The craggy Stone

Watching Keith Richards play the guitar is like seeing a piece of rock n' roll soul in action. He is 63 this December and he remains one of the genre's big-time movers. To me, he is one of the rock icons of our time.

As the rhythm guitarist of The Rolling Stones, Keith is known for the raw passion than the flashy technique that other guitarists adopt. His singing, seems to a large extent, instinctive.

I remember during the Stones concerts back in 2003, he sang "Slipping Away", "Happy", "Thru & Thru" and "Before They Make Me Run". Before he sings, he clears his throat. No mean feat, he must have decades' worth of nicotine down his throat. One loud uummmphhh and the throat clearing turns to a hacking cough and he lights up a cigarette on stage. Keith Richards winds up laughing.

The opening guitar riff for "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" has been compared and widely known as "rock's equivalent to Beethoven's Fifth". Very flattering, I guess.

Well, truly Keith Richards is the undisputed tough and craggy Stone that I knew of. He stills remains the personification of rock n' roll's delinquent tendency. As the key figure of The Rolling Stones (besides Mick), he has contributed a pivotal musical legacy and still looking unbowed since the early sixties. Five decades of barely imaginable mayhem.