Mick Jagger had a missed connection with the King.
In a recent interview on the podcast Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend, the Rolling Stones frontman recalled heeding John Lennon‘s advice not to meet Elvis Presley. “I remember John telling me, ‘Yeah, you should never meet your heroes,’” Jagger, 82, said. “So, I didn’t. I took John’s advice.”
Looking back, Jagger admitted that it “was really stupid of me” because he would “have loved to have met Elvis.”
The rocker said that Lennon would often tell him the story of when the Beatles met Presley at his mansion in Bel Air, Los Angeles. O’Brien, who helped add in a few details from the visit that took place during the Beatles’ 1965 U.S. tour, suggested that Lennon was “disappointed” by the encounter.
“I wanted to keep my Elvis to myself, my version of Elvis,” Jagger said. “I didn’t want my version of Elvis shattered like John’s was. But maybe my Elvis version would have been different.”
According to Tony Barrow, the Beatles’ press officer in the 1960s, the band’s encounter with Presley was underwhelming. “John asked what had happened to the old rock ’n’ roll Elvis, who at that point was mainly singing the soundtracks to his films,” Barrow told The Guardian. “He was half-joking, but he meant it.”
Luckily, things got better after Presley brought out guitars and everyone began jamming. “That is when the party took off,” Barrow said. “With words, they didn’t have much to say. But as soon as they got into the music, the conversation began to spark.”
Despite the jam sesh, it was clear that Lennon’s expectations of Presley hadn’t been met: “John said it had been about as exciting as meeting Engelbert Humperdinck.”
