Andrew Loog Oldham: You ask the questions
Such as: so who really killed Brian Jones? And are you as bad a man
as you'd have people think?
09 May 2001
Andrew Loog Oldham, 57, discovered and managed the Rolling Stones.
His father was killed on a bombing mission in 1944, just before Oldham's
birth and he was brought up in North London, by his mother and given a
public school education by her long-time boyfriend, entre-preneur Alec
Morris. Oldham left school at 16 and worked by day as a window-dresser
for Mary Quant, waiting on tables at Ronnie Scott's by night. He moved
into PR, working for, among others, The Beatles' manager, Brian Epstein.
In 1963, he got a tip-off to go to the Station Hotel in Richmond, where
he first saw the Rolling Stones play live. Oldham stopped managing the
Stones in 1967 but continued to be involved in putting together albums
such as The Rolling Stones Singles Collection/ The London Years.
He also managed and recorded Marianne Faithfull, and on his Immediate
Records label recorded Rod Stewart, The Small Faces, Eric Clapton and
Jimmy Page. He now lives with his second wife, a Latin American actress,
in Bogotá, Colombia.
What was your relationship with Brian Epstein like?
Carla McDougall, Kidderminster
Brian was very anal about his gayness. I wasn't, it was something I
wore on occasion and with affection. He was a homosexual in a time when
it was against the law and only found acceptance in show business; the
navy, when your ship was six miles offshore; some tawdry pub and a few
public urinals. It did not make for a healthy or happy life. Brian
should be honoured posthumously, there should at least be a plaque
outside 24 Chapel Street or a statue on the corner. He deserves better
than that BBC Arena aberration where they wheeled out all
theremaining old queens to inform us what kind of sex Brian liked, and
Paul McCartney, who was kind enough to let us know he had nothing
against Brian being gay or Jewish.
Do you have any shame over claiming "producer" credits
on all those early Stones albums?
Colin Worsley, Devon
You are there to remind the artist of all the possibilities that are
available to best serve the song and the performance. When recording a
group the producer should also know when to leave the room, but he
should always leave the tape running. My Mesolithic run includes some
perfect recorded moments, some very good trys and an acceptable amount
of dreck. I participated in this work as the producer. If I had not, you
would never have heard the recordings because they just would not have
been recorded. My headstone will proudly state, "He Gave Us
Satisfaction" though don't count on me being under it, as some of
my friend's may have smoked me.
If you were still in the game, would you manage a boy band? If so,
what would your first piece of advice to them be?
Nadine Webb, Hertfordshire
You're right, I am not "in the game". If I was it would
depend if this boy band of yours wrote their own songs or not. A group
without songs is an aeroplane without parachutes. As for advice, if you
are not prepared to get screwed the first time around and remain
standing, then find another game. The system functions on giving you one
slice of the cake and then inviting you to eat away at yours. Of course,
if I was 19 I'd jump right in again regardless.
Which of the Rolling Stones would you most like to have round to
tea today, and why?
Jess Naylor, King's Lynn, Norfolk
Brian Jones. When I arrived in Colombia in 1975 and realised I was
home I was so happy. I looked up at the sky and said, "Brian, you
fool. Why did you have to take it all so seriously? You should have
stuck around for the good time" Anyway, that was when I was 31,
it's 26 years later and I know a little more. I'd have time for him now
whereas then he just got in the way, and being young and invincible and
struggling to keep this thing we'd got going, we pushed him aside and
let him drown, in all senses of the word. Brian was obviously seriously
disturbed. So was I, but less seriously.
Are you as bad a man as you'd have people think?
Michael Forman, by e-mail
I've never set out to have myself thought of as bad. I just lay the
facts out as flat data, ma'am. Truculent, obstinate, teenage,
excessive... yes. What do you expect from a 21-year- old kid driving
around in a Phantom V who hasn't paid his taxes? But bad? Not at all, my
universe is clear and I'm an asset to it.
Would you let your daughter marry a Rolling Stone?
P McMillan, Stafford
I was sure not to have daughters so as to avoid dilemmas of that
sort. A friend once told me that if I'd had daughters I'd have packed
them into a plane and I'd be at the gun turret aiming at all incoming
genitalia.
The Stones have produced their own records for decades. But up to Sticky
Fingers, they worked with a strong producer. If you were to
produce their next record, what would you do differently to The Glimmer
Twins?
Steven Gaydos, Hampstead
I'd like 'em all in a room, on no more than 16 track, that way you
might get a recording as inspired as Stripped, which was the
group's last great recording. The rest of it, post "Start Me
Up", has been a techno mumbo-jumbo subject to a world that's, for
the most part, more interested in Jerry Hall's point of view than Mick
Jagger's.
What kind of a name is Loog, isn't it time you dropped it?
Pauline Symes, Colchester
No, it's not. Loog was my father's surname. He was a Texas airman of
Dutch heritage named Andrew Loog. My mother was his girlfriend during
World War Two. He expired dropping bombs for you on Hitler six months
before I was born. My mother gave me his name, Andrew Loog and her
maiden name, Oldham, and I'm proud of all them.
What were the three adjectives that went through your head when
you first met Mick Jagger?
Meera Norton, London
I can't remember the adjectives but my general reaction "Oh, my
God, I never thought my future would be in trousers".
Don't you realise Scientology is a form of brainwashing?
S Patton, by e-mail
Oh, I hope so, my brain really needed a spring clean. I no longer
keep any thoughts that I did not choose to put into my own uni-verse.
I'm sure there are many ways to get better and back into life but
Scientology is what worked and works for me. It jump-started my ability
to return to a productive life after 30 years out there in the cold.
Who killed Brian Jones?
Olivia Wade, Cardiff
PJ Proby. Just kidding, Brian managed it all on his own.
Of all the beautiful women who used to hang out with the Stones,
which one was the most arresting?
Kyle Hanlon, by e-mail
Anita Pallenberg. An absolutely devastating lady, deadlier than the
male and twice as attractive. If she had played guitar!
Do any of today's bands have what you saw the Stones had when you
saw them for the first time?
Rupert Morden, Wimbledon
The last time I saw that flash was when Ken East of EMI took me to a
club on Charing Cross Road underneath the old Astoria to see the first
London gig of Duran Duran as their first single was about to enter the
charts. So it was a career-breaking moment. The group were on that
exciting tightrope and it showed. The drummer was real, and was as
opposite to the group as Charlie Watts was to the Stones and it worked.
They were hungry young pups with a view for the kill. Since then, the
first eight years of Gary Oldman is about as good as it gets. He gets
all the roles Mick Jagger dreams of.
Met any good Svengalis lately?
Lisa Clements, by e-mail
My last sighting was Berry Gordy Jr in 1972. Does that count? The
problem with being a Svengali in such an excessive media age as today is
that you get a platform that rightfully belongs to the artist and that
is not good for business. The true Svengalis of the day are the artists
who basically manage and divine themselves daily Ricky Martin,
Madonna, Tom Cruise, Mariah Carey are some who do it. This brand of
artist all have business antenna that make your actual Svengali, such as
the likes of Malcolm McLaren and those who followed me, redundant.
If the Sixties was your decade, whose century was it?
W Hughes, Hastings
Sir Alexander Fleming, Aids, Adolf Hitler and The Beatles have to be
in the A list.
Why did you move to Colombia?
Sarah Milnes, by e-mail
I went to see a play called John, Paul, George, Ringo and Bert
at the Saville Theatre in London in 1974. In the intermission I was
introduced to an actress from Colombia named Esther Farfan. I was
mesmerised, I still am. I had the good sense to follow her home to
Colombia the next year and ask her to let me be a part of her life.
We'll have been married 25 years next 14 February.
Since giving up drugs have you ever been tempted to take them
again? If so what provoked it?
B Burridge, London
Oh, they've loomed up on my radar screen and the cinema screen via
such films as Trainspotting or Traffic. The toilet scene
in Trainspotting had me forget I was watching a movie and wonder
how they knew so much about me. I'm not tempted because I never get the
"nice to be high" re-stimulation, I get the "done too
much" re-stimulation and there's nothing attractive about that. I
saw cocaine in a dressing room in New York last September, it was the
first time since I stopped all that in 1995. It was a dead issue.
Who of the other greats of the Sixties would you have most fancied
managing?
T Branwell, Luton
I had the very best of it. I met the Stones when we could do no wrong
and for a short while everything we did was right. I'll settle for that.
'Stoned' by Andrew Loog Oldham is published as a paperback by
Vantage, priced £7.99
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