were there when it happened."
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| gimmekeef |
Will Shanghai be Omaha'd OR will the phrase now be changed to "being" Shanghai"d ?? |
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| Joey |
quote:
gimmekeef wrote:
Will Shanghai be Omaha'd OR will the phrase now be changed to "being" Shanghai"d ??
Why didn't Michael Cohl book the band in Beijing ?!?!
Why ?!?!
WHY ?!?! |
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| Soldatti |
quote:
gimmekeef wrote:
Will Shanghai be Omaha'd OR will the phrase now be changed to "being" Shanghai"d ??
They'll get a full warhorse setlist, what can we expect for the first Stones show in China? |
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| gimmekeef |
Of course....but it would be funny as hell..if they dusted off that old Faces "Every Picture Has A Story"...with the line about Shanghai Lil!!!! |
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| Break The Spell |
quote:
Soldatti wrote:
They'll get a full warhorse setlist, what can we expect for the first Stones show in China?
Certain warhorses like Brown Sugar aren't allowed to be played in China, there was an article about it. About 4 of their songs have been deemed too sexually explicit. I wonder what will be played in their place?? Perhaps Star star maybe, it wasn't on the banned list!! |
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| Jumping Jack |
BS, HTW, Beast, LSTNT are supposedly banned. I expect Rocks Off, Starfucker, Cocksucker Blues, and Rambler to be played instead.
This is supposedly going to be on TV according to Micck on RS.com. Can anyone record Chinese TV?
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| Joey |
" I expect Rocks Off, Starfucker, Cocksucker Blues, and Rambler to be played instead. "
FUNNY !!!
Christ, that's posting on loan from God right there.
-- "He is relentless...a relentless GENIUS!!! Long may Jumping Jack and his keyboard live!!!", Paul Eberly - Posting World Magazine.
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| Jumping Jack |
Good Morning young Joeykins.
Will Mick be eating raw fish in China? I would hate for his bowels to be Shanghaied. |
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| gimmekeef |
quote:
Jumping Jack wrote:
BS, HTW, Beast, LSTNT are supposedly banned. I expect Rocks Off, Starfucker, Cocksucker Blues, and Rambler to be played instead.
This is supposedly going to be on TV according to Micck on RS.com. Can anyone record Chinese TV?
Record Chinese TV?...Since all the dvd players in the world are made there..should be easy!..I've got like 300 channels on Directv but dont think any are Chinese...lol |
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| Monkey Woman |
quote:
Jumping Jack wrote:
Will Mick be eating raw fish in China? I would hate for his bowels to be Shanghaied.
Sheesh! Raw fish is Japanese.  You might've picked up swallow's nests or shark fin soup as exemples. |
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| pdog |
They'll play China, but won't play Vermont? |
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| glencar |
Vermont's still communist. They also won't play Habana. |
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| jb |
Nice to see Mick and Keith having some fun..... |
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| pdog |
quote:
glencar wrote:
Vermont's still communist. They also won't play Habana.
China isn't commie no more? |
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| nanatod |
"They also won't play Habana."
Compay Segundo can't play Havana any more either. Nor can Ruben Gonzalez, Ibrahim Ferrer or as of March 23, 2006, Pio Leyva.
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| glencar |
quote:
pdog wrote:
China isn't commie no more?
Not as much as VT anyway! |
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| Joey |
quote:
Jumping Jack wrote:
Good Morning young Joeykins.
Will Mick be eating raw fish in China? I would hate for his bowels to be Shanghaied.
Hello Jumping Jack !!!!!
I am quite sure that Mick likes Sushi ...... his ' Macrobiotic Diet ' has kept him alive and healthy all these years ( See : John Lennon , circa May , 1980 on the High Seas ) .
Then again , what the Frig do I know !!!!!
Sea Chanty !!!!!!
JJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJJACKY !!!!!! |
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| pdog |
quote:
glencar wrote:
Not as much as VT anyway!
Have you been to Berkeley recently? |
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| Joey |
quote:
pdog wrote:
Have you been to Berkeley recently?
P. - Poi - Dig - Diggity - Doggity - Dog - Pondering !!!! |
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| pdog |
Have you seen my post count? I will surpass you by years end!
It's on!
LAMF!!! |
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| Joey |
quote:
pdog wrote:
Have you seen my post count? I will surpass you by years end!
It's on!
LAMF!!!
You are posting with renewed vigor and enthusiasm these days .
I am proud of you !!!!
www.QWESTCENTER.com |
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| glencar |
quote:
pdog wrote:
Have you been to Berkeley recently?
Geez, not in 20 years! |
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