ike her son Keith, the late Doris Richards had an appreciation for drugs — at least in her final days.
He tells Radio Times that her final words to him before she passed in 2007 were: “‘Why me, Keith?’ and I said, ‘You’re 93, mum.’ That was the best line I could come up with. And she said, ‘This morphine’s not bad, you know?’ And those were her last words to me.”
Asked about the longevity of The Rolling Stones, he says, “They’re not really bands if they don’t last; they’re groups. We’re a band and a real band sticks until it dies. These bands, they become big, but they’re generational, just for their one decade. They literally go when their testosterone goes… We work hard and no-one takes it for granted. We’re still looking to make our best record and put on our best show. The Stones have managed to be part of life, without becoming passé. Also, what else are you going to do? You never grow up, you just learn a little more. I ain’t getting old, I’m evolving.”
Richards also discussed The Beatles, saying, “Musically, [they] had a lovely sound and great songs. But the live thing? They were never quite there.”
And a little-known fact: After the Fab Four took up with the Maharishi in 1967, Keith wanted nothing to do with them. “He was an operator, a sucker job. But you have to think, what had being The Beatles done to The Beatles? They wanted somebody else to take them away. They didn’t want to be God anymore, so they plugged it all onto the Maharishi.”
Keith and the Stones are working on a new album that they hope to have out in the fall.