Jagger is unbearable, says fellow Richards

Keith Richards has described fellow Rolling Stone Mick Jagger as “unbearable” in a candid memoir that lays open their fraught relationship.

In his autobiography Life, the musician reveals his nicknames for Mr Jagger are Brenda or Your Majesty, and compares coping with an annoying mynah bird as “like living with Mick”.

Mr Richards writes of the distance between the pair, saying: “I used to love Mick, but I haven’t been to his dressing room in 20 years. Sometimes I think, ‘I miss my friend’. I wonder, ‘Where did he go?’.”

He uses the book, serialised in The Times, to take personal swipes at his bandmate, writing: “It was the beginning of the 80s when Mick started to become unbearable.”

He also dismissed Mr Jagger’s solo album Goddess In The Doorway by saying: “It’s like Mein Kampf – everyone had it, but no one read it.”

In an interview with Caitlin Moran, Mr Richards, 67, says Mr Jagger has read Life and adds: “I think it opened his eyes, actually.”

Asked by Ms Moran whether he was trying to “wind up” Mr Jagger, Mr Richards replies: “We’ve had our beefs but, hey, who doesn’t? You try and keep something together for 50 years.”

He insists in the interview that he still wants to work with Mr Jagger, saying he plans to go on tour with the Rolling Stones.

Despite years of drug taking, Mr Richards told Ms Moran he hopes he has many years left to live, adding: “Well, I’m not putting death on the agenda. I don’t want to see my old friend Lucifer just yet. He’s the guy I’m gonna see, isn’t it? I’m not going to the Other Place, let’s face it.”