Keith Richards says drugs “never did anything” for his creativity.
Richards, who has been open about his past drug use, insisted that the idea that illegal substances can provide inspiration is a myth and revealed he stopped using drugs because he didn’t want them to become more important to him than the music.
Speaking to Kirsty Young on BBC Radio 4’s ‘Desert Island Discs’, he said: “I have never felt it did anything for my creativity. It kept me up a lot at nights looking for the stuff.
“It was something that I had to stop because I realised there are experiments that go on too long. Some people can handle things and other people can’t. If the drugs become more important than the music then you’ve lost the battle.”
Keith also opened up about going on stage just two hours after his 10 month old son Tara died in 1976.
He said:””It was such a shock at the time especially… I’m getting a phone call in Paris and this happened in Geneva, and I thought, I’m going to go mad… unless I do this show tonight.”
“If I just sit here with this idea, I don’t know what I’ll do. Maybe it was just a sense of self-preservation… it was a rough, rough thing. I had a feeling this is a show and I must go on stage. I’ll worry and grieve and think about this all after the show.”
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