John Lennon gave Mick Jagger bad advice about Elvis

After Conan O’Brien hosted the Rolling Stones’ album launch event earlier this spring, he and frontman Mick Jagger have become fast friends. On the heels of the band’s new album, Foreign Tongues, Jagger appeared on the comedian’s SiriusXM podcast Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend. The two discussed Jagger’s musical history, which spans six decades. Jagger recalled one frustrating anecdote: when John Lennon told him never to meet Elvis Presley. Lennon, who, along with the rest of his Beatles bandmates, met the King of Rock and Roll in 1965 and came away dissatisfied. “I remember John telling me, ‘You should never meet your heroes. I would never meet Elvis, Mick, if I were you,’” Jagger remembered. “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 continued, “Maybe my Elvis version would have been different.” 

Over the course of the one-hour interview, Jagger also remembered friendly competitions with Lennon and David Bowie, noting that the two artists pushed him to perform at his best. He described his and Bowie’s relationship as one of artistic competition, explaining that Bowie “made” him competitive through proximity to his own enormous ambition. Jagger also recalled a time when Bowie had played him “The Jean Genie,” which he dubbed an “homage” to the Rolling Stones. Jagger said that he and Lennon, on the other hand, were “competitive in being sarcastic.” Perhaps the Beatles frontman hadn’t meant what he said about Elvis, after all.

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