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An archive text from October 2024.
Late rage from a former Rolling Stone: The band’s former bassist Bill Wyman shared the reasons for his departure from the rock institution. He left the Stones in January 1993. The 87-year-old now says he should have left the group much earlier. Because he, Charlie Watts and Ronnie Wood had constant financial problems.
“Well, I should have left much earlier…in the eighties,” he agreed “Classic Rock.” “I did three more tours, which ended in 1989 and 1990, after seven years of no income. And at the end I had a bank overdraft of £200,000. Because we weren’t earning anything.”
“Mick and Keith were totally wealthy”
The “we” excludes two very specific band members. “Mick and Keith were super wealthy, so it didn’t bother them. But me, Charlie and Ronnie were just getting by. Ronnie started making art to support his family. Anyway, I only started playing with them again, hoping it would only last a few years because I had all these other things I wanted to do.”
The interview also discusses the criticism that the Rolling Stones involuntarily received after their step into tax exile. The band left the UK in 1971. “We didn’t have any fucking money,” said Wyman. “Our manager, Allen Klein, had all the money. And if you wanted something, you had to beg him to send you some money. You were in debt to the bank. So instead of partying all the time, you were worrying about how you were going to pay your bills. It was a nightmare.”
“And then we were accused of being multimillionaires”
The government also got in the way of the Stones: “And then Prime Minister Harold Wilson comes along and raises taxes to ninety-three percent, which was absurd. So we left. We had to leave because we owed the tax office so much money that with ninety-three percent taxes we could never make enough to pay it back. So we had to leave. And then we were accused of being multi-millionaires who went because they didn’t want to support themselves.”
The Rolling Stones’ money problems were getting worse and worse. But only for three of them. “When Brian Jones died he was over thirty thousand pounds in debt. When I bought the mansion in Suffolk I had a thousand pounds in the bank. Had to take out a mortgage and hope I would continue to make enough money to keep it.”
And further. “That’s how bad it was. Mick and Keith were wealthier because they had songwriting and publishing royalties, but me, Brian [Jones]Charlie and eventually Ronnie only had about a tenth of what they were given.”