How I became Hawaii's No. 1 Stones Fan
By Wayne "Shakey" Boteilho
I became a Rolling Stones fan in 1968. I was 10 years old and in the fifth grade when I announced to my classmates: "There is a group better than the Beatles ... the Rolling Stones." Thus began an adventure for me that unbelievably continues to this very day.

The hit song in 1968 was "Jumping Jack Flash." I couldn't believe that such a great song had been written. It was perfect for me; it was exactly the type of music that was going on inside of my head. I began to realize I was attracted to the Stones because, if you took my spirit, my soul, and my attitude, and put it to music, Rolling Stones songs would come out.

As I grew up as a young lad on Maui, I never once wavered. The Stones are and have always been the only rock group for me. I own no other rock 'n' roll records or compact discs. Over the years, I have also amassed what is believed to be the largest collection of Rolling Stones memorabilia in the state of Hawaii. My automobile during the 1980s was a customized black Chevy Van with the Rolling Stones tongue painted on the side.

In the early 1980s, I spent three years singing Rolling Stones songs in semi-professional bands. My style was enough like the Stones that I was given the stage name "Shakey." I still use that name today for karaoke, or when sitting in with other bands. The highlight of my singing Rolling Stones songs was when I sang "Get Off of My Cloud" at the Maui Jaycees Carnival, and, in true Rolling Stones style, the building burned down a few days after my performance (though I didn't think I sang that bad!).

I saw the Rolling Stones for the first time on Oct. 21, 1989, at the Los Angeles Coliseum. I paid $475 for my 11th row ticket. It was worth every penny. In fact, when the Stones come to Hawaii this year, I will be in the front row!

I am a true and honest fan of the Rolling Stones, and I have been so for the past 29 years. The Rolling Stones are the one continuous line that goes all the way back to my childhood. This year, it will be my 30th anniversary of being a Rolling Stones fan. It is truly magical that I will be able to see them once more.

But then again, the Rolling Stones have always made my life magical.




Kodak moment gone bye bye
By Jorgen Hansen
It was June 27, 1965, a sunny afternoon along the coast just north of Copenhagen, Denmark. Dressed in a wet, stinking sweatshirt, I was in the middle of my daily 15-mile workout of kayak paddling when I spotted a 25-foot sailing boat going in the same direction.

Due to lack of wind the skipper used motor power to propel the boat. The propellers created a nice little wave for a kayak to ride on, so I decided to ride along.

I increased my speed, got over the first wave, the second wave and what the heck!

I was staring into the face of Mick Jagger sitting next to Keith Richard in the cockpit of the boat. Bill Wyman sat under deck in the far corner of the cabin. The other two Rolling Stones, Charlie Watts and Brian Jones, had not joined them this relaxing afternoon on the ocean.

Less than 16 hours earlier I had seen the Rolling Stones perform live in Copenhagen; a ravishing experience with thousands of screaming fans, which had left me nearly deaf for several hours.

Excited and energized, I followed the boat for the next hour and a half while chatting with Mick Jagger and Keith Richard. Bill Wyman stayed in the cabin the whole time and said only a few words but smiled from time to time.

It was very easy to strike up a conversation with Mick. He is talkative and seems genuinely interested in what is going on. He asked questions about the kayak, the steering, training methods, etc. Unfortunately we were along the coast, so he could not try out the kayak.

Keith looked tired, unshaved, as he puffed away on his cigarette and he seemed a little dazed. Well, he looked like Keith Richard.

Here I was, out in the ocean talking with Mick Jagger & Co. and no camera to immortalize this exciting moment in my life. What a bummer!

They offered me a soda and after drinking it, our ways parted. They continued to sail on the road of fame and success while I paddled into the sunset in my old, smelling shirt.




I like it, I like it, yes I do!
By Patricia K. Hustace
I have seen the Rolling Stones in concert five times, the most recent time was in Chicago for the kick-off of the "Bridges to Babylon" tour.

My "Stone Story" took place in Borders Books store in Chicago, where I was standing in line to purchase something.

There was a woman ahead of me and a man behind me. The woman kept looking toward an escalator where I saw a wiry thin man, all dressed in black, riding up.

The woman then looked at the man standing behind me, and he said to her, "Yeah, that's who you think it is."

Meanwhile, I was wondering what they were talking about.

I asked the man, "Who?" and he said "Mick Jagger."

I said "WHAT?!" and got out of the line fast and ran up the escalator!

Mick was looking through some CDs in the store's music department! I was within arm's length of the famous Stone with my camera ready.

Unfortunately, I was halted by the various security around him - oh well ... my day was made anyway! For a 54-year-old rocker, Mick looks darn good!

I already have my tickets for both nights at Aloha Stadium.

What's strange is that, I never was a Rolling Stones fan before. My brother was, and still is.

Now that I'm growing older, at 42, I just LOVE their music! I'm growing up with "Mick and the Boys."

I freak out whenever I hear such songs as "Satisfaction," "Brown Sugar" and "Gimme Shelter" among other greats. I up the volume on my stereo!




But if you try sometime, you get what you need
By Evanita Midkiff
To put us in our proper cubicle, I was born in Honolulu in 1922; my husband was born here in 1920.

Our No. 2 daughter (out of five children), Robin, graduated from Punahou in 1968 and went to Stanford. Some time after that she was home for vacation and all our children could talk about was the Rolling Stones and how they could get tickets and who would stand in line, etc.

Robin even had friends at Stanford coming to Honolulu just to see the Stones. Our kitchen was full of Stones talk. Finally I could stand it no longer and suggested that as long as they were standing in line, they might as well get tickets for us.

"Go to the Rolling Stones with my MOTHER??" wailed 14-year-old Bobby. So I stopped making suggestions.

Then one day I was driving past Blaisdell, and acting on impulse I turned in. The line wasn't very long so I decided to park and see what I could do. As I got closer to the box office window I suddenly realized that I had to pay for the tickets with cash ... no checks accepted. Yikes! I normally carry about $5 cash. I looked in my wallet, and for some unknown reason found I had 50-some dollars ... so I bought 10 tickets.

That night, Bob and I sat down and decided which friends to invite. They were Sam and Anne King, Bob and Tookie White, Pete and Betty Vitousek, and Bud and Lila Morgan.

The night of the concert I told Bobby to be on his good behavior because I would be checking up on him. We arrived at the arena to find 6,500 people under 30 milling around. It was awesome.

Our seats were high and very good, across from the band. I had brought a pair of binoculars so that I could look for my kids, and wouldn't you know it, directly above the band, standing up and looking toward us with his binoculars was Bobby! Of course I stood up and waved wildly. He spotted me and sat down instantly.

It was a fabulous concert. Mick Jagger was so full of energy and charging around every minute. We loved it all. And there was nothing lewd about it. It was just very enjoyable and exciting music, rhythm and dance.

Bob and I are going again, on Saturday. Our kids are going too, but they didn't offer to get us tickets this time either!




My first concert
By John A. Fujioka
Back in 1973 I was living on Maui, going to Maui Community College. My high school buddies were going to the University of Hawaii at Manoa. They invited me to the Rolling Stones concert.

After a hard week of school and work I was very excited to see the Rolling Stones. I flew out on Hawaiian Airlines, on a stand-by fare for $12 (regular fare was about $25). It was the last flight out of Maui.

The concert was the following evening at the Hawaii International Center (HIC), now the Blaisdell Center. Tickets in those days were $6.50, $5.50, $4.50. Walking into the arena that night was awesome! I never saw so many seats in my whole life. Growing up on Maui, the biggest venue was the War Memorial Gymnasium, that held maybe 2,000 to 3,000 people, similar to a high school gymnasium.

The seats that my buddies bought were in Section 26, Upper Level. The last row at the very top. The back of the seats was where the roof of the arena began. The tickets were $5.50, the cheap seats for $4.50, were behind the stage.

The Rolling Stones played all the favorites. During the song "Satisfaction," Mick was moving across the stage. That's when my friend, Aric, stood up and waved his hands. I asked him what was up? He said that Mick was looking at him, so he reacted.

As far as I was concerned, it could have been a group of impostors on stage that looked like the Rolling Stones. They were so small.

All in all it was an unforgettable experience. I flew back to Maui a couple of days later on stand by. Total cost for the concert, $24 for plane fare, $5.50 for the ticket, and a couple of bucks for food. This month's Rolling Stones concert tickets are starting at $45 a seat. What a bargain I got in 1973.

The next year I transfered to UH-Manoa and continued to go to concerts, like Elton John, Aerosmith, Deodato, Steely Dan, Jesse Collin Young, Santana, Eric Clapton, Rod Stewart, Jefferson Starship and Grand Funk Railroad, just to name a few.

I never sat in the last row again.




I think it was the Stones
By Tom Loomis
In 1973, I, my then-wife Gail and our friends Lynette and Alan all had tickets for the Rolling Stones concert. We were all excited about this event and smoked elephant weed just before we arrived at the HIC.

When the Stones came on, I was so stoned the band looked like shimmering purple light transmutating before my eyes. Mick Jagger could really wiggle his butt.

It was way too loud. Alan couldn't take it and had to leave, and Lynette (who later became his wife), left with him out of a loyalty that was to mark other aspects of their relationship in later years.

Gail and I stuck it out, aware that this was the kind of experience we would never forget. My ears rang for two days after that, and I still wonder if it might have done some permanent damage.

My current girlfriend asked me if I wanted to go to the Stones concert in 1998. "Sure," I said. "The last time I saw the Stones I was so stoned I couldn't stand it."

"Me, too," she said. "We smoked some elephant weed and it was so loud I had to leave."

So there we were, 24 years ago in a parallel universe, neither knowing the other existed. We're going to the '98 Stones concert, and we've both learned our lesson: No elephant weed this time (if it still exists), and we'll bring earplugs, too!

I don't think I'll be in a parallel universe this time ... I'm planning to stay with this girlfriend, even to the next Rolling Stones concert, tentatively scheduled for January 2022!




Let's spend the night together
By Sylvia Dahlby
The first time I saw the Rolling Stones in concert was on Jan. 23, 1973, at what was then called the HIC (Honolulu International Center).

I was a senior at Kailua High School and madly in love with Mick Jagger. When I was 14, I cut a picture of Mick out of Parade magazine and carried it in my wallet. When I heard the Stones were coming, I planned to camp out at the box office for a front row seat.

The tickets went on sale Dec. 26, 1972. This put a damper on my plans because I had to be at home for the holidays. I would have preferred to spend all week at the HIC so I'd be first in line. Such were the priorities of my Stones-crazy teen-age self. I had to wait until after dinner before beginning the Rolling Stones odyssey I'd looked forward to more eagerly than Christmas Day.

My best friend Betsy and I got to the the HIC at sunset on Dec. 25. The place was already mobbed. It looked like one big hippie slumber party clear out to the parking lot. The air was filled with cigarette smoke mixed with sweet smelling pakalolo, rock music and the sounds of a bazillion excited kids laughing, talking, playing guitars and singing Stones songs all at once.

Fortunately, our friends Todd, Susan and Doug had gotten there earlier to stake out a place in line. Betsy and I unrolled our sleeping bags and joined them. Everyone shared their "camping" supplies, passing joints, beer, wine, soda, beef jerky, li hing mui, M&M's, potato chips and everything else in the junk food universe. It didn't look like we'd be getting any sleep!

We proceeded to play trumps, drink, smoke, munch and talk story. The biggest topic of conversation was, of course, the Stones and which songs we wanted them to play at the concert. We had all seen the film "Gimme Shelter" and hoped for a show that was good enough to make a movie out of (but with a happier ending than Altamont's). We sang as much of "Sympathy for the Devil" as we could remember until we reduced it to just the "whooo-oooh" part. Betsy's favorite songs were "Bitch" and "Brown Sugar" because of the sexy dance beat and lyrics that were naughty then but now aren't even naughty enough to rate a parental warning label.

My favorite tunes were "Jumping Jack Flash" and "Monkey Man" which I felt were the essence of Jagger and Richards respectively. We discussed the relative merits of each of our favorite songs, and debated which Stone was the definitive soul of the band.

We finally agreed that while the late Brian Jones was the original force of the Stones, the soul was a synthesis of Mick's vocals and Keith's guitar, although at that point I'm sure we were too wasted to pronounce words like "synthesis."

I showed off the picture of Mick in my wallet and Susan pointed out a previously unnoticed resemblance to Doug. Skinny, long-haired Doug looked at the faded yellow image of Mick at the Monterey Pop festival and said, "Yeah, besides bigger lips and a million bucks, what does Mick got that I don't?"

The morning after, we ended up with pretty good seats, if not quite front row. We all went home exhausted, but feeling like we'd got some satisfaction.

I slept nearly 16 hours straight through until the next day. When I woke up, I got a belated Christmas present from my dad - two tickets to the Rolling Stones concert from a friend of his at the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, better seats than I already had. He said he didn't want to promise me the tickets for Christmas in case his friend didn't deliver, "Besides, you were so looking forward to your camping trip."

The best part is that the Stones were scheduled to do three shows, one concert set for Friday and two more performances for the following Saturday night. The tickets my dad got were for the 6 p.m. show on Saturday; I had bought tickets for the second show at 8 p.m. That meant Betsy and I got to see the Stones play twice - spending another long night together at the HIC.

As for the concert itself, let's just say that it was as much fun as two teen-age girls could have without backstage passes.

Afterward, my mom got me some great photos of the show from her friend who was a photographer for the now defunct Sun Bums newspaper. I replaced the dog-eared photo of Mick in my wallet with one of these pictures.


* * *
As fate would have it, Betsy and I found ourselves living in the Phoenix area when the Stones' rolled into Sun Devil Stadium on Nov. 7, 1997. We shelled out $200 each for seventh row seats. It was a small price to pay for what may be the last time we'll see the Stones in concert.

It's been said you're never too old to rock and roll, and this is certainly true for the Stones. Betsy and I thought the "Bridges to Babylon" concert was as much fun as two 40-something girls could have without backstage passes.

Afterward, my husband got me a Japanese bootleg CD of the 1973 concert in Honolulu. This surprise Christmas gift bridges that first concert to the last, and completes the circle of my Stones story.


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I am a Frenchie ,as Mick affectionately called them in the Old Grey Whistle Test in 1977 .

They didn't play Satisfaction in 1973. 1966 yes, but no 1973.

Hi Shakey. You say you first became a fan in 1968 and then at the end you say you've been a fan for 30 years?

Thanks for putting these stories together, SwayStones - we were all so busy with the collective Charlie-quits panic yesterday that I've only just got round to reading them. A good read.

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HEILOOBAAS
They didn't play Satisfaction in 1973. 1966 yes, but no 1973.

You're absolutely right .Being sitting at the last row shouldn't mean he couldn't hear the songs.Wrong living memory I guess.

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Green Lady
Thanks for putting these stories together, SwayStones - we were all so busy with the collective Charlie-quits panic yesterday that I've only just got round to reading them. A good read.

You're welcome Grren Lady .
Tom's story made me smile ..I've always been "clean" -no alcohol,no drugs - at a Stones show ,I would have been too much afraid to miss something !



I am a Frenchie ,as Mick affectionately called them in the Old Grey Whistle Test in 1977 .