On the anniversary of Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts’ death, Mick Jagger posted a video combining photos of the two over the years, with a brief spoken passage and the group’s 1974 song “Till the Next Goodbye.”
“I miss Charlie… because he had a great sense of humor,” Jagger says. “Outside of the band, we used to hang out quite a lot and have interesting times. We loved sports, we’d go to football, we’d go to cricket games, and we had other interests apart from just music. But, of course… I really miss Charlie so much.”
Watts was wry and rock-steady in both his playing and his personality. Never a flashy drummer — he always used a small kit — his whipcrack snare, driving rhythms and preternatural sense of swing powered the band from the day he joined in January of 1963 until his death. Yet his steadiness and low-key demeanor masks the complexity of his work: A lifelong jazz enthusiast — he led several jazz bands over the years during downtime from the Stones — his playing bears a groove and a subtlety that marks the greatest drummers of that genre, along with a disdain for the clichés that many rock drummers fall prey to. (Check out a selection of Watts’ greatest performances with the band here.)
Until the time of his death, the Stones had not played a single concert without him since he joined, and released just a handful of songs recorded with a different drummer. The best-known of those, 1974’s “Its Only Rock and Roll,” features Faces/Small Faces drummer Kenney Jones, who played on the jam session that spawned the song (which also featured Mick Jagger and future Stone Ron Wood, along with David Bowie on backing vocals). Keith Richards added his guitar parts later, but the group never replaced the drum track. Jones said in 2015, “I called Charlie up and said, ‘I didn’t mean to play drums on your album.’ He said, ‘That’s okay. It sounds like me anyway.’ He’s a lovely guy, Charlie. A perfect gentleman.”
Shortly before his death, Watts announced that he would not be joining the group for the tour due to health reasons, but endorsed Steve Jordan — who played for decades on Keith Richards’ solo projects — to take his spot.
“After all the fans’ suffering caused by Covid,” Watts said in a public statement, “I really do not want the many RS fans who have been holding tickets for this tour to be disappointed by another postponement or cancellation. I have therefore asked my great friend Steve Jordan to stand in for me.”
The group has since completed two tours with Jordan, all of which feature a video tribute to Watts.