Bassist Bill Wyman, who returned to the fold with The Rolling Stones for their 26th studio album Hackney Diamonds in 2023, has revealed that after the passing of drummer Charlie Watts, he thought the band would have decided to throw in the towel.
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Wyman, bassist for The Rolling Stones from 1962 to 1993 and reunited again on their 2023 Andrew Watt-produced Hackney Diamonds, tells Louder that after the passing of longtime drummer Charlie Watts in 2021, it felt to him like a good time to officially end the band.
“When Charlie left, I thought they would close. I really did,” Wyman says. “They could replace the bass, but I didn’t think they could replace Charlie, and his charisma, and what a great guy he was, but they went on, which surprised me. I wouldn’t say it disappointed me, but it surprised me."
“I think it would’ve been a good time for them" to put the band to rest at that time he adds, "But I don’t think they’ve got anything else to do, otherwise they’d do it, wouldn’t they?”
“I’ve got six different things I’m doing all the time, and I’m so happy doing them, but I don’t think they… Well, Ronnie’s got art, as a second thing… And Mick’s tried to do movies and things but hasn’t really succeeded, and he’s done solo stuff which really didn’t work as well as it should’ve done either. And so they just… It’s just the Stones all the time,” he explains.
Elsewhere in the interview, Wyman admits he wasn't all that fond of the song he recorded on the latest Stones record, “Live by the Sword,” but chose to do it simply because it was one of the last recordings that Charlie had completed.
“After I left the band, until he died, we saw each other every week. He would come to the house. ‘Can I have a cup of tea, Bill?’ And we’d spend an hour or two chatting,” he says. “When the Stones had that one track with Charlie on it, Mick Jagger and the producer Andrew Watt called to ask me to play on it… I was quite happy to do it, actually.”
Although he says, “I wasn’t crazy about the song, and I wasn’t crazy about the way they’d done it. It was just full of guitars, and there was no air in it. No spaces, no gaps. … It could have been done so much simpler. But that’s the way they do it, bless ’em. It was hard for me to put a bass in because there wasn’t a lot of room... But it was nice doing it, because it was me and Charlie again."
Bill continued, "Anyway, after I’d finished my part, and was happy with it, I said: 'Have you got any other songs that I could do while I’m here?' They said: 'Yeah, there’s another one.' So they set it up, and I played bass on it, and they said: 'We’ll save that for the next album.' So I might be on the next album as well," he revealed. Read the full interview HERE.
Wyman left the group after a 30 year tenure to pursue other endeavors in 1993, though he says frontman Mick Jagger and Watts both tried to get him to remain in the band. “I left in 1991," he says, "but they would not believe me. They refused to accept I had left."
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