Keith Richards opened up about life during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Rolling Stones revealed he spent most of his time practicing songs to keep busy.
The rock star met up with his The-X-Pensive Winos drummer Steve Jordan recently for a jam session. Richards started the band as a solo pursuit away from the Stones. Richards promoted the band’s album Live at the Hollywood Palladium.
“Not new ones, but I practiced on the old ones. In fact, I had a session, funny to speak of this, just about a week ago, a couple of days, with Steve Jordan,” Richards said. “We worked together a lot, we managed for the first time in – I don’t know – eight months to, ‘Come on, let’s try one out in the city, and going through all the rigmarole and everything.’ We managed a little bit of thunder for a couple of days.”
Keith Richards Is Optimistic For The Future
During the lockdown, Richards confessed that he felt pressure to write new material. He said the period in his life was the longest he hasn’t “jammed with other musicians.”
“It’s the longest time I’ve ever done nothing,” Richards said. “I’ve been playing around, of course. I do it anyway. In fact, I feel a bit of pressure – write some songs for Christ’s sake!”
The pandemic came in the middle of production of The Rolling Stones’ new record. Richards said the band is trying to figure out logistics of getting together and performing while also social distancing. He said he’s uncertain what lies in the future, but he also feels optimistic.
“I imagine we’re not the only ones, it’s everywhere – if you want to pull in restaurants, sports… I realized that we’re all suffering from this,” Richards said. “What we need is to get the act together, man. I don’t want to predict anything right now, and I think anybody that does this – they are crazy!”
He continued, “Yeah, I’m sure. I’ve told all the boys to keep jogging. And it’s just a matter of when. Would it be like next year? It like with everybody else, we’re in a bit of a conundrum, and the first opportunity we’ll be back. First off, we missed this year’s tour and we The Stones have never missed a gig. So we feel obliged to fill in these gigs that were booked this year and we couldn’t do them. So, as soon as possible.”
[H/T: Raised on Radio]
