Why Rolling Stones' Bill Wyman quit the band before his surprising career change

The Rolling Stones' legendary bass player Bill Wyman was back in the spotlight last year when the bandmates reunited for the album Hackney Diamonds. Now the Stones are on the cusp of launching their 19-date tour in America this weekend in Texas.

Even so, Bill says his real life is million miles from the rock 'n' roll lifestyle. The 87-year-old told the Mirror about how much he enjoys spending time at home, adding to his collection of archaeology books and how he's toying with the idea of opening a Rupert Bear museum.

"I’ve an archive of the Stones too," he says. "I’ve got a library that I created of everything that has happened to me. I wanted to keep an archive of the Stones to show my son I was once in a band."

The bassist parted ways with the band in 1991 when he suddenly called it quits after more than 30 years on the road. Now in 2024, the Rolling Stones will be headlining football stadiums again, though Bill says he wouldn't swap places with them for the world.

With a laugh, he says: "I left in 1991 but they would not believe me." Bill ended his 30-year hiatus to play bass with late drummer Charlie Watts on the Hackney Diamonds album track Live By The Sword.

"They refused to accept I had left. It was not until 1993, when they were starting to get together to tour in 1994, when they said, ‘You have actually now left, haven’t you?’ And I said, ‘I left two years ago’. They finally accepted it, so they say I left in 1993."

Bill, who made a personal fortune of £60million with the band, admits he grew tired of spending nights in far-flung places.

"I just had enough. It was half my life and I thought, ‘I have got other things I want to do’," he says. "I wanted to do archaeology, write books, have photo exhibitions and play charity cricket. I used to read about ancient cultures while I was on the road and take photos as well. I just had this whole other life I wanted to live."

After the Stones, he wrote books and became a metal detectorist who hunted for treasure. One of his notable hobbies is collecting - Bill collects stamps, cigarette cards, music hall posters and Roman coins, as well as comics, children’s books and every Rupert Bear annual since 1936. Bill says his hobby is borne from learning to value things as a child.

"Growing up in the war we did not have presents. But we had Rupert Bear annuals which we all shared. I used to read them to the younger ones. And then I started to collect them as I was crazy about them. It was ­something that stuck with me.

"I’ve got the whole series right to the present day and I have other stuff like Rupert scarves, badges, postage stamps. I could fill a museum with it. Maybe one day. I love collecting and don’t like throwing things away."

Bill talked about his life and time in the Stones at National Army Museum in Chelsea, West London, where he lives with wife Suzanne Accosta. The event helped launch his latest book, Billy in the Wars, which charts his childhood in Penge, South East London.

Bill says his early years were "scarred by poverty" after surviveing the Blitz, which killed some of his neighbours. From the age of 19, he spent two years of national service in the Royal Air Force, which led to him being posted to Germany, where he ­discovered the birth of rock ’n’ roll in dance halls. Fast forward to 1962 and he heard an emerging rhythm and blues band called The Rolling Stones were looking for a bassist. He auditioned in a pub in Chelsea... and the rest is musical history.

The three remaining Stones – Sir Mick ­Jagger, 80, Keith Richards, also 80, and Ronnie Wood, 76 – are said to have a combined wealth of more than £990m. Bill recalls money was tighter in the 1960s when late Stone Brian Jones, who died by drowning in 1969 at the age of 27, founded the band.

"There was no money for a year or more," he remembers. "We used to play gigs for £5 or £2. We did whatever we could as we were a blues band and the blues was not popular.

"It was very difficult. Brian took whatever you earned to pay for food or guitar strings. Charlie was working and I was working. I had an eight-month-old son, so had responsibilities. Those lucrative years came much, much later."

Whilst the Rolling Stones will be playing to crowds of 70,000, Bill says fans in America were not always rushing for tickets when they made their debut there.

"We first went to America in June, 1964 and nobody had heard of us," he says. "We had a night in New York once and the fans almost destroyed Carnegie Hall. They tried to stop us doing a second gig but we did it. We were the first band who went on stage in casual clothes as we did not have uniforms like The Beatles."

As a member of one of rock's wildest bands, Bill was tame compared to Keith, Ronnie and Mick. Like late Stones drummer Charlie, Bill – who stood stock still on stage – was perceived as the “quiet member”, who ran away when drugs came out.

However, Bill isn't a stranger to controversy. In 1984, he met model and 13-year-old Mandy Smith when he was 47. The relationship only became public two-and-a-half years later, when she reached 16 – the age of consent in the UK.

Bill and Mandy tied the knot in 1989 when she was 18, though she moved out weeks after they married. The union ended in divorce after 23 months, with Mandy winning a large settlement.

Things became more entangled when Bill's son from his first marriage, Stephen, then 30, married Mandy’s mother Patsy, who was 46. They split after two years.

Today, Bill shares his life with his wife of 31 years, ex-model Suzanne. The couple have three daughters – Jessica, Matilda and Katherine. The two have homes in Chelsea, 15th-century Gedding Hall in Suffolk, and a place in the South of France.

And when thousands of fans gather at the NRG Stadium in Houston tonight (Saturday April 27), for the kickoff of the Stones' American tour, Bill will be at one of those homes thinking of them from afar.

He laughs: "The weird thing is ever since I’ve left, up until the present day, I still dream I’m on tour, like we are in a dressing room or we are in a hotel. I still dream those dreams and I dream of other friends like David Bowie. They are all very nice but very confusing.”

Bill Wyman’s book on his childhood days in London, Billy in the Wars, is out now at Amazon and Waterstones.

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