I remember this shot –This is one of the few times that we had to wait on Keith and that’s why I remember it. We were at the Plaza Hotel and we were all downstairs waiting. I used the outside house phone and Ethan captured this shot.
We were in New York for Thanksgiving on the ’69 tour. My wife’s relatives lived in New Jersey and we went to their house in Maplewood, NJ for Thanksgiving. We brought back a ‘care package’ of turkey and all the fixings to our room at the Plaza. Mick Taylor and Rose were hanging out with us in our room and I offered Mick some Turkey. He told me he was a vegetarian and had been for many years. Mick was a very nice guy and said that he would share in our holiday celebration and would eat the turkey. He did. Not too long thereafter, Mick got sick and threw up. (nice Thanksgiving image) He later told me that after that he went back to eating meat. I still feel a bit guilty..
Tags: Mick Taylor
When the tour ended in California 1966, our charter plane was heading back to the East coast and the pilot asked if we wanted to be dropped anywhere along the route back. Keith asked if I wanted to join him and Gered Mankowitz on an overnight camping , horseback riding trip to Scottsdale, Arizona. I loved the idea and told the pilot to drop us off in Scottsdale. We made arrangements with John Wayne’s cowboy guide (the chiseled faced cowboy looking scruffy guy in the picture) to take us out. The only shoes I had were my Bally shoes and a pair of jeans.. so much for home on the range. When we arrived we outfitted ourselves with chaps, hats, and Winchester rifles. Keith also had a custom made .45 that was loaned to him by Lou Adler. A horseback riding we went. At the very start of our quest for nature my horse walked through a stream and started pawing the water I asked what this meant and found out, as the horse laid down in the stream with me aboard. So much for the Bally shoes…no wonder they wear boots. The image above is prior to Keith and I shooting at targets. I think the .45 jammed after a couple of shots. The carbines were fun as they reminded us of the “old west”. Our biggest concern was that the horses would ‘spook’ and run away.
I have more to tell later, for now, I will mention that a bobcat stole our bacon and there is more to come with our other horseback riding adventures in Dallas, etc.
Tags: Gered Mankowitz, Keith Richards
Further to Keith’s, LIFE — he goes into a lot of detail about his friendship and times with Gram. It includes a lot of detail of their drug dalliances.. I don’t know if Keith remembers this one…We were in San Francisco at the Mark Hopkins Hotel ( I believe) and I got a call from Keith to come to his suite, immediately. I rushed up to his room and he and Gram called out to me to come into the bedroom. In the bedroom was a large four poster bed with these large wooden posts on each corner. Keith stood next to one of the posts and said, “Ronnie, look!” and then he lifted his left arm up with his right arm and swung his left arm like a baseball bat, into the wooden post. “I can’t feel a thing!” Gram did the same and they both said they were freaked as they had no feeling in their arms. Yet they kept saying, “Look” and kept smashing them into the post.. I got a doctor and the doctor client privilege takes over as I didn’t hear anything else about it and they both seemed fine the next day.. It is still one of the wildest things I have ever seen.
Tags: Gram Parsons, Keith Richards
I am listening to Keith’s LIFE audio book and I came across his describing his relationship with Anita. At one point he says she made him a man. I can give a specific occasion which brings illustration to his statement.
We were in Goteborg, Sweden at the Intercontinental. The tour promoter had gathered the local politicians and their entourage for a sit down long table dinner with all of us. We were at the far end of the table..on my left was Anita Pallenburg, Keith and then about 10 ‘others’ across from me was Bill and Charlie, it was awhile before Mick got there. A waiter appeared and Anita whispered something to him–she asked as to what was the strongest alcohol that was traditional –he appeared with a bottle of a clear liquid (probably like straight grain alcohol). Anita took a water glass and filled it from the bottle, she then took the glass and chugged it. Slammed the glass down in front of Keith, refilled it and said..”prove to me that you’re a man”..Keith chugged it as all us ‘men’ did..when Mick appeared we were getting quite drunk and he wanted to catch up so he chugged a glass.. By now things were getting noisy, Keith had put his feet up on the table, smashing the plates that were there, and once again we were talking louder …the promoter signaled me over –he said that I had to try and get them under control as it was bothering the people.. I called the boys over and we actually huddled..I said that the promoter had called me over to help get them under control and laughed that he didn’t realize how drunk I was and we just laughed about it.. Keith ended up on the floor of the restaurant making out with Anita, at this time the promoter, politicians, etc left. A waitress came over to pull Anita off of Keith and Keith accidently hit her with his arm–a photo of this was on the front page of the paper the next day..
A waitress came over to me and said that the police had been called and I had better get them out of there. I pushed, dragged and carried us out and into the elevator to go up to our rooms..I actually carried Anita and now for something no one knew: As I had Anita in my arms carrying her out of the restaurant, she looked up at me and said, “do me a favor, take me to your room”–she was drunk and not for a second would I ever do that to Keith, myself or the tour and now after Keith’s book it could have been a game she was playing on us as well… I came down a little later and asked the waitress what had happened.. she said the police and a paddy wagon had come but since no one was there..they left…and oh I should know that the police would now not come back on any further call… and with that I went back up to the boys, told them and they ended up back at the restaurant and played there until very early the next morning..
Tags: Anita Pallenburg, Keith Richards
Because of a time problem we had gotten two 6 passenger Lear Jets to fly us to Baltimore. My first request, was based on info that I had picked up somewhere, and that was a request for a power assisted takeoff. It’s basically a booster pack for the jet and when they do that kind of a take off, they taxi down the run way and then launch the jet at a 90 degree angle and you shoot straight up into the sky.. It’s amazing, if you love to be pinned back in your seat because of the ‘ g ‘ forces and heading to the heavens.
After the take off, the two jets were flying side by side when we decided that it would be cool to race the other jet.. We told our pilot to step on it, he said that it was against the FAA rules and they couldn’t race but then he ‘stepped on it’ and we began to race each other..at least the pilots seemed to make it so as each jet leapt in front of the other back and forth as we sped across the sky.. Great fun!!
I don’t recall how I got this picture. It is the Paris show at the Palais des Sports and in the spotlight is my one year old son, Eric Schneider. Looking over him is my ex, Jane, with the glasses and I believe the woman looking from the left is Rose, Mick Taylor’s ex..
Everybody was trying to have a business card that stood out from the usual 2″ x 3″ card–gold embossing, ultra thin translucent paper, eye catching fonts and then John came over and said, “here’s my business card” (it’s 8″ x 11″) (sorry for the bend marks-I don’t treat stuff that well)
So what to you think? Leave a comment and let me know!
Tags: john lennon
One of my fondest memories of being with John Lennon (Yoko, I hope you remember) was one day in 1969, when he was drawing what he envisioned a house should be. He said it should be made of mirrors so it reflects the sky, trees, grass, nature. He said it should be invisible so a plane could fly over and only see the ground, and here it is 41 years later. I always liked and remembered shall I say, that reflection. Yoko and he agreed that it should be round in shape, similar to an igloo. No corners just curves. A bit different than this but the same idea.
They said it couldn’t be done. When we first wrote about the almost invisible tree house to be built in Sweden by Tham & Videgard, 899 commenters thought it was computer-generated eye candy, impossible to build, and death for birds.
But the architects built it, one of six units in a “Treehotel,” which recently opened 40 miles south of the Arctic Circle in Sweden.
And now I just found this…. (I don’t think John was contemplating this as well)
This one-way glass stall looks like a mirror to an outsider, but completely transparent to an insider, leading to a nerve-wracking bathroom experience.
Tags: john lennon, yoko ono
While in a discussion about John and the bed in-I found this on wikipedia…:
During the Vietnam War, in 1969, John Lennon and Yoko Ono held two week-long Bed-Ins for Peace in Amsterdam and Montreal, which were their non-violent ways of protesting wars and promoting peace.
Montreal Bed-in
Their second Bed-In was planned to take place in New York, but John was not allowed into the country because of his 1968 cannabis conviction. Instead they held the event in the Bahamas at the Sheraton Oceanus Hotel, flying there on May 24, 1969, but after spending one night in the heat, they decided to move to Montreal. Setting the record straight: I couldn’t go with them to the Bahamas and sent a friend of mine from Miami to go with them. I thought all was going well until I contacted my friend who came back the next day from the Bahamas. He said that John and Yoko had set up a bed at the foot of the stairs in the room but didn’t like the looks they were getting from the staff at the hotel. Based on the weird vibe they felt..they left for Canada…
Had nothing to do with the heat..they had air conditioning..
Tags: bed-in, john lennon, yoko ono
