Quote
The Worst.
[cgi.ebay.co.uk]

The wristband that follows with this signed copy is number 27,
in other words a member of the family right in front of me.
They were about 10 people or so and I thought it was great
to see the parents raise their kids in the spirit of rock and roll!
But now I understand: they are not fans of Keith and the Stones,
and the only reason to drag these poor kids with them and make them
wait for 20 hours was just to get four more signed copies to sell
on ebay for about 750 US dollars.
"#%&!¤" disgusting.

Yeah it's pathetic. But even more pathetic are the people willing to pay it.

yes Business only Business ...

poor society

remember 2 years ago:

Elle avait traversé la crise de 1929, mais n'aura finalement pas résisté à la crise des subprimes. Lehman Brothers Holdings, la maison mère de Lehman Brothers, suite à l'échec des négociations de ce week-end pour sa reprise, va demander dans la journée sa mise en faillite sous le chapitre 11

Monday 4PM.
Having finally caught up with my sleep and recovered from my "ordeal",
I thought it was now time to add my own experiences of the BIG day.
I arrived at Waterstones afdter a short (2 hour) train journey, around 00.30.
I was immediately welcomed by my next numbers in the queue,
Rosa lee, Alan, Darren and his Dad and "The lady in Pruple",
and we all remained close,right through until after the event, 6PM the next day.
Instant friends!, and it really helped the hours pass by to be in such good company!
The Waterstones "minders" also joined us from time to time,
VERY friendly guys with lots of stories about the celebs thayve guarded-
Apart from a brief half-hour visit to K.F.C. around mid-day, (via Trafalgar Square),
and a couple of walks to the end of the ever growing queue,
I never ventured from my spot at all in nearly 15 hours.
Again, we struck lucky by having the barrier to lean on and the traffic to watch,
unlike the unfortunates who had to stare at a brick wall/alley
The hours really did seem to fly by, the rain held off and apart from a brief drop in temperature just before dawn,
it was very mild for a November night-VERY!
Gold wristabands on our persons,(I was number 57) we were taken into the actual shop around 2:30 ish!
Where we continued our stand for another couple of hours.
Ironically, it was more comfortable OUTSIDE, and would have been better to stay ther until 5 PM, as a couple of us commented.
I laughed at Alan, who seemed to be having a minor nervous breakdown as the prospect of meeting Keef seemed more a reality than ever!
Virtually trembling he gasped "What do you say to SOMEONE like HIM??!!"
I was wrestling with the same question, but it was refreshing to see that I wasn't the only one who's heart was beating 50 to the dozen (not just 20!).
Having been chatting virtually non-stop for so many hours (mainly about the Stones) we all fell eerily quiet and contemplative.
You could see the nerves on peoples faces and cut the tension with a knife-
Darren, Alan and Myself in paticular!.
When Keith finally entered from a side door (and not the stairs or lift as everyone expected)
He literally walked past our group standing just about a foot away.
A HUGE round of applause and cheers of "KEEF!!" from everyone.
I put the "thumbs-up" sign to him and he was beaming!
He looked tanned,happy and healthy.
After the literal scrum of press had their shots ,hundreds of photos of the great man must have been taken in just a couple of minutes,
along with the same numbers of "Keith this way!!" "keith hold up the book!!" and so on!
As we shuffled ever closer, my nerves surprisingly subsided-I just felt numb, but in a good way.
Heres a transcript of exactly happened!:-

Me,standing in front of keith:

Keefs minder (on recognising me): "Morning!"

Me to Keefs minder: "Morning!!"

Keef hands me signed book.

Me to keef-" Thanks Keith, can I PLEASE shake your hand?!"

Keith raises his right arm-I shake his hand, it feels small and wam,

Me to Keith "Thanks Keith -you're the MAN!!"

...then I drifted away in a complete daze (not an understatement).
Briefly catching up with Rosa lee,Alan, Darren and "Dad",
and determined not to make a fool of myself in public,
I could feel tears coming to my eyes.
Rosa lee commented "I don't want to leave him!!"(Keith).
I bid them goodbye and wandered out into the cold London Evening.
Having called home to ground myself, I made my way back to Euston and caught the 21:30 train back home
for some well earned sleep.
According to friends who knew where I'd been, I was "beaming" for 2 days afterwards!
Well thats about it, was it worth it? YES.
Would I do it all again? Maybe, but only for Mick or Charlie, not for anyone else-
cos much Like the Stones, I'm not getting any younger!

Cheers everyone!,
Thanks for reading:
Mark.

*Photos to follow if I can figure out how?.

CORRECTION: it was DARREN who said "what do you say..." NOT Alan-apologies mate if you're reading this (never been good with names me!)

Great story Mark. Thanks

-------------------
Keep On Rolling

Hi Mark01942 and everyone else out there who queued at waterstones. This is Alan and I just wanted to say what a pleasure it was meeting you guys. Glad you got home safe and sound. Can't bring myself to start reading the book yet,it's too precious with Keith's signature in it. Must admit I found it to be a bit of an emotional experience too. Managed to hold myself together and say "thank you for the music Mr. Richards". He beamed that enourmous smile of his and replied "It's been a pleasure" then held out his hand for a warm handshake. Great moment in my life.
Greetings also to Rosalie. It was a pleasure meeting you, hope you got home safely. Hi also to Darren and "dad". Good people. Good company.

oh that was your name was it Monkeytonkman - ya mad feckin midlander!

lol, hey! btw, was it you who let rip that massive belch up on the 2nd floor when we were queuing inside? lol

i was the guy with long hair with the black chic by the shop window (position 12/13) next to the american woman (lena) who's balls you were breaking about being a republican, lol heheheh

hey, Lucy (the girl i was queueing with) got a soundbyte interview on London tonight, lol. check it, it'll remind u who we were.

[www.itv.com]

she's on at 60 seconds in.

check her band/songs out:
[www.screamingviolets.com]
i play guitar for her when the bands actualy got a drummer



anyhoos, good luck Monkeytonkman mate. if your down London again, give me a email and we have a pint ok. I'm down in chelsea.



to everyone else, it was a good 2 days, shame to hear so many ebay saddos were there.

Sorry to have missed you too, you going to Ronnie's / Mick Taylors gig at the 100 club 1st December ? If so, see you there !!
Chris

Satisfied since 1976

mark01942, thanks for your story, and you too, Alan!

An American Republican, oh my goodness. They usually
don't leave the U. S.

Great story Mark.Still getting nice storys nearly a week after the big day.You guys will have those memorys for the rest of your lives. ><

Quote
wolfmeister
oh that was your name was it Monkeytonkman - ya mad feckin midlander!

lol, hey! btw, was it you who let rip that massive belch up on the 2nd floor when we were queuing inside? lol

i was the guy with long hair with the black chic by the shop window (position 12/13) next to the american woman (lena) who's balls you were breaking about being a republican, lol heheheh

hey, Lucy (the girl i was queueing with) got a soundbyte interview on London tonight, lol. check it, it'll remind u who we were.

[www.itv.com]

she's on at 60 seconds in.

check her band/songs out:
[www.screamingviolets.com]
i play guitar for her when the bands actualy got a drummer



anyhoos, good luck Monkeytonkman mate. if your down London again, give me a email and we have a pint ok. I'm down in chelsea.



to everyone else, it was a good 2 days, shame to hear so many ebay saddos were there.

Hello mate. good to hear from you. 'Course I remember you both. My brain isn't that addled yet brother!!

Yeah, pretty much certain that was me burping in the book store, better to get it out than do it in front of Keef!

Was good meeting both of you. Next time I'm up in the big smoke i'll give you a shout, be good to have a pint.

Good luck with finding a drummer. Remember you mentioned you were lookig for a drummer on the night.

Anyway, take care brother and keep on rockin.

I'm a real fan and I recieve this from the store of Waterstones. Thank you

Pat

My signed copy of life with an interesting article about the "Exclusive signed edition".



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

There is some confusion on here regarding these books which I thought I would try and clear up as they are selling for big money. The issue is this, some dealers are selling the books with a gold wristband which they claim is more exclusive than the black wristband because the gold is signed in the book and the black is signed on a book plate.
These are the facts as happened on the day. The first 150 people in the queue did indeed receive a numbered gold wristband - I was there at about 6.30 am and got number 136. People in the queue from 151 to 450 got a black wristband. The security advised us that the gold wristbands would get in to meet Keith but the black wristbands wouldn't, they would however get a signed book.
At about 4pm the gold wristband wearers were moved into the store (Waterstones Piccadilly) and lined up around the edges of the 1st floor - Being number 136 I was obviously near the back of this queue and there were certainly more than 14 people behind me so a few black wristband wearers were also squeezed in (I would guess no more maybe10 - 15 though). Once the room was full the stairs were closed and no-one else was let in - security was very tight.
In due course, Keith arrived, the queue shuffled through and Keith signed each book individually and shook hands with each of us. It was well worth the 12 hour wait!
The wristbands had to be cut off by Waterstones staff before they would let you leave, presumably to stop you going around for another book!
As I left the shop, the remaining 300 or so people were still being held in a queue outside.
Now I haven't actually seen one these so called book plate versions which the remainder of the people queuing with black wristbands were issued with, but from seeing pictures on here, I think I can safely explain the difference to you.
They are signed on an extra page in the book which is headed 'Exclusive Signed Edition'. Now this page doesn't exist in the normal version of the book - Take a look at some of the pictures of 'Gold Wristband' versions, you'll see that the book is signed on the title page with no mention of 'Exclusive Signed Edition'.
There is no way that the publishers have printed 300 different copies of the book with an extra page, just for this event. So how do they do this?
The extra page is pasted in quite professionally by book shop staff after the author has signed it elsewhere at his leisure. Its easy to spot as this page is glued to the edge of the page behind it, at the spine side, rather than being actually bound into the book. Waterstones actually do quite a few of these for different authors, it means they can send a box of 300 pages out to be signed rather than a box of 300 books!
In my opinion this means that the gold wristbands and books signed on the title page are more desirable as they are the only copies actually handled and signed in public by Keith Richards, just my opinion though.

In any case there are only 450 of these altogether and both gold and black will remain extremely sought after.

Quote
steffiestones
My signed copy of life with an interesting article about the "Exclusive signed edition".



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

There is some confusion on here regarding these books which I thought I would try and clear up as they are selling for big money. The issue is this, some dealers are selling the books with a gold wristband which they claim is more exclusive than the black wristband because the gold is signed in the book and the black is signed on a book plate.
These are the facts as happened on the day. The first 150 people in the queue did indeed receive a numbered gold wristband - I was there at about 6.30 am and got number 136. People in the queue from 151 to 450 got a black wristband. The security advised us that the gold wristbands would get in to meet Keith but the black wristbands wouldn't, they would however get a signed book.
At about 4pm the gold wristband wearers were moved into the store (Waterstones Piccadilly) and lined up around the edges of the 1st floor - Being number 136 I was obviously near the back of this queue and there were certainly more than 14 people behind me so a few black wristband wearers were also squeezed in (I would guess no more maybe10 - 15 though). Once the room was full the stairs were closed and no-one else was let in - security was very tight.
In due course, Keith arrived, the queue shuffled through and Keith signed each book individually and shook hands with each of us. It was well worth the 12 hour wait!
The wristbands had to be cut off by Waterstones staff before they would let you leave, presumably to stop you going around for another book!
As I left the shop, the remaining 300 or so people were still being held in a queue outside.
Now I haven't actually seen one these so called book plate versions which the remainder of the people queuing with black wristbands were issued with, but from seeing pictures on here, I think I can safely explain the difference to you.
They are signed on an extra page in the book which is headed 'Exclusive Signed Edition'. Now this page doesn't exist in the normal version of the book - Take a look at some of the pictures of 'Gold Wristband' versions, you'll see that the book is signed on the title page with no mention of 'Exclusive Signed Edition'.
There is no way that the publishers have printed 300 different copies of the book with an extra page, just for this event. So how do they do this?
The extra page is pasted in quite professionally by book shop staff after the author has signed it elsewhere at his leisure. Its easy to spot as this page is glued to the edge of the page behind it, at the spine side, rather than being actually bound into the book. Waterstones actually do quite a few of these for different authors, it means they can send a box of 300 pages out to be signed rather than a box of 300 books!
In my opinion this means that the gold wristbands and books signed on the title page are more desirable as they are the only copies actually handled and signed in public by Keith Richards, just my opinion though.

In any case there are only 450 of these altogether and both gold and black will remain extremely sought after.

Thank you, that is a VERY interesting article and explaination.

BIG Props to you for timing it perfectly to be there in time to get a gold band and shake the man's hand... and get your book signed.... very cool.

..."BIG Props to you for timing it perfectly to be there in time to get a gold band and shake the man's hand... and get your book signed.... very cool."....

No, My copy is with the black band, this review have i find on the net, just to let you know...

Ah, so I reread, and I see the important part is having the extra page, or not.
Thank you, you always have great info, and make it fun


...."They are signed on an extra page in the book which is headed 'Exclusive Signed Edition'. Now this page doesn't exist in the normal version of the book - Take a look at some of the pictures of 'Gold Wristband' versions, you'll see that the book is signed on the title page with no mention of 'Exclusive Signed Edition'.There is no way that the publishers have printed 300 different copies of the book with an extra page, just for this event. So how do they do this?"......

PS
I am curious what you (and other expert collectors) think or know about the online Rolling Stones museum [www.therollingstonesmuseum.com] which Meredith posted about on this thread [www.iorr.org] ?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2011-08-16 19:15 by Max'sKansasCity.

fwiw- This looks like one of the gold band, "signed in person", no special page, copies...
$2200 buy it now... it will interesting to see what the value does over the years