DEMONS AND COCKTAILS
As the numerous slavish followers of my Live Journal will know by now is that I am a great fan of “The Rolling Stones”. They keep on defying all logic by just alive after more that four decades at the top of the Rock ‘n Roll pile, notwithstanding hard living, substances abuse and even falling out of coconut trees on the odd occasion. They keep on delivering high energy live performances that bands with half their longevity can on dream about.
Stuart Cable, sacked drummer of the Stereophonics, quite a good band in my opinion, is releasing a book about his time with the Stereophonics. I might read it at some stage as I love rock bio’s
In "Demons & Cocktails" Cable writes how he almost caused the Rolling Stones to cancel their tour...by eating a shepherd's pie or, for that matter that they’d almost caused The Stones to cancel an entire tour because they’d eaten Keith Richards’ post-show shepherd’s pie.
“We were backstage supporting the godfathers of rock’n’roll in Europe when I saw it. ‘Kelly, Kelly, there’s shepherd’s pie!’ I said, like an excited 10-year-old at Christmas and I whacked several hefty spoonfuls onto my plate. Suddenly Ronnie Wood walks in and says: ‘Hi, boys. Mick would like to meet you.’
Our faces froze as the ageing lead singer ambled in. I wasn’t sure if I should stand, curtsy or clap. He was royalty with a capital R. The dressing room went silent. Mick introduced himself. ‘I loved the show, boys. Glad to have you on board.’
The Jaggerman then stopped in his tracks and the pleasantness suddenly left his face. ‘Who’s eating that?’ he pointed to the half-eaten plate of shepherd’s pie on the table, which was littered with cigarette butts and cans of beer. I put my hand up like a school kid in class asking to go to the toilet.
He chuckled and made a face, rolling his eyes to the ceiling. ‘Do you know the rules?’ ‘What rules?’ I replied.
‘One’ - he held his finger up - ‘you don’t play on the snooker table unless you’ve been asked.’ Mick continued: ‘And, secondly, you never, ever, take the shepherd’s pie unless Keith’s broken the crust first.’ Kelly and John, our manager, shot dagger eyes at me.
‘Did you break the crust?’ Mick asked. ‘Of course I broke the crust,’ I wanted to answer him. ‘How the hell could I have a plateful of the stuff without breaking the crust?’ ‘Do I look like f*****g Paul Daniels?’ Instead I nodded again.
Mick smiled; it was lined with childlike wickedness. He twirled on his heels and said jokingly, before heading out: ‘Enjoy the show, boys. If there will be a show. I’m not sure if he’ll go on after this.’ At least I thought it was a joke. Ronnie shook his head slowly and disappeared behind him.
There was silence in our dressing room yet again. ‘You better take it back and see if they can re-crust it,’ our manager John cried. So it was then left to me to make the long walk back to catering, carrying the half-eaten plate of food as if it were a bomb ready to explode.
Luckily, when I got to catering I knew the waitress - she had worked with us on the U2 tour. She took it back and shook her head slowly and muttered: ‘Don’t you know the rules?’ But she soon went to work on it and re-laid the potato topping making it as good as new, even if it was a little thinner.
Major world disaster averted.”
Other rockers might call for champagne, caviar and all other kinds of impossible and outlandish stuff, but trust Keef to insist that non-one f*cks with his shepherd’s pie!
Demons & Cocktails - Stuart Cable
John Blake Publishing Ltd (6 April 2009)
ISBN-10: 1844547264