Mick Jagger has been alive for 80 slutty, slutty years.
Whilst I love to belittle and berate this man just as much as the next guy [and maybe even more] today feels a more appropriate day than ever to commend him for the trailblazer and icon he always has been and always will be.
From sexual liberation, to makeup, jewels, being more than a brain dead rockstar, Mick Jagger has proved he owns every single piece of the iconography attached to his name.
It was in the early 1960s when the world was introduced to one of the sharpest and weirdly androgynous men of the 20th century: Michael Phillip Jagger.
He wasn’t like any of the other popstars. He had his hair cut into a long shag, he was known for his wild movements, and was one of the only boy band members who seemed to rival his elders in wit and knowledge. While they could disagree with him, they knew that disagreement would trap them into a battle with the sharp tongued, wide lipped economic school drop out, someone they’d lose every battle with.
It was once he started writing his own music with Keith Richards that fear truly set in around him. If a 22 year old who had hoards of fans was going to write a song like Satisfaction and then bark it through every radio and speaker to young people he surely would radicalize, who wouldn't that strike fear into? He’d shown enough fear whilst simply missing a haircut or two, and now he’s proving his worth, something he would do time and time again.
It would be the later 60s when he would truly develop into who we view as Mick Jagger. It would be his 1967 arrest at Keith Richards home, the op-ed Who Breaks a Butterfly On A Wheel, and a World in Action interview in which he sits with suits in debate about the rights of individuals. It would be his protesting with the people against the Vietnam War, penning some of the most intelligent and thought provoking songs about his generation [take the intricate history lessons weaved into his takedown of humanity and religion in Sympathy for the Devil or his juxtaposition laced, grim look at war in 1969’s Gimme Shelter], and starring in a film that pushed a boundary of gender and sexuality whilst standing as one of the most looked at people in the world.
His looks would grow extravagant. From his turtlenecks and corduroys to bedazzled jumpsuits and painted nails, he kept every eye on him. It was whilst dressed in ways to turn heads he’d turn more once he was sat down and spoken too, proving once more he was sharp as knife and cunning as a snake.
The thing about Mick Jagger, the thing that’s always been about Mick Jagger, is he is an act. He doesn’t exist on a plane of existence as he is barely real. His antics are his stage act, the man that leaps like a toddler and rolls around in tights is not the same one who can maintain a lively discussion on morality and business, as in those moments, he’s not acting.
While Bob Dylan went into hiding after a 1968 motorcycle accident, The Beatles broke up, and his own band was in shambles behind him, Jagger never flinched. He kept his band at the top of the world, and remains too, a near impossible feat. While he looked stupid, flailing around and slurring words, he kept it together better than anyone else in his position did. The two most turbulent decades is when the man reigned over rock, setting new standards for what it meant to be a frontman.
Many are compared to him in their ability to wrap audiences around their finger, but no one did it before him and can do it quite like him. It’s not just the dance, or the innuendo, or the music for Jagger. He combines all of them into his stage act, walking the line between inducing a riot and giving people a good time. He effortless weaved multiple popular genres into The Stones music throughout the 70s, from glam, ballads, soul, funk, reggae - he kept the band relevant and kept the band close enough to their roots to not fall into cover band territory, once more walking a thin line that his strut manages to make look effortless. It was when Jagger became the band's ringleader that they became the biggest in the world. It was his idea for a logo so iconic it would introduce them without words, his idea to make the tours a spectacle as opposed to a show. He never made quite a big mockery of the band through branding as Gene Simmons of Kiss, but once more showcased the art of balance and its importance to running a show as he has.
It was his childish eye rolls and death glares towards Ed Sullivan's cameras in 1967 due to being asked to change words of the hit Let's Spend the Night Together that created an image for him. Between that, the mismatched clothes, and dancing he began to look about as dumb as… as well Mick Jagger. But it was this same man that just 3 years later would take the brunt of responsibility for Altamont, and the tragedy that occurred. He saw how his selfishness and ego caused tragedy, and did the little he could to showcase an understanding of that. It was his idea to release the documentary Gimme Shelter despite the tragedy, deciding it was important that people see what happened, as opposed to hiding it away in vaults and pretending as though it never happened. A
mature response to an event caused by childish immaturity.
From fashion, to wit, musical triumphs and tragedies, and 60 years as the world’s most famous name, there will never be enough to say about the man who flipped stereotypes on their head and personified what it meant to be a rockstar for all it was worth.
For all there is to say about Mick Jagger, words seem to fall flat in description of him. For all he is and for all he’s done it's hard not to end with the same things everyone says. He’s a toddler with a college education, and the best to have done it with no competition.
Here’s to many more slutty years of the icon that Mick Jagger, the personification of living like a Rolling Stone.
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