The Steampunk Opium Wars: Lord Palmerston declares war on China video

Egged on by Sir Jardine Matheson, Lord Palmerston declares war on China when Lin Zexu destroys the British opium stocks.

Poem "After Kipling: Apology for the First Opium War" written and performed by John Crow.

The Steampunk Opium Wars is written and narrated by Anna Chen.

With Paul Anderson, Louise Whittle, Hugo Trebels, Neil Hornick, John Paul O'Neill. Charles Shaar Murray on Guitar and Marc Jefferies on bass. Plus Deborah Evans Stickland and Gary Lammin.

More of The Steampunk Opium Wars

HSBC's record drugs money laundering fine: from Opium Wars to Mexican drug lords

Ain't life funny?

The HSBC started off in the 19th century opium wars, servicing the British narcocapitalists, and here they are still at it, laundering drugs money for Mexican drugs lords.

You'd think, given the severity of US drugs laws and how they slap every spliffer and cannabis-dealing youth into jail — especially if they're black — that proportionately, the suits behind the mega-bucks Class A drug loot would find themselves dropping their soap in the showers along with the rest of the small-time felons.

However, you'd be wrong. For some strange unfathomable reason, the drug-profiting HSBC has been let off with a £1.2 billion fine to "settle allegations" in the US that they laundered money. Oh, and then there're the global terrorist funds they put through the wash as well, but no-one's been locked up.

So do remember that if ever you're caught with a wrap of coke or a joint.

Alice In Wonderland review: Disney and the Opium Wars

Rather belatedly, I'm posting a review of Tim Burton's 3D movie adaptation of Alice In Wonderland. Being a sucker for the technology (especially now that you get proper stylish Rayban-style spectacles and not the horrid — if nostalgic — cardboard face-wear of old), I had gone to see Alice the first week it opened at the local multiplex. I'd been a fan of the Rev Dodgson's finest since childhood, natch, and knew "Jabberwocky" and "The Walrus And The Carpenter" by heart. Many's the time I've watched politicians, big and small, and thought of the Carpenter weeping for the fate of the poor oysters as he stuffs as many as possible into his blubbering gob under cover of his handkerchief.

So I was determined not to miss out. The visuals didn't disappoint, even though the movie came hot on the heels of James Cameron's Avatar blockbuster. The performances positively sparkled. I will say, though, that Matt Lucas, brilliantly cast as both Tweedledum and Tweedledee, was criminally underused. Johnny Depp in best Vivienne Westwood drag and eyes enlarged through CGI by 25 per cent, put in another one of his trademark oddball performances as the Mad Hatter who, played by the box-office pull, morphed into a centre-stage action hero. Burton's missus, Helena Bonham Carter as the Red Queen, allowed her director husband to commit gross uglification by hydroencephalising her pretty head. One laugh-out-loud moment is when this mass-murdering monster looks up at her evil swain and flutters her outsized eyes in a manner she assumes is appealing. Oh, the joy in the recognition that some of us just can't do 'cute'.

Mia Wasikowska played Alice as a feisty 19-year old Victorian miss, and very attractively too. In her shining armour and flowing pre-Raphaelite hair (be still, my beating heart!), she made the most stunningly beautiful boy in her climactic fight with the Jabberwock (voiced, in full-on stentorian mode, by no less a personage than Christopher Lee).

But the script ... something failed to fully emotionally engage and I didn't know what it was. Hmm ... made for Disney, huh?

As the film was made for the Fascist Rodent corporation, I was surprised to see it foregrounding the druggy perspective, an interpretation popular since the tripped-out 60s, with a very stoned Caterpillar (Alan Rickman) sucking on a hookah which was more opium pipe than shisha.

Now, everyone seems to have assumed that Tim Burton had taken his eye off the ball with Alice and turned out a nice safe movie for Disney, and that the hint that this might be an opium dream was just a cheap way to reclaim a bit of his old transgressive credibility. Well, yes. But much more than this, oh, yes.

The framing device, before she falls down the rabbit hole and enters Wonderland, is set around Alice's real life and her imminent engagement to Hamish (Leo Bill), a twittish minor aristocrat (aren't they all?), offspring to Lady Ascot (Geraldine James) who wants Alice's beauty in the family gene-pool so they can breed beautiful grandchildren for her. At the end, fresh out of her adventures in Underland, Alice rejects Hamish and a life of a privileged brood-mare, telling everyone what she thinks of them, and taking charge of her late father's business in partnership with Hamish's father, Lord Ascot.

Laid on with a shovel, Alice's anachronistic feminist feistiness may have been irritating as an unconvincing attitude which was not so much seeing the age refracted through modern eyes, as completely rewriting history. But, in a great Tim Burton sleight-of-hand, there was something else going on which seems to have bypassed the studio execs. The Powers That Be may be congratulating themselves that this is a nice conventional tale of how white folk in the Imperial West (for the glory days of Great Britain, read the nostalgia for America's 'finest hour') advanced themselves through trade, all with a dash of Girl Power.

But where did all that wealth come from? Burton and co-writer Linda Woolverton focus you on the business of how money is made in the opening scenes.

Alice's father, (Marton Csokas as Charles Kingsleigh — does that make Alice a water baby?), is in shipping to the East Indies and Indonesia. But what looks at first glance as a ho-hum story of middle-class folk innocently making their fortune in the world with a feminist twist is dealt a sly kicking by the writers.

At the end, breadhead Alice — child of the British Empire — drags Lord Ascot into a room where she lays out the map of the world and analyses their current Eastern trade routes. Her new-found leadership skills (she has just slain the Jabberwock with her vorpal sword) take her beyond what's known and into the relatively new area of trade with China. She points triumphantly at Hong Kong. THIS is where they will make their fortune. Her brush with the stoned Caterpillar and his drug habit has taught her where there is money to be made.

Anyone even slightly familiar with that slice of history knows about the Opium Wars, and exactly how Britain acquired Hong Kong. How, when our taste for China's silks, spices, tea and porcelain threatened to empty the treasury of its silver, Britain cultivated cheap opium in Bengal and forced it on China at gunpoint. This was what Britain's trade with China meant: in turning what had once been an aristocratic vice into a mass addiction, Britain became the world's Number One Pusher and turned China into a nation of junkies.

And that's where I nearly fell off my chair. Mr Burton, you sly dog, you. Never mind the lovely Johnny, I think I'm a little bit in love with Tim.

Alice In Wonderland review: Disney and the Opium Wars

Rather belatedly, I'm posting a review of Tim Burton's 3D movie adaptation of Alice In Wonderland. Being a sucker for the technology (especially now that you get proper stylish Rayban-style spectacles and not the horrid — if nostalgic — cardboard face-wear of old), I had gone to see Alice the first week it opened at the local multiplex. I'd been a fan of the Rev Dodgson's finest since childhood, natch, and knew "Jabberwocky" and "The Walrus And The Carpenter" by heart. Many's the time I've watched politicians, big and small, and thought of the Carpenter weeping for the fate of the poor oysters as he stuffs as many as possible into his blubbering gob under cover of his handkerchief.

So I was determined not to miss out. The visuals didn't disappoint, even though the movie came hot on the heels of James Cameron's Avatar blockbuster. The performances positively sparkled. I will say, though, that Matt Lucas, brilliantly cast as both Tweedledum and Tweedledee, was criminally underused. Johnny Depp in best Vivienne Westwood drag and eyes enlarged through CGI by 25 per cent, put in another one of his trademark oddball performances as the Mad Hatter who, played by the box-office pull, morphed into a centre-stage action hero. Burton's missus, Helena Bonham Carter as the Red Queen, allowed her director husband to commit gross uglification by hydroencephalising her pretty head. One laugh-out-loud moment is when this mass-murdering monster looks up at her evil swain and flutters her outsized eyes in a manner she assumes is appealing. Oh, the joy in the recognition that some of us just can't do 'cute'.

Mia Wasikowska played Alice as a feisty 19-year old Victorian miss, and very attractively too. In her shining armour and flowing pre-Raphaelite hair (be still, my beating heart!), she made the most stunningly beautiful boy in her climactic fight with the Jabberwock (voiced, in full-on stentorian mode, by no less a personage than Christopher Lee).

But the script ... something failed to fully emotionally engage and I didn't know what it was. Hmm ... made for Disney, huh?

As the film was made for the Fascist Rodent corporation, I was surprised to see it foregrounding the druggy perspective, an interpretation popular since the tripped-out 60s, with a very stoned Caterpillar (Alan Rickman) sucking on a hookah which was more opium pipe than shisha.

Now, everyone seems to have assumed that Tim Burton had taken his eye off the ball with Alice and turned out a nice safe movie for Disney, and that the hint that this might be an opium dream was just a cheap way to reclaim a bit of his old transgressive credibility. Well, yes. But much more than this, oh, yes.

The framing device, before she falls down the rabbit hole and enters Wonderland, is set around Alice's real life and her imminent engagement to Hamish (Leo Bill), a twittish minor aristocrat (aren't they all?), offspring to Lady Ascot (Geraldine James) who wants Alice's beauty in the family gene-pool so they can breed beautiful grandchildren for her. At the end, fresh out of her adventures in Underland, Alice rejects Hamish and a life of a privileged brood-mare, telling everyone what she thinks of them, and taking charge of her late father's business in partnership with Hamish's father, Lord Ascot.

Laid on with a shovel, Alice's anachronistic feminist feistiness may have been irritating as an unconvincing attitude which was not so much seeing the age refracted through modern eyes, as completely rewriting history. But, in a great Tim Burton sleight-of-hand, there was something else going on which seems to have bypassed the studio execs. The Powers That Be may be congratulating themselves that this is a nice conventional tale of how white folk in the Imperial West (for the glory days of Great Britain, read the nostalgia for America's 'finest hour') advanced themselves through trade, all with a dash of Girl Power.

But where did all that wealth come from? Burton and co-writer Linda Woolverton focus you on the business of how money is made in the opening scenes.

Alice's father, (Marton Csokas as Charles Kingsleigh — does that make Alice a water baby?), is in shipping to the East Indies and Indonesia. But what looks at first glance as a ho-hum story of middle-class folk innocently making their fortune in the world with a feminist twist is dealt a sly kicking by the writers.

At the end, breadhead Alice — child of the British Empire — drags Lord Ascot into a room where she lays out the map of the world and analyses their current Eastern trade routes. Her new-found leadership skills (she has just slain the Jabberwock with her vorpal sword) take her beyond what's known and into the relatively new area of trade with China. She points triumphantly at Hong Kong. THIS is where they will make their fortune. Her brush with the stoned Caterpillar and his drug habit has taught her where there is money to be made.

Anyone even slightly familiar with that slice of history knows about the Opium Wars, and exactly how Britain acquired Hong Kong. How, when our taste for China's silks, spices, tea and porcelain threatened to empty the treasury of its silver, Britain cultivated cheap opium in Bengal and forced it on China at gunpoint. This was what Britain's trade with China meant: in turning what had once been an aristocratic vice into a mass addiction, Britain became the world's Number One Pusher and turned China into a nation of junkies.

And that's where I nearly fell off my chair. Mr Burton, you sly dog, you. Never mind the lovely Johnny, I think I'm a little bit in love with Tim.

China executes British man by lethal injection

It's very sad to learn that the Chinese authorities went ahead and executed British national Akmal Shaikh by lethal injection. Although he was caught carrying 4kg of heroin, this was no drugs baron who might have been a continuing threat to Chinese society. He was a weak bit of social flotsam who it appears was suffering a bipolar mental disorder. The fact that he was a Muslim probably isolated him even more.

China should have been bigger and shown compassion even in the face of extreme provocation from a hostile British government eager to scapegoat it over the Copenhagen failure. Brown and Ed Miliband are fully aware that they can't insult a nation like China and expect them to roll over and comply. We don't own half the world any more and Brits with drugs in China are likely to press some deep buttons especially in the light of current hostilities and past history.

Under different circumstances there was more than enough of an excuse for China to show leniency. Fahim wrote in an online discussion:

Most death sentences are never actually carried out. A uniquely Chinese sentence system called 'death penalty with 2 yrs probation', means that as long as you don't commit any further offences within 2 yrs your sentence is generally reduced to life. In 2003 a local court sentenced a triad leader to death with 2 yrs probation, but a public outcry led to the supreme court retrying the case which resulted in a death penalty carried out immediately.

But how likely was that with the utter lack of meaningful diplomacy on show from our government and the savaging in the British press? The hypocrisy of some of the media's breast-beating is sickening in the light of their recent misreporting — we'll never know for certain if the execution is in part a result of their hollow war-like cries. Newspapers that shrieked "China holds the world to ransom" when it's now clear that no such thing happened now scream inflammatory headlines about Shaikh. When will you lot cut out the testosterone? It doesn't help.

But China! I'm glad to hear they wish to phase out the death penalty — 71% of global executions are held there — but now would have been a good place to start. China could have gained the moral high ground by showing mercy to this man and made many more friends in the international community but they got down on the British government's level and now a man, a political pawn, lies dead.

To those who say they couldn't care less that a drug smuggler has been executed, let's hear it from John Donne :

No Man is an island entire of itself; every man is a part of the whole continent. Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.

It's forgetting that that is leading us into some dark places.

This is what I'm talking about. Sections of the British media practically declare war on China

Blood and Treasure has this take

Michael White in The Guardian on Why denouncing China is hypocritical A tip of the Miaow chapeau to Harpymarx

UPDATE: 30th Dec 2009 This is one situation where I am pleased to say I was wrong. The eruption of sinophobia at The Independent seems to be at an end with the publication of a balanced leader article that lets no-one off the hook: What this execution doesn't say about China and Britain

... it would have been an extraordinary gesture of humanity or diplomatic goodwill had the Chinese authorities overruled the court to commute the sentence. That they permitted two of Shaikh's cousins to pay a farewell visit was itself unusual and suggested that Beijing might not be completely deaf to the pleas from many miles away.

UPDATE: Talking of barbarism, while the media has been feeding us diversionary hysteria over Shaikh's execution — to which I remain opposed — here's how Western justice treats the massacre of Iraqi civilians by Blackwater operatives. I do wonder where the front page hysteria was on this occasion.

Gordon Brown signs Briton's death warrant in China

Being implacably opposed to the death penalty, I hope that China will put to one side the dishonest, unprincipled, British government and media dissembling over Copenhagen and show mercy to Akmal Shaikh, the British man caught smuggling four kilograms of heroin. It now appears he was mentally ill and deserving of clemency.

In the face of extreme provocation by the rich nations who threw a hissy-fit because China wouldn't sign up to their pact condemning the poorer nations to a slumdog future, China would come out of this the better nation if it commuted the death sentence due on 29th December.

It is somewhat laughable to see that Gordon Brown intends appealing to President Hu Jintao on Shaikh's behalf after what he and his muppet Ed Miliband just said about China. If I was Shaikh I'd be praying Brown stayed well out of it because I reckon President Hu won't find Gordon appealing one little bit.

So, Ed, China tried to hijack the summit, did it? George Monbiot presents a different appraisal here.

The Guardian reports Shaikh's lawyer, the renowned anti-death penalty campaigner, Clive Stafford Smith as saying:

Stafford Smith said Shaikh's chances of avoiding a death sentence may be hampered by the row between China and the UK and US at the climate change summit last week in Copenhagen: "Britain and the US chose to make China the scapegoat at Copenhagen which, given US intransigence over the past decade, might be viewed as hypocritical. We very much hope that Akmal Shaikh does not become a victim of the regrettably cold political climate that has resulted."

And that's how ugly politics gets.

UPDATE: Monday 28th 2009. Shaikh has been given the time of his execution, 10:30 (2:30 GMT) tomorrow morning. This is awful as, on top of the whole death penalty debate, it does appear that he is mentally ill. I hope China will show clemency and not make him pay the price of the West's recent politicking.

Gordon Brown signs Briton's death warrant in China

Being implacably opposed to the death penalty, I hope that China will put to one side the dishonest, unprincipled, British government and media dissembling over Copenhagen and show mercy to Akmal Shaikh, the British man caught smuggling four kilograms of heroin. It now appears he was mentally ill and deserving of clemency.

In the face of extreme provocation by the rich nations who threw a hissy-fit because China wouldn't sign up to their pact condemning the poorer nations to a slumdog future, China would come out of this the better nation if it commuted the death sentence due on 29th December.

It is somewhat laughable to see that Gordon Brown intends appealing to President Hu Jintao on Shaikh's behalf after what he and his muppet Ed Miliband just said about China. If I was Shaikh I'd be praying Brown stayed well out of it because I reckon President Hu won't find Gordon appealing one little bit.

So, Ed, China tried to hijack the summit, did it? George Monbiot presents a different appraisal here.

The Guardian reports Shaikh's lawyer, the renowned anti-death penalty campaigner, Clive Stafford Smith as saying:

Stafford Smith said Shaikh's chances of avoiding a death sentence may be hampered by the row between China and the UK and US at the climate change summit last week in Copenhagen: "Britain and the US chose to make China the scapegoat at Copenhagen which, given US intransigence over the past decade, might be viewed as hypocritical. We very much hope that Akmal Shaikh does not become a victim of the regrettably cold political climate that has resulted."

And that's how ugly politics gets.

UPDATE: Monday 28th 2009. Shaikh has been given the time of his execution, 10:30 (2:30 GMT) tomorrow morning. This is awful as, on top of the whole death penalty debate, it does appear that he is mentally ill. I hope China will show clemency and not make him pay the price of the West's recent politicking.

Miaow now a drug as well as Madam's ace blog

Of all the things in the world and beyond that could be named after this blog's author, I never imagined it would be drugs. ("Oh yes you did," says Evil Self. "And you love it.")

"Miaow" is a plant food sold on the internet but newly discovered as having some sort of inebriant qualities. I've always wondered what flaming hoops early drug pioneers had to go through to find out that model plane adhesive, Benzadrex inhalers soaked in cola (doesn't work — just makes you puke, so I'm told) and now flower fertiliser can give you a high.

"Ooh, there's a pretty poppy seed pod. I wonder what happens if I slice it here and gather the sap ... and stick it into a vein."

"Just got to water the plants, love. Ah, sod the skunk, just nick their food."

The Telegraph says:

Apart from the euphoria and alertness it is said to induce anxiety, paranoia and a risk of fits.

Unlike Scotch, gin, vodka, rum, brandy which Telegraph journos all know is good for you, rejuvenates your liver, sweetens the breath and improves your mood the more you drink, Miaow kills you.

A scientist writes.

I wonder if I can get a sponsor.

Miaow now a drug as well as Madam's ace blog

Of all the things in the world and beyond that could be named after this blog's author, I never imagined it would be drugs. ("Oh yes you did," says Evil Self. "And you love it.")

"Miaow" is a plant food sold on the internet but newly discovered as having some sort of inebriant qualities. I've always wondered what flaming hoops early drug pioneers had to go through to find out that model plane adhesive, Benzadrex inhalers soaked in cola (doesn't work — just makes you puke, so I'm told) and now flower fertiliser can give you a high.

"Ooh, there's a pretty poppy seed pod. I wonder what happens if I slice it here and gather the sap ... and stick it into a vein."

"Just got to water the plants, love. Ah, sod the skunk, just nick their food."

The Telegraph says:

Apart from the euphoria and alertness it is said to induce anxiety, paranoia and a risk of fits.

Unlike Scotch, gin, vodka, rum, brandy which Telegraph journos all know is good for you, rejuvenates your liver, sweetens the breath and improves your mood the more you drink, Miaow kills you.

A scientist writes.

I wonder if I can get a sponsor.

Spartacus's grandson arrested for selling Crystal Meth: Cameron drugs scandal

From the BBC website:

Actor Michael Douglas says his family is "devastated" by the arrest of his son on drugs charges.

Cameron Douglas allegedly made thousands selling methamphetamine, one of the nastiest drugs ever. (In)Hailing from the Douglas acting dynasty, he's not exactly your average poverty-stricken street-corner dealer struggling to survive. He's likely to get ten years to life for this one — I'm not surprised the family is devastated.

At least he's still alive. A few years back, Michael's less talented half-brother, Eric, died of suspected substance abuse. I saw him die onstage at the Edinburgh Fringe of audience abuse when his stand-up bombed and all he could do was sneer and grunt at us, and then sadly he got the real thing.

"I am Cameron". "No, I am Cameron." "No, I am Cameron, and so is my drug dealer."

Spartacus's grandson arrested for selling Crystal Meth: Cameron drugs scandal

From the BBC website:

Actor Michael Douglas says his family is "devastated" by the arrest of his son on drugs charges.

Cameron Douglas allegedly made thousands selling methamphetamine, one of the nastiest drugs ever. (In)Hailing from the Douglas acting dynasty, he's not exactly your average poverty-stricken street-corner dealer struggling to survive. He's likely to get ten years to life for this one — I'm not surprised the family is devastated.

At least he's still alive. A few years back, Michael's less talented half-brother, Eric, died of suspected substance abuse. I saw him die onstage at the Edinburgh Fringe of audience abuse when his stand-up bombed and all he could do was sneer and grunt at us, and then sadly he got the real thing.

"I am Cameron". "No, I am Cameron." "No, I am Cameron, and so is my drug dealer."

Ancient Chinese stoner loses his stash: oldest marijuana ever found

Roll over Cheech and Chong. East India Dock Company and HSBC (former Midland Bank), your opium-addled drug-running days in China were 2,500 years too late.

The world's oldest stash of marijuana has been found in a shaman's tomb in the outlands of China. "The region of China where the tomb is located, Xinjiang, is considered an original source of many cannabis strains worldwide."

And none of that feeble "hemp used for fibre", malarky. Experts say this weed was "cultivated for psychoactive purposes".

Two and a half millennia ago? Dammit! I know where we went wrong. We invented ice-cream but no CHOCOLATE!!!!!

Ancient Chinese stoner loses his stash: oldest marijuana ever found

Roll over Cheech and Chong. East India Dock Company and HSBC (former Midland Bank), your opium-addled drug-running days in China were 2,500 years too late.

The world's oldest stash of marijuana has been found in a shaman's tomb in the outlands of China. "The region of China where the tomb is located, Xinjiang, is considered an original source of many cannabis strains worldwide."

And none of that feeble "hemp used for fibre", malarky. Experts say this weed was "cultivated for psychoactive purposes".

Two and a half millennia ago? Dammit! I know where we went wrong. We invented ice-cream but no CHOCOLATE!!!!!

Keith Richards stole my last joint: guest post from Charles Shaar Murray

EXCLUSIVE TO MADAM MIAOW SAYS — KEEF ENCOUNTERS

It's 1975. The Stones have just released a fairly disappointing album, Black And Blue, and in my capacity as frontline hatchetman for the New Musical Express, I pen a feature-length review making this case at great length. Bearing in mind Mick Jagger's dictum that he doesn't care what they say about him on Page 25 as long as his picture is on the front of the magazine, we decide to make the drummer our cover boy with a headline reading 'The new album by CHARLIE WATTS and his fabulous Rolling Stones.' Ahhh, fun'n games ...

The following week, the Stones, touring for the first time with new guy Ron Wood, are playing in Frankfurt (note to US readers: this is a city in Germany famous for its sausages and its right-wing economists) and it is decided that I should attend on behalf of the NME. It is not a great performance: the highlights are Keef tripping over his own legs and falling over, being helped to his feet and regaining Homo Erectus status whilst still playing, and Mick J returning to the stage after Keef's outrageously sloppy rendition of his vocal feature on Happy to announce, in his broadest Mockney, 'Fank you Keef, that WOS GRATE!'

After the show, the company assemble in Mr Wood's hotel room for an impromptu reception. I am seated on a sofa swapping badinage with Mr Wood when I hear someone saying (in broad Mockney) 'I fought your review was BLAAAAAAAAHDY STOOPID.' I ignore him. He says it again. I continue to ignore him. Mr Jagger is not well pleased. I commence rolling a joint. This attracts a certain amount of attention. I am informed that, whilst various White Powders are in plentiful supply, there is a total weed famine, and that I am the only person in the room with any incendiary intoxicants.

Five of us journo types are summoned to join Mr Richards at a table. Stone-faced (no overt pun intended), he is chopping out a dozen lines of some unidentified White Powder on a small marble slab. Producing a high-denomination banknote and rolling it into a tight cylinder, he then proceeds – glaring at each of us in turn – to snort all twelve lines himself. I continue rolling the joint, a process which is taking me far longer than it should: partly because the German papers seem entirely devoid of adhesive, and partly because I am already fairly refreshed.

An ashen-faced PR guy appears at my elbow. 'Mick says that if you don't leave now,' he informs me, 'he'll have you thrown out.' Noting that Mr Wood doesn't appear to have much of a say in who can and cannot remain in what is, after all, HIS room, I gather up my almost-completed spliff and rise to my feet.

'OI.' sez Keef. 'He stays. He's the only fucka who's got a joint.'

I sit down again and finally complete the spliff. I'm just about to ignite it when the PR returns, and by now he's a whiter shade of chartreuse. His job may depend on getting me out of there before Mick turns round. I shrug and head for the door. Keef gets up and follows me. At the door I light the joint. Keef mutters, 'Look, never mind what 'E sez. What's your room number? There's a party later on in Billy Preston's room [late keyboard player, former Ray Charles sideman and shares with the equally late Nicky Hopkins the distinction of being one of the only keyb guys to have played and performed with both Beatles and Stones] and I'll give you a call later on.'

I scribble out my room number and hand him the spliff. The door slams in my face. I realise that Keith Richards, grandmaster of cool and idol of millions, has just ripped me off for my last joint.

Back in my room, I think 'fark dis,' and -- to quote an old Stones B-side -- back in the bed I started reading my book, and I take my phone right offa the hook.

Next morning, there's a note under my door, scribbled on a page from the tour program. 'Tried to call you. What happened?'

1979: Keef and Ron are touring the US as the New Barbarians, with Stanley Clarke on bass, Joseph 'Zigaboo' Modeliste from The Meters on drums, Bobby Keyes on tenor sax and Ian MacLagan on keys. I join them in Dallas. We conduct an amusing interview during which Keef boasts of having a better reggae collection than any of the punkrockaaas (not surprising since he has a house in Jamaica), and all the old stagers seem a trifle nervous about an up-and-coming new band called The Police. At a post-gig party in Keef's room, attended by several members of the Dallas Cowboys football team and their cheerleaders, Keef announces that he has a bag of primo weed in one of his suitcases, but passes out before he can find it. I then watch him snooze on the floor while a whole bunch of people he doesn't know ransack his luggage looking for weed, and reflect that being an iconic rock star occasionally has its downsides.

1984: release of another disappointing Stones album, Dirty Work. For some reason I have been hanging out with Jeff Beck, who's been invited to the launch party,so I tag along. Bump into Keef. He gives me a big hug.

'I'm flattered,' I tell him, 'but we've never been close. Why are you so glad to see me?'

'I'm glad to see anyone,' he tells me, 'who's still around.'

POSTSCRIPT, 2003: The Stones are on the Forty Licks tour, and I am dispatched to Amsterdam to interview Uncle Keef (by now mellowed into the Lovable Old Pirate we know today) for the London Evening Standard. Having both purchased and consumed rather too enthusiastically at one of the city's cannabis cafe, I have only just regained the power to speak a known human language when it is time for the interview.

Keef arrives in high spirits (no pun intended) waving a fresh bottle of Stolichnaya, accompanied by a minder with a tall glass, an ice bucket and several cans of orange Fanta. We conduct a lively interview, during which Keef makes a major theatrical show out of pouring his drinks. I tell him that I'm not crazy about carrying all my remaining weed back through customs, and offer it to him as a goodwill gift.

'Aha!' he chuckles, 'EMG!'

I say, 'Huh?'

"EMG,' he repeats. 'Everything must go!'

At the end of the interview (a brief interlude of Geek Chat is later spun off into a separate piece for Guitarist), he leaves, and I note that he has not only left behind the bag of weed, but the bottle of Stoly, most of which remains. Despite all the theatrics, he has doused his vodkas in so much orange fizz that his drinks barely qualified as alcopops.

I am reduced to the ancient trick of wrapping the bag of weed in a rolled-up pair of dirty socks when returning home. It works, mainly because I now look so old and respectable that Customs don't bother with me. Back home in London, I consider putting Keef's bottle of Stoly up on eBay as a Stones collectable ...

... and then I think 'fark dis,' and drink it.

by Charles Shaar Murray

Keith Richards stole my last joint: guest post from Charles Shaar Murray

EXCLUSIVE TO MADAM MIAOW SAYS — KEEF ENCOUNTERS

It's 1975. The Stones have just released a fairly disappointing album, Black And Blue, and in my capacity as frontline hatchetman for the New Musical Express, I pen a feature-length review making this case at great length. Bearing in mind Mick Jagger's dictum that he doesn't care what they say about him on Page 25 as long as his picture is on the front of the magazine, we decide to make the drummer our cover boy with a headline reading 'The new album by CHARLIE WATTS and his fabulous Rolling Stones.' Ahhh, fun'n games ...

The following week, the Stones, touring for the first time with new guy Ron Wood, are playing in Frankfurt (note to US readers: this is a city in Germany famous for its sausages and its right-wing economists) and it is decided that I should attend on behalf of the NME. It is not a great performance: the highlights are Keef tripping over his own legs and falling over, being helped to his feet and regaining Homo Erectus status whilst still playing, and Mick J returning to the stage after Keef's outrageously sloppy rendition of his vocal feature on Happy to announce, in his broadest Mockney, 'Fank you Keef, that WOS GRATE!'

After the show, the company assemble in Mr Wood's hotel room for an impromptu reception. I am seated on a sofa swapping badinage with Mr Wood when I hear someone saying (in broad Mockney) 'I fought your review was BLAAAAAAAAHDY STOOPID.' I ignore him. He says it again. I continue to ignore him. Mr Jagger is not well pleased. I commence rolling a joint. This attracts a certain amount of attention. I am informed that, whilst various White Powders are in plentiful supply, there is a total weed famine, and that I am the only person in the room with any incendiary intoxicants.

Five of us journo types are summoned to join Mr Richards at a table. Stone-faced (no overt pun intended), he is chopping out a dozen lines of some unidentified White Powder on a small marble slab. Producing a high-denomination banknote and rolling it into a tight cylinder, he then proceeds – glaring at each of us in turn – to snort all twelve lines himself. I continue rolling the joint, a process which is taking me far longer than it should: partly because the German papers seem entirely devoid of adhesive, and partly because I am already fairly refreshed.

An ashen-faced PR guy appears at my elbow. 'Mick says that if you don't leave now,' he informs me, 'he'll have you thrown out.' Noting that Mr Wood doesn't appear to have much of a say in who can and cannot remain in what is, after all, HIS room, I gather up my almost-completed spliff and rise to my feet.

'OI.' sez Keef. 'He stays. He's the only fucka who's got a joint.'

I sit down again and finally complete the spliff. I'm just about to ignite it when the PR returns, and by now he's a whiter shade of chartreuse. His job may depend on getting me out of there before Mick turns round. I shrug and head for the door. Keef gets up and follows me. At the door I light the joint. Keef mutters, 'Look, never mind what 'E sez. What's your room number? There's a party later on in Billy Preston's room [late keyboard player, former Ray Charles sideman and shares with the equally late Nicky Hopkins the distinction of being one of the only keyb guys to have played and performed with both Beatles and Stones] and I'll give you a call later on.'

I scribble out my room number and hand him the spliff. The door slams in my face. I realise that Keith Richards, grandmaster of cool and idol of millions, has just ripped me off for my last joint.

Back in my room, I think 'fark dis,' and -- to quote an old Stones B-side -- back in the bed I started reading my book, and I take my phone right offa the hook.

Next morning, there's a note under my door, scribbled on a page from the tour program. 'Tried to call you. What happened?'

1979: Keef and Ron are touring the US as the New Barbarians, with Stanley Clarke on bass, Joseph 'Zigaboo' Modeliste from The Meters on drums, Bobby Keyes on tenor sax and Ian MacLagan on keys. I join them in Dallas. We conduct an amusing interview during which Keef boasts of having a better reggae collection than any of the punkrockaaas (not surprising since he has a house in Jamaica), and all the old stagers seem a trifle nervous about an up-and-coming new band called The Police. At a post-gig party in Keef's room, attended by several members of the Dallas Cowboys football team and their cheerleaders, Keef announces that he has a bag of primo weed in one of his suitcases, but passes out before he can find it. I then watch him snooze on the floor while a whole bunch of people he doesn't know ransack his luggage looking for weed, and reflect that being an iconic rock star occasionally has its downsides.

1984: release of another disappointing Stones album, Dirty Work. For some reason I have been hanging out with Jeff Beck, who's been invited to the launch party,so I tag along. Bump into Keef. He gives me a big hug.

'I'm flattered,' I tell him, 'but we've never been close. Why are you so glad to see me?'

'I'm glad to see anyone,' he tells me, 'who's still around.'

POSTSCRIPT, 2003: The Stones are on the Forty Licks tour, and I am dispatched to Amsterdam to interview Uncle Keef (by now mellowed into the Lovable Old Pirate we know today) for the London Evening Standard. Having both purchased and consumed rather too enthusiastically at one of the city's cannabis cafe, I have only just regained the power to speak a known human language when it is time for the interview.

Keef arrives in high spirits (no pun intended) waving a fresh bottle of Stolichnaya, accompanied by a minder with a tall glass, an ice bucket and several cans of orange Fanta. We conduct a lively interview, during which Keef makes a major theatrical show out of pouring his drinks. I tell him that I'm not crazy about carrying all my remaining weed back through customs, and offer it to him as a goodwill gift.

'Aha!' he chuckles, 'EMG!'

I say, 'Huh?'

"EMG,' he repeats. 'Everything must go!'

At the end of the interview (a brief interlude of Geek Chat is later spun off into a separate piece for Guitarist), he leaves, and I note that he has not only left behind the bag of weed, but the bottle of Stoly, most of which remains. Despite all the theatrics, he has doused his vodkas in so much orange fizz that his drinks barely qualified as alcopops.

I am reduced to the ancient trick of wrapping the bag of weed in a rolled-up pair of dirty socks when returning home. It works, mainly because I now look so old and respectable that Customs don't bother with me. Back home in London, I consider putting Keef's bottle of Stoly up on eBay as a Stones collectable ...

... and then I think 'fark dis,' and drink it.

by Charles Shaar Murray