Mick Jagger has spent decades collecting stories few people could imagine. One, however, is the story that never happened.
Appearing on SiriusXM’s Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend, The Rolling Stones frontman revealed that he never met Elvis Presley because John Lennon warned him against it. Lennon, who famously met Presley alongside the rest of The Beatles in 1965, apparently came away disappointed–and later convinced Jagger to preserve his own image of the rock ‘n’ roll icon.
“I remember John telling me, ‘You should never meet your heroes. I would never meet Elvis, Mick, if I were you,'” Jagger recalled. “And so I didn’t. I took John’s advice. It was really stupid of me, really. I’d love to have met Elvis.” He added that Lennon repeated the story several times. “Maybe my Elvis version would have been different,” Jagger reflected.
Elsewhere in the podcast–which runs for over an hour–Jagger opened up about his “friendly” rivalry with David Bowie, which pushed both artists creatively. According to Jagger, Bowie became “so competitive” that he felt he had no choice but to respond in kind, recalling how Bowie once played him “The Jean Genie” and jokingly admitted the glam classic was a “homage” after Jagger accused him of borrowing the Rolling Stones’ sound. He also described Lennon as competitive in a different way: “John and I were very competitive too… but we were more competitive in being sarcastic.”
The interview also touched on the Rolling Stones’ recent AI-assisted “In the Stars” music video, which digitally recreated younger versions of the band. Jagger explained that artificial intelligence was used only for the members’ faces, joking that he had to stop production after an early cut accidentally transformed Ronnie Wood into Jeff Beck. He also shared the story behind last month’s viral impromptu pub performance in Oxford, revealing he joined an Irish folk session after chatting with a student over dinner and decided to sing an old standard on the spot after realizing no one else was handling lead vocals.
The interview arrives just days after the Rolling Stones released their 27th studio album, Foreign Tongues, on July 10th. Recorded in under a month in London, the 14-track album features the lead single “In the Stars” alongside guest appearances from Paul McCartney, Robert Smith, and Steve Winwood.
Watch Jagger’s full conversation with Conan O’Brien below.
