Bandmate attacks Jagger over knighthood
Rolling Stones star Keith Richards has launched a scathing attack on Mick Jagger for accepting a knighthood.
Richards dismissed the honour as “paltry” and said his friend’s decision to accept it was “ludicrous”.
Jagger is due to collect his knighthood from the Queen of England at Buckingham Palace on Friday December 12, nearly 18 months after it was first announced.
But Richards told Uncut magazine: “I thought it was ludicrous to take one of those gongs from the Establishment when they did their very best to throw us in jail.
“Just as we were about to start a new tour, I thought it sent out the wrong message. It’s not what the Stones is about, is it?”
He went on: “I don’t want to step out on stage with someone wearing a f***ing coronet and sporting the old ermine. I told Mick, ‘It’s a f***ing paltry honour’.
“He defended himself by saying that Tony Blair insisted that he took the knighthood. Like that’s an excuse. Like you can’t turn down anything. Like it doesn’t depend how you feel about it.”
His comments echo a tirade last year in which Richards threatened to pull out of the band’s tour in a row over the knighthood.
Then he accused his bandmate of more than four decades of “blind stupidity” in agreeing to accept the honour.
The guitarist, once imprisoned in Wormwood Scrubs after a conviction – later quashed – for allowing cannabis to be smoked at his home, said in September last year: “I doubt they thought of offering me one.
“Because they know what I would’ve said. The idea that I’d take something from the people At Whose Pleasure I was banged up – they knew I’d tell them where they could put it.”
Jagger is finally attending his investiture after taking months to fix a date.
He was due to accept the knighthood on December 10 but pulled out because it was the same day as England rugby hero Jonny Wilkinson was being presented with his MBE.
Jagger will be accompanied to the Palace by his 90-year-old father, Joe.
