Keith Richards stopped by The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon Tuesday night to promote his new children’s book, Gus & Me: The Story of My Granddad and My First Guitar.
Richards told Fallon his grandfather “teased” him into playing the guitar by keeping one high and out of Keith’s reach, telling him that if he wanted to play it, he’d have to get it.
"One day I was standing there in grandpa’s parlor with the guitar in my hand and he said, ‘How did you get that?’" Keith recalls when he told his grandpa he used chairs and a book to reach the guitar, his grandpa replied, "‘If you need it that much, let’s start learning a few things.’"
Richards also recalled the circumstances surrounding the first song he and Mick Jagger wrote. He said the Stone’s manager told them they needed to start writing their own songs and locked the two in a kitchen until they came up with one.
"After 36 hours, and the kitchen was very barely stocked, so…we’re getting hungry and thirsty…Eventually we came out with ‘As Tears Go By,’"
Keith also told Fallon the story of when his idol, Chuck Berry, punched him out backstage when Keith had the nerve to touch Berry's guitar.
Richards’ new children’s book features illustrations by his daughter, Theodora
-Spencer