Bill Wyman remembered the beginnings of the Rolling Stones and the financial difficulties which notably pushed them to leave England.
Like any young training just starting out, The Rolling Stones struggled. At the beginning of the 1970s, the group’s situation was even very precarious, despite the commercial successes of “Beggars Banquet”, “Let It Bleed” and “Sticky Fingers”.
“In the red”
“We had no money”, recalled Bill Wyman during an interview given to Classic Rock magazine. If the records sold wildly, it was their manager, Allen Klein, who managed the wallet of the band Mick Jagger. “He had all the money, and when we wanted something, we had to beg him to send it to us”, he reveals.
Constamment “in the red”, the period was not really conducive to fun. “We didn’t party all the time, we worried about being able to pay our bills, confides the bassist. It was a nightmare”. But the worst was to come for their bank account.
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When the then Prime Minister Harold Wilson imposes a tax on income at 93%, Rolling Stones were completely forced to leave the United Kingdom in the spring of 1971. “It was absurd, poursuit Bill Wyman. We had to leave because we owed so much money in taxes, that with 93% taxes we would never have been able to earn enough to pay it back”.
Result ? Failing to have its income taxed, the group is accused of being privileged, opting for tax exile in order to keep its fortune in its pocket. “We were accused of being multi-millionaires who were leaving the country because we didn’t want to pay our share, but that was false”, says the musician. But not everyone was in the same boat.
“They didn’t care”
Bill Wymanwho left the Rolling Stones in 1993, revealed that it had had to cover an overdraft of £200,000 after several years of inactivity by the group. “I should have left sooner… in the 1980s″, he regrets. Brian Jones as for him, died with £30,000 in debt. In contrast, Mick Jagger et Keith Richards fared much better thanks to copyright and publishing rights.
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“Mick et Keith were totally rich, so they didn’t care, he confides. But me, Charlie et Ronniewe managed as best we could. Ronnie started making art to feed his family. I started playing with them again in the hope that it would only be for a few years because I wanted to do all these other things”.
Bill Wyman released his 9th solo album, “Drive My Car”, on August 9. He also made an appearance on the new album of Rolling Stones“Hackney Diamonds”, published just a year ago.
