McLagan, Ian [1945 - 2014]
Ian ‘Mac’ McLagan was born on May 12, 1945 in Hounslow, Middlesex, England (that is, neither in London nor the countryside out beyond it), grew playing piano, acquiring a Hammond organ and, in an early band, the Muleskinners, backing Howlin’ Wolf, Little Walter and other scary figures on their quick, cheap tours of Britain in the early 1960s.
In 1965 he joined the Small Faces, which turned into the Faces in 1969. The Faces broke up when Ron Wood joined the Rolling Stones; McLagan joined them as a sideman later. In 1984 he was the keyboards player on Bob Dylan’s European tour (Dylan’s first since the semi-gospel tour of 1981), playing from May 28 in Verona, Italy through to Slane, Ireland on July 8: a total of 27 concerts. Thirteen years later, though the detail is murky, he says he was on a session for Time Out Of Mind - including on the song ‘Love Sick’ - but that the versions he played on were not used.
Near the end of the 1990s, McLagan published a well-received memoir, All the Rage, and though the original hardback edition is out of print, the paperback is advertised online with this nicely judged short blurb: ‘The book covers pre-Small Faces days with the Muleskinners, the great days with the Small Faces and the Faces. After that Mac plays with a number of bands including the Rolling Stones, Bonnie Raitt and the ever-cheerful Bob Dylan. He talks about both sides of the Moon (Keith, that is), the losses of Ronnie [Lane] and Steve [Marriott], his fight with drugs and drinks and what Rod Stewart is really like. Furthermore, he gets royalties on this so buy it now.’
The great British music critic Charles Shaar Murray elaborates on this in the review he gave the book in Mojo in January 1999:
‘All The Rage contains an unfeasibly large helping of unforgettable vignettes of the rich and famous at work and play…. Here’s Keith Richards, back in his druggy period [?], shooting himself up in the arse straight through his jeans, and then walking around with syringe still protruding from his butt. Or Bob Dylan replying to a large man introducing himself as “Hello, Bob, I’m Peter Grant. I manage Led Zeppelin”, with a terse “I don’t come to you with my problems.”’
Long married to Kim, the former Mrs. Keith Moon (a man much loved by McLagan even though Moon once paid someone to break his fingers - Pete Townshend paid the same man the same amount again not to), until her accidental death in 2006, Ian McLagan lived in Austin, Texas from 1994 until his death from a stroke on December 3, 2014.
[Ian McLagan, All the Rage: A Rock’n’Roll Odyssey, London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1998; republished as All the Rage: My High Life with the Small Faces, the Faces and the Rolling Stones, London: Pan, 2000. Time Out Of Mind session claim in interview by Kent H. Benjamin, 5 Dec, 1997 for Pop Culture Press no.44. US, 1998.]
Ian ‘Mac’ McLagan was born on May 12, 1945 in Hounslow, Middlesex, England (that is, neither in London nor the countryside out beyond it), grew playing piano, acquiring a Hammond organ and, in an early band, the Muleskinners, backing Howlin’ Wolf, Little Walter and other scary figures on their quick, cheap tours of Britain in the early 1960s.
In 1965 he joined the Small Faces, which turned into the Faces in 1969. The Faces broke up when Ron Wood joined the Rolling Stones; McLagan joined them as a sideman later. In 1984 he was the keyboards player on Bob Dylan’s European tour (Dylan’s first since the semi-gospel tour of 1981), playing from May 28 in Verona, Italy through to Slane, Ireland on July 8: a total of 27 concerts. Thirteen years later, though the detail is murky, he says he was on a session for Time Out Of Mind - including on the song ‘Love Sick’ - but that the versions he played on were not used.
Near the end of the 1990s, McLagan published a well-received memoir, All the Rage, and though the original hardback edition is out of print, the paperback is advertised online with this nicely judged short blurb: ‘The book covers pre-Small Faces days with the Muleskinners, the great days with the Small Faces and the Faces. After that Mac plays with a number of bands including the Rolling Stones, Bonnie Raitt and the ever-cheerful Bob Dylan. He talks about both sides of the Moon (Keith, that is), the losses of Ronnie [Lane] and Steve [Marriott], his fight with drugs and drinks and what Rod Stewart is really like. Furthermore, he gets royalties on this so buy it now.’
The great British music critic Charles Shaar Murray elaborates on this in the review he gave the book in Mojo in January 1999:
‘All The Rage contains an unfeasibly large helping of unforgettable vignettes of the rich and famous at work and play…. Here’s Keith Richards, back in his druggy period [?], shooting himself up in the arse straight through his jeans, and then walking around with syringe still protruding from his butt. Or Bob Dylan replying to a large man introducing himself as “Hello, Bob, I’m Peter Grant. I manage Led Zeppelin”, with a terse “I don’t come to you with my problems.”’
Long married to Kim, the former Mrs. Keith Moon (a man much loved by McLagan even though Moon once paid someone to break his fingers - Pete Townshend paid the same man the same amount again not to), until her accidental death in 2006, Ian McLagan lived in Austin, Texas from 1994 until his death from a stroke on December 3, 2014.
[Ian McLagan, All the Rage: A Rock’n’Roll Odyssey, London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1998; republished as All the Rage: My High Life with the Small Faces, the Faces and the Rolling Stones, London: Pan, 2000. Time Out Of Mind session claim in interview by Kent H. Benjamin, 5 Dec, 1997 for Pop Culture Press no.44. US, 1998.]
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