'Life'

I've just finished reading Keith Richards' autobiography 'Life'.  It manages successfully to present (to my eye) a cohesive picture of a musician's development and what it takes to be a member of The Rolling Stones.

What fascinated me the most was the progress of 'Keef' in finding the music that turned him on.  There is his interest in what made that music tick.  The book describes the long hours he spent teasing apart the threads of that music, when the group's initial aim was to simply bring American R'n'B to the attention of their audience.

There are bits where I knew exactly what he meant about the creative process.  Keef comes up with a tune and the lyric is not entirely clear, but he knows the sound of it - the line has to end with an 'ay' sound, or an 'aw' sound to be right.  I've been there.  I think, in all creative fields, one should never be afraid to experiment, dabble, have a go, leave it, come back to it, let the thing grow piecemeal if it must.  Don't expect to have something creative arrive intact, perfect.  The fear of imperfection is a bloody great hurdle to creativity, I think.

Reading Keef's exploits, they both attract and repel me.  He's a bon viveur and that has led him into some intriguing and terrifying scrapes.  He mentions projects outside the Rolling Stones which interested me and led me to pursue recordings I'd never known of before.  He makes friends with anyone he feels an affinity with.  He says something in the book like 'I'll trust you until you let me down', which I admire.  He details his close working relationship with Mick Jagger - that's a tough job.  I think Keef would be a great guy to chill with, but on the other hand I'd never want to piss him off!

I enjoyed the book a great deal.  It had been on my shelf a good year or so and took me about two weeks to eventually read.  At the end of it (an abrupt end, I have to say - took me completely by surprise) I felt that sense of loss, the thing you feel when you reach the final pages of a book and want it to go on forever.  That's a bittersweet feeling, but a good thing.

I'd recommend 'Life' to anyone who loves real music and a free spirit.