Mick Jagger

A miracle of still-plentiful hair, raw sex-appeal, and strutting talent . The frontman of one of the most influential and controversial groups of all time. A musical genius with a career spanning over four decades. Mick Jagger is a testament at once to British glamour and sensual decline, the ultimate architect and demi-god of rock.

Bestselling biographer Philip Norman offers an unparalleled account of the life of a living legend, Mick Jagger. From Home Counties schoolboy, to rebel without a cause to Sixties rock sensation and global idol, Norman unravels with astonishing intimacy the myth of the inimitable frontman of The Rolling Stones. MICK JAGGER charts his extraordinary journey through scandal-ridden conspiracy, infamous prison spell, hordes of female admirers and a knighthood while stripping away the colossal fame, wealth and idolatry to reveal a story of talent and promise unfulfilled.

Understated yet ostentatious; the ultimate incarnation of modern man's favourite fantasy: 'sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll', yet blessed with taste and intelligence; a social chameleon who couldn't blend in if he tried; always moving with the Jagger swagger yet modest enough to be self-deprecating, Mick was a paradoxical energy that reconfigured the musical landscape.

This revelatory tour de force is ample tribute to a flawed genius, a Casanova, an Antichrist and a god who, with characteristic nonchalance realised the dreams of thousands of current contenders and rocker pretenders, longevity, while coasting on a sea of fur rugs.

Reviews

‘Commendable thoroughness, engaging wit and boundless energy, much as Jagger has shown over the decades’ Mail on Sunday

‘Hugely readable’ The Guardian

‘One of Norman’s triumphs in Mick Jagger is to chart the decade’s evolution as well as his progress within it’ Sunday Express

‘The most ambitious and comprehensive Jagger biography to date’ Rolling Stone

'Extremely well researched' Rolling Stone

‘Barnstorming…Norman has ploughed this terrain for much of his career, and brings to his subject both a deep fascination with the ecology of rock'n'roll plus a sharp eye for its absurdities’ The Observer

‘Norman’s book reads like a thrill ride. He captures as well as anybody that magical combination of youth, talent and low rent that would eventually become the Rolling Stones’ The New York Times

About the author

Philip Norman was born in London and brought up on the Isle of Wight. He joined the Sunday Times at the age of twenty-two, soon gaining a reputation as Atticus columnist and for his profiles of figures as diverse as Elizabeth Taylor, P. G. Wodehouse, Little Richard and Colonel Gaddafi. In 1981 he published SHOUT!, a ground-breaking biography of the Beatles that was a bestseller in both Britain and the US. He has also written the definitive lives of Sir Elton John and Buddy Holly.
His journalism has been published in three collections, THE ROAD GOES ON FOREVER, TILT THE HOURGLASS AND BEGIN AGAIN, and THE AGE OF PARODY. His latest book is BABYCHAM NIGHT, a memoir of his childhood on the Isle of Wight. He is married with a daughter and lives in London.