Socks N Mugs N Rock N Roll

I was reading an article about Aerosmith Singer Steven Tyler the other day. Apparently the rest of his band are rumoured to be arranging a tour … without him! Madness!!

The reason for the band taking such drastic action is down to the fact that Tyler (a reformed alcoholic and drug addict) has rather spectacularly ‘fell off the wagon’. To add to Tyler’s new found adventurism and waywardness he has also shacked up with a new girlfriend old enough to be one of his pubic hairs!

The above behaviour by Mr Tyler and his new squeeze has provoked outrage amongst the music and mainstream press calling for him to “act his age” and “grow up”. So I have a question: why should these rock stars (and anyone else of an ‘older persuasion’) grow old gracefully?

Another fine example of these older men going through these bouts of mid-life crisis is good old Ronnie Wood from The Rolling Stones. He, like Tyler, has pretty much gone down the same route. But, If Ronnie Wood wants to run off with a nineteen year old Russian cocktail waitress, then good on him. Most people probably think “dirty old pervert” and “what his wife is left to do without him?”(and without access to his credit card no doubt), but the truth is most people are probably thinking about this fit Russian girl bouncing up and down on Wrinkly Ronnie’s Wrinkly Old Chap thinking “lucky bastard”. If you’re not thinking it, you’re plain and simply a liar.

Now don’t get me wrong here, the sight of Mick Jagger, Rod Stewart and Steven Tyler prancing around in a skin tight eye patch covering their Shells is hardly top of the list of most people’s to die for sights in their life, but the point here is this: why not? It’s quite hard to believe here, but some people do actually see it as … wait for it … fun! And people are still prepared to pay big money to see these acts of public exhibitionism (i’m talking about them performing live by the way)

Not everyone has the panache the likes of Wood & Tyler can (if you pardon the expression) pull off though as there are the odd grumpy bastard still getting their rocks off. Take Van ‘The Man’ Morrison for instance. Van quit the bottle a good few years ago, so in order for him to maintain his position on the wagon, he has banned the sale of alcohol at all his concerts! Maybe Van should think about staying home and taking up knitting instead of moaning his way round the circuit propping up the dug up corpse of Georgie Fame at his keyboard! Miserable arld’ git!

But who is to say these men should suddenly start acting like responsible adults and force feed their grand children Werther’s Originals while reading The People’s Friend in between episodes of Countdown? I, for one, am not! After all, it’s a free(ish) country and the age old statement of “if you don’t like it, don’t watch it” certainly applies to anyone from the Mary Whitehouse Brigade who is offended by it. Simples!

One final note to remember is this:

“A rolling stone gathers no moss”

As for grey (platinum) hair – we’ll leave that subject for another day shall we?

Mol