“My hero?” says Keith Richards. “It’s got to be Muddy Waters. Because I know him as an all-round gent and his music is sublime. Mick Jagger introduced me. The first time Mick and I ever met—we were about 16—he showed me his album on the train. Mick came ’round my house a day or two later and let me listen to it: The Best of Muddy Waters. That was the first time I’d heard Muddy. The first time I met Muddy was in Chicago in 1964. We were doing our first session at Chess studios, and on our way through the studio, Mr. Chess or the management said, ‘You might like to meet this guy.’ And there was a guy painting a ceiling—whitewashing it—on a step ladder. And he turned around and looked down and it was Muddy Waters. He had white paint running all down his black face. They told him, ‘This is the Rolling Stones,’ and he said, ‘I love what you’ve
been doing with my music.’ And there I am looking up, watching the white paint run down that great black face, and he’s smiling. It really was like, ‘Meet the painter.’ And he was doing that because he hadn’t been selling records—that’s how he made his living, he’d paint the studio. They’d go, ‘You’re not selling records, come on over and make a few bucks painting the ceiling.’ Soon after that he got his thing back again—but what a way to meet the man! I’ve never forgotten what a gentleman he was, and it made me think, you didn’t have to be a loudmouth.”