Bill Wyman

Lower Sydenham and RAF Oldenburg

He was born William George Perks and named after his father. The accounts of where differ. His memoir, published chapter by chapter on billwyman.com, says he was born at Lewisham Hospital on Saturday 24 October 1936 and that the family lived in Lower Sydenham in south London. The Independent placed his birth in Penge. Both give the year as 1936.

National service took him into the Royal Air Force. By his own account he reported to RAF Cardington on 20 January 1955 as Air Craftsman 2 Perks, went through basic training at RAF Padgate and trade training at RAF Credenhill, and qualified as a Clerk Progress in July 1955. He was then posted to RAF Oldenburg in West Germany, where he was promoted to Leading Air Craftsman.

Back home, he married Diane Maureen Cory at St John's Church, Penge, on his 23rd birthday, 24 October 1959.

The Wetherby Arms Audition

In December 1962 Wyman, 26 years old by Rolling Stone's count, went to the Wetherby Arms pub in Chelsea to audition for the Rolling Stones, who needed a replacement for their founding bassist, Dick Taylor. The sources disagree on the day. Rolling Stone gives 7 December. The Rolling Stones Chronicle gives 9 or 10 December and dates his first concert with the band to 14 December 1962, at the Ricky Tick Club in Windsor.

He joined as a husband and father. His son Stephen had been born on 29 March 1962, according to the Chronicle, and the Independent noted that he was already married to Diane Cory with a young son when he became a Stone.

Asked about his playing in The Quiet One, the 2019 documentary about his life, he described his approach: "Leave space, don't fill it up."

Steel Wheels and the January 1993 Exit

His last tour with the band was Steel Wheels, in 1989 and 1990. On 6 January 1993 he said in a British television interview that he was quitting, according to the Chronicle, which records his words from that month: "I thought the last two tours with them were the best we have ever done, so I was quite happy to stop after that." Pollstar later gave the reason in one line: he left because he did not want to tour anymore.

Who earned what from those three decades is a question he has answered himself. In an Independent interview headlined "Grumpy old man", given when he was three years short of 70, he said he had never made much money from the band and compared it with the Faces, who "divided their publishing rights equally." He went on: "The Stones didn't, and so Mick and Keith got most of the profits." In the same interview he said his money had been invested in the stock market, that it fell after the 11 September attacks, that he had made cutbacks, and that "I'll never be able to afford to retire."

That is his own account. FamousBio found no disclosed figure and no dated estimate of his wealth from a reliable source, so this article gives no net worth.

Mandy Smith, Then a Wedding in Vence

Wyman married Mandy Smith in 1989. Rolling Stone, writing about The Quiet One in 2019, reported that he began dating her in 1984 when she was 13 and that they divorced two years after the wedding. The Guardian's review of the film said Smith was 18 when they married, and gave a different timeline: a separation three years after the wedding and a divorce two years after that, in 1993. The Guardian also reported that a planned screening of the documentary at Sheffield Doc/Fest was cancelled after protests that the film did too little to examine the relationship.

In 1993 he married Suzanne Accosta. The Chronicle records their engagement in England on 16 January 1993 and the wedding in Vence, France, on 21 April 1993. The Guardian, which spells her surname Acosta, also dates the marriage to 1993. "When I left, I was finally able to focus on the things I'd missed out on," he told the Independent.

Bill Wyman's Rhythm Kings

The band he went on to lead formed in 1997, the year its featured vocalist, Beverley Skeete, joined, according to the Lancashire Evening Post. The Independent described it as a nine-piece whose players included the singer and organist Georgie Fame and the guitarist Albert Lee.

In October 2016, at his 80th birthday gala at The O2 in London, Steven Van Zandt presented him with the BluesFest Lifetime Achievement Award, the Wexford Echo reported.

Sticky Fingers and a Roman Homestead in Suffolk

Outside the band he opened a restaurant, Sticky Fingers, in Kensington, the Independent reported. He wrote two memoirs, Stone Alone and Rolling with the Stones, and a book on metal detecting, Bill Wyman's Treasure Islands.

The detecting started in the early 1990s, when he bought a detector and found the site of a Roman homestead at his home in Suffolk, Pollstar reported in 2007. He told the Independent he had found at least 300 Roman coins, all verified by the British Museum. "It keeps me fit," he said. "Fit and active." When his daughter wanted to try the hobby and he could not find a detector that suited her, he asked the maker of his own machine to design one with him. The Bill Wyman Signature Detector took two years to develop, and he did most of the field testing himself.

Live By The Sword on Hackney Diamonds

Thirty years after he left, Wyman played on one track of the Rolling Stones' 2023 album Hackney Diamonds. Guitar.com reported in September 2023 that the song, "Live By The Sword," also features Charlie Watts, recorded in 2019. Mick Jagger described the session plainly: "We asked Bill to come into the studio, and he came and did one track."

Sources

• Bill Wyman at 90: Special photography exhibition opens in London - Bill Wyman
• News - Bill Wyman
• 1930s - Bill Wyman
• 1950s - Bill Wyman
• Watch Bill Wyman Explain How he Joined the Rolling Stones in 1962
• Chronicle 1962
• Chronicle 1993
• Grumpy old man | The Independent | The Independent
• The Quiet One review - controversial and evasive Bill Wyman documentary | Tribeca film festival | The Guardian
• A Rolling Stone Gathers …Treasure - Pollstar News
• Bill’s band is blues who’s who
• Wexford Echo - Lifetime achievement accolade for ex-Rolling Stones stalwart Bill Wyman
• Charlie Watts and Bill Wyman reunite one final time on new Rolling Stones album Hackney Diamonds