To Absent Friends - Charlie Watts

 

Charlie Watts

1941-2021

The news came with a simple announcement:

As a young boy in England, Charlie Watts loved music and showed a propensity for playing the drums.  Educated as a graphic designer, he worked in a London ad agency, and messed around playing drums in various blues and jazz bands.  In 1963, singer Mick Jagger asked him to join in a band that he was forming with Keith Richards and Brian Jones.  Thus, the Rolling Stones as the world came to know them were born, and Watts was a part of it for over fifty years.

I won't pretend to offer critical commentary about Watts' ability as a drummer.  Jagger and Richards swore by him, so that's good enough for me, and I loved this quote that I saw in his obituary that appears in  Variety online today.  This is from a 2019 review in that publication of the Stones' tour that was taking place at the time:

“Sitting at a minimalist kit and moving even more minimally with his casual jazz grip, [Watts looks] like the mild-mannered banker who no one in the heist movie realizes is the guy actually blowing up the vault.”

RIP Charlie Watts

"The World's Greatest Rock & Roll Band" 

Watts, Richards, Jagger, and Ronnie Wood 

The Rolling Stones