Name: Life
Rating: 3.810810810810811 (37 reviews)
ISBN: 9783453163034

Life

Greg Talbot

Not too many of us will experience wild parties at the playboy mansion, world tours with expansive outdoor platforms and being widely regarded as one of the great guitarists. Audaciously titled "Life", Richards converses with us about his road-map. From the hapless post-WW2 childhood of bullying and humble living, Richards auspiciously finds inspiration in those delta blues artists, Muddy Waters and the like. You get a lot of Richards personality, which is remarkably charming. Like a good cocktail, it's a mix of ingredients ever so refined and stirred up in a crazy way. You get Richards the romantic, the instigator, the loyal friend, the castaway wanderer. Richards is likable, but he has a habit of telling long-tells, or giving way to make himself in the most positive light. His drug use is told inconsistently at times, and generally talks about himself as one in control during those times. Generally upbeat, but you do get a sense that the recklessness has taken a huge toll in his personal life. His relationship to his son is not all that warm and more procedural. Also these little inserts of other narrators feel a little too glossy at times. A lot of image-making going on there. Gotta give Richards credit for doing a little demythology in his writing though. Our Captain Jack Sparrow blasts his fellow mate Mick as being an opportunist, classist, and all around jerk. Richards quietly establishes himself as a very hard-working guitar player. In times of stress with law or relationship discord, he talks about working on his craft in a very structured way. Ultimately I come down really enjoying this book. Richard crafts his nuggets of wisdom in a salt of the earth, your best mate kinda way. He does share a lot of stories of women, boozing, the touring life, being a loyal friend that humanizes him. Being a Rolling Stones fan helps too. It may not be life as I know it. Still you got to admire the view of this high flying rouge.

Jeannette Ordas

I don't know why I just didn't stop reading - well, skimming was more like it. Keith Richards doesn't seem very likable and he's full of himself and has lots of gossipy things to say about his band mates and other celebrities.

Josh Clement

Listened to the audiobook version, which I recommend as it's partly read by Keith himself

Robin M Cabana

This was just pure rock and roll. I loved the audio book readings by Johnny Depp and Keith himself. As a big Stones fan, I've never read that much about them so it was fun to hear about all the crazy stories, the drama and back stabbing, the technical details about playing guitar. I'm a much bigger Keith Richards fan now.

Jason Porterfield

Tracey O’Rourke

I really wish I had liked this book better. There were times when I thought I liked it, mostly when Keith was writing about writing music. But in the end, it was much too rambling to be enjoyable. The final straw was towards the end when in the middle of a moderately interesting section, Keith suddenly feels the need to tell us how he makes Bangers and Mash. I don't care. This autobiography is missing the one thing that autobiographies need - I knew no more about the subject when finished the book than I did before I started.

Nikolay Bachiyski

I really enjoyed Keith Richards' life story. Especially the motivations versus just the string of events.

I didn't expect all the great details about the process of writing songs.

John Philpin

Wonderful book - and this from someone who was never a fan of the Stones - but always a fan of great music - and living

Life

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