To fully understand rock music legend Bill Wyman, formerly of the Rolling Stones, one must first grapple with some daunting math. Wyman was in the band for 30 years, and he quit the band 30 years ago.
When, as in the case of Wyman, you play a key part in the making of records like “Jumpin’ Jack Flash,” “Satisfaction,” “Paint It Black,” “Miss You,” “Start Me Up,” “Gimme Shelter,” etc., it’s not so easy to shift the compass point of your life away from the distant past and toward the present or at least the more recent past.
But Wyman, gently, politely, resolutely tries, though the challenge is made more complex by recent headlines announcing Wyman has“returned to the Stones,” which the fine print reveals actually means that Wyman has just flown to Los Angeles to cut one new track on an album made in tribute to their late drummer Charlie Watts.
And then Wyman reveals this isn’t exactly the whole truth.
“When Mick (Jagger) asked if I would play on one of the tracks in tribute to Charlie, of course I immediately said yes. But I haven’t flown in decades, so I just went over to Metropolis Studios here in London and recorded my part. Mick indicated he’s delighted with the track, so that’s a bonus, but that’s the extent of my ‘return.’ Are we finished talking about the Stones today?”
Since Wyman is a man of many interests, none of which he seems to take lightly or without throwing himself into developing deeper wells of knowledge, there’s never a shortage of new “third act” creative ventures to chat about.
And in discussing Wyman’s latest book, “Bill Wyman’s Chelsea: From Medieval Village to Cultural Capital” (Unicorn), his enthusiasm and passion for the bustling, posh London borough subject matter is explained simply as “I see Chelsea as a village.”
This led Wyman to spend four years exploring and documenting Chelsea “village life” in meticulous notes and derived from what he estimates were “nearly 2000 photographs I took over that time. The book contains something under 300 of my photos.”
Wyman’s post-Stones life did include great music, courtesy of his rollicking rhythm and blues outfit “Bill Wyman’s Rhythm Kings,” which toured the U.K. and Europe for nearly two decades. But Wyman explained to me two decades ago at our first PvNew chat, “If I hadn’t been a musician, I would have been an archaeologist.”
His methodical, scientific approach to cultural research has resulted in many first-rate non-fiction works, all of which bear out that claim.
“Bill Wyman’s Blues Odyssey: A Journey to Music’s Heart and Soul” (DK: 2001) lovingly documents the roots of all those Rolling Stones hits and more. Like a fellow ‘60s music icon named Bob Dylan, Wyman’s passion for the artists who inspired him to a life in rock and roll has inspired him to spend countless hours researching, documenting and sharing the fruits of his awe and respect.
“Bill Wyman’s Treasure Islands: Britain’s History Uncovered” (Sutton: 2005) is more literally about archaeology, or at least its popular cousin, treasure hunting.
“Bill Wyman Shoots Chagall” (Genesis: 1998) is Wyman’s joyous photographic documentation of his friendship with the artist Marc Chagall, who Wyman first met when the Stones went into their famous tax “Exile” in the South of France back in the 1970s.
And of course “Rolling with the Stones” (Dorling Kindersley: 2002) (co-author Richard Havers) benefits from his obsessive attention to detail and provides a phenomenally dense and colorful photographic exploration of the band’s day-to-day adventures during his three-decade career with the band.
In many ways, “Chelsea” is Wyman’s most personal book, as this is a street by street celebration of the place where Wyman and his wife Suzanne have lived since the ‘90s, when Wyman says “I used my money from the settlement with leaving the band” to buy a stunning, historic home from 1714 on Upper Cheyne Row. It’s only a Stones throw (sorry) from where the band was living a spartan lifestyle, and to hear Wyman tell it, a rather unkempt existence at the apartment rented on Edith Grove by Stones’ founder, the late Brian Jones.
“Those were incredible days,” recalls Wyman, despite “the horrible mess” inside Jones’ bachelor pad, Soon Mick and Keith had their place in Chelsea, while Wyman, and the late, great Stones drummer, Charlie Watts, “dropped in from our places in South London.”
“I would go shopping for clothes on Kings Road,” recalls Wyman, “and bump into Terrence Stamp, or Twiggy or Michael Caine. We were all going to Dandy Fashion or Mr. Fish or having dinner at Alvaro’s or we’d run into each other at the Chelsea Drugstore.”
If that last Chelsea haunt sounds familiar, it’s the same spot that’s been memorialized in the song “You Can’t Always Get What You Want,” which the Stones today play almost every night on the road.
Wyman, known in his Stones life as “The Quiet One” per Oliver Murray’s excellent 2019 documentary study of the bass guitar wizard, over the past three decades might be pegged as “The Meticulous One.” “Bill Wyman’s Chelsea” works spectacularly well as a somewhat traditional travel guide, as you can follow Wyman’s street-by-street chronicle and London history will confront the newcomer at every corner.
Wyman’s fascinated by the borough’s legendary denizens, which include the martyred Thomas More and scandal-cursed Oscar Wilde. There’s the Rosettis, currently the subject of a major Tate Museum retrospective down one street, and the “Queen’s Elm,” named for a rainy-day visit by Queen Elizabeth decades ago.
Now that Wyman has shared explored and documented his passion for his London village, he’s hard at work on his next book, which is his genealogical study of the Suffolk village of Gedding, where Wyman has owned a magnificent, listed manor house, Gedding Hall, for over 50 years.
Wyman sits me down at the computer of his home office in Chelsea and begins poring through the marriages, births, deaths from centuries of Gedding life, pausing to recount fantastic tales such as “the Green Children of Woolpit,” a mysterious green-hued brother and sister duo who appeared near Gedding in the 12th-century reign of King Stephen.
By the time we’ve strolled through this amazing, magical but true tale from days of yore, it’s rather easy to say to Wyman, “Mick and Keith who?”
