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This is Later with Lee Matthews,
the Lee Matthews Podcast. More of what

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you here Weekday Afternoon is on the
Drive. Robert Greenfield is a former associate

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editor of the London Bureau of Rolling
Stone Magazine. Gary Stromberg represented music industry

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superstars including The Rolling Stones, Pink
Floyd, Barbara Streissan, Elton John,

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The Doors, Earth Wind and Fire, and many more. They've teamed up

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for a podcast that can be heard
on the iHeartRadio app and everywhere you get

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podcast Stones Touring Party, A long
hot Summer with the Rolling Stones greeting greetings,

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gentlemen. Hey Lee, good to
be with you, to me with

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you, Yeah, Robert, I
want to start with you. When did

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you decide to sit down with Gary
and just to put together this podcast?

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Well, it was never a decisionally, I got Gary and I were very

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close on the tour with your main
friends for all these years. And then

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astonishingly, like maybe two and a
half years ago, he called one day

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had said, hey, it's the
fiftieth anniversary of the Rolling Stone Store stp

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Journey through America with the Rolling Stones, the book I wrote about that tour,

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And I said, right, so
who cares? And marry who you

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know that I followed as a lead
forever said no, Bob, it's a

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podcast. So anyway, it took
a while, and anybody could have put

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it out for the fiftieth anniversary.
We got it out for the fifty first

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anniversary, and it just kept mushrooming
and getting bigger. And we discovered sixty

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hours of interviews that I had done
right after the tour that I had never

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heard. I had, I mean, I had heard them, but I

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had never transcribed them, had never
maked. Anyway, they were on cassettes

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and they were digitized, and so
we have Mick Jagger and Keith everybody talking

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about what it was like to tour
America in what was really a long,

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hot summer when there was all kinds
of political stuff going on, social,

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cultural and the stone. Gary will
tell you, because he handled all this

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and arranged it any place we went
that summer, we were front page news.

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And Gary, did did you get
a lot of audio from Keith Richards

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and Mick Jagger talking about what it
was like to be at the birth of

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Christ? Thank you for getting that. Thank you for getting that. I

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forgot to ask that course, but
I interrupted you. Gary, you were

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going to say something else, go
ahead. They were the wise man.

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Ye yes, Chart was the drummer
boy anyway. But Gary, this what

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was so special about this particular tour, this particular summer, Well, if

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you had to sum it up in
one word, it was danger. It

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was danger kind of sat over our
shoulder the entire length of this tour.

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And there were just several incidents where
we were acutely aware of threats that were

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constantly around us on this tour.
From the big very beginning in Vancouver to

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a bomb threat in Montreal to getting
arrested in Rhode Island. There was just

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there was always something going on that
lets you know that this wasn't a normal

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rock and roll tour. Let me
just throw this in the mix, and

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you know, Gary remembers it all, so do I. Kind of getting

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arrested in Rhode Island while the concert
was in Boston, which was one in

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flames, there had been a race
ride and the ghetto was burning and the

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Stones were not there and there were
a lot of really angry people assemble to

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see them. And Chip Monk,
who was the stage manager and everything and

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kept playing the music, and the
Mayor of Boston came to address the crowd

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to beg them to be good so
he could deploy police and fire to keep

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the city from burn. I mean, you can't make this up. Robert

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Greenfield is with us along with Gary
Stromberg. They host the podcast Stones Touring

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Party Long a long, hot summer
with the Rolling Stones. Why did because

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so many of the bands of that
era really burned out because of that hard

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living lifestyle, what was it about
the guys that kept them kept that from

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happening. It's a really good question. I mean, I think I once

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asked Marshall Chess, who was the
head of their record label and the son

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of the famed Leonard Chess, and
his uncle was Phil Chess, who founded

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Chess Records. I said, Marshall, this is later in their career.

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Yeah, so why did they keep
doing this? What? Why are they

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still working? I mean, what
is it? And he said to me,

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Bob, the only time they feel
alive is when they're on stage.

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And again it's more history, unlike
the Beatles, who you know, a

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sensation. The Stones began as a
touring band in England. They worked every

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night, night after night, with
their piano player and eventual roadie Ian Stewart,

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driving them in a Volkswagen bus of
some kind, and they you know,

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once you've become a Gary knows this. Gary has spent so much more

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time on the road than I have. Once you've become addicted to the road,

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that's your life. From my wrong
garret, they as they both Keith

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and Nick book said that we're not
really alive unless we're on stage. There.

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So the recording and all of that
stuff is fine, but they really

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come to life on stage. And
it's very apparent in the podcast here that

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that's what their their ambition is.
Is just the thing I onways think about.

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This may seem insipid, but I
also wrote with Bill Graham, or

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the great Bill Graham, you know, I wrote I wrote his book with

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him. Uh, and so I
once set to him, it's like,

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do what the same question and simply
and this is the greatest rock promoter vault

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time answering kind of a dumb question, said Bob. If they weren't any

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good live, nobody would want to
come see them. Yeah, that's the

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bottom line, isn't it to any
band really, especially of that era.

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Gary Stromberg along with Robert Greenfield and
the podcast is Stones Touring Party, a

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long hot summer with the Rolling Stones. You can hear never before heard interviews

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and conversations with the band from the
guys who were there, watching it happen

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as it happened, documenting it as
it happened on the podcast, on the

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iHeartRadio, appen everywhere you get podcasts. Gary, you were with them more

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than Robert at one point. Was
there ever a point where you were like,

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Okay, things are getting a little
too crazy for me. I'm going

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to go back to the hotel.
Well, Robert was there during the entire

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tour, so I and I only
enjoyed it after the first concert. But

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yes, for many instances where I
had to look myself in the mirror and

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ask me, you know, what
was I doing here? But like I

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said early in this podcast that this
was more fun than I've ever had in

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my life. And I couldn't imagine
that this is where my life had taken

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me, that I was actually touring
with the Rolling Stones at the height of

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their career. It was just an
amazing experience, and I think I conveyed

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beautifully by Bob and I on this
podcast. You know, I also somehow

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feel like will we're edging towards here
and I'll stay away from it are the

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X rated stories when the of course
Gary and I were in the hotel out

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by the airport that we were in
the Stone State and the playmore mentioned in

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Chicago, Heffner numerous playmates, you
know, many of whom I had seen

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before, but only in a magazine, you know. Yeah, under the

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bed being the Mattresses. Yeah,
yeah, yeah. So you know,

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I don't know any other bands who
were hung out there when they were in

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Chicago. We know there was special
I'll say that. So Robert, you

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mentioned too, a lot of the
materials taken off of cassette and was digitized,

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So you all, you both have
seen a lot of changes in the

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music industry technology wise. When Gary
came to you with a podcast, did

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you have to ask what's a podcast? I did not, but I said,

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Gary, I've never listened. I've
never done a podcast, and I've

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also never listened to a podcast,
you know. So actually we went to

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the sessions in la in a horse
drawn wagon. Does that say anything?

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It sounds there was very little video
that existed in nineteen seventy two. This

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is the perfect format for retelling the
story of the nineteen seventy two Stone stour.

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It's not like you had a home
movies everywhere. Yes, a jacket

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shot film, but I mean the
point is just to keep, you know,

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building the level of drama here.
I mean, don't ask me why

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Truman Capponi was on this tour along
with we're along with Jackie Kennedy's sister,

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Princess Lee Radzewell, if you will, a very famous photographer named Peter Beard,

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and so the levels of social interaction
and well, I mean, Gary,

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if we have time, you could
tell him the key story you know

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about Truman. You got a minute, Yeah, go ahead, I'm given

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a signal that we got to wrap
up. Okay, okayacking Truman Caponi tuned

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into the podcast. You'll hear all
about it. That's an excellent teasier and

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an excellent place to leave it.
Guys, Stone's touring Party, A long

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hot summer with the Rolling Stones.
If you love this behind the scenes stuff

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like I do, you'll love this
podcast from Robert Greenfield and Gary Stromberg and

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I thank you for bringing us the
podcast and joining us. Thank you,

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thank you, thanks for listening to
Later with Lee Matthews the Lee Matthew News

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Podcast. And remember to listen to
The Drive Live weekday afternoons from five to

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seven and iHeartMedia presentation

