Selling Mick to Pay Con Ed

Selling Mick to Pay Con Ed

On this date in 2012, a set of 10 love letters that Mick Jagger wrote to his one-time paramour Marsha Hunt were auctioned off for £187,250 ($305,929). Hunt, a singer, novelist and model who appeared in the original London production of "Hair," met Mick in 1969. The couple secretly dated and produced a love child - Karis - born in 1970. She is the first of seven children that Mick fathered with four different women. Just how does he find the time for all these family affairs?

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Bob Dylan and Scarlet Rivera: Strings of Rolling Thunder

Bob Dylan and Scarlet Rivera: Strings of Rolling Thunder

Man, I can't tell you how many times my shrink has had to listen to me recount this dream: I'm strutting down the street decked out like Joan Jett -- carrying a guitar/amp/tambourine/harmonica - when a car pulls over and a famous, seasoned musician asks me to stop by a recording studio and rehearse with him. Instant stardom, based on nothing more than IMAGE. Hey, it's no more far fetched than grabbing 15 minutes of fame by being anointed "star du jour" by the glam-bam-thank-you-ma'am "American Idol" judges. Being swept off the street by a rock star may be nothing more than a wet dream for yer blogger, but this really did happen to a young violinist named Donna Shea, better known as Scarlet Rivera.

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Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby?

Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby?

The Rolling Stones' 1966 release, "Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby, Standing in the Shadow?" isn't a song normally thought of as a Mother's Day tribute tune. Nor was it intended as such. Its ambiguous lyrics hint that mom's doing something of a shadowy nature. Mick Jagger sings the narcissistic lyric, "tell me a story about how you adore me." Shouldn't that line be the other way around? Okay, so although this is definitely NOT a song you'd want to include on your mix-tape for Mother's Day, it does serve as a reminder: have YOU seen your mother lately, baby? Today let's take a look at the women who gave life to some famous entertainers.

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And Your Liverbirds Can Sing: The Electric Girls Known as The Female Beatles

And Your Liverbirds Can Sing: The Electric Girls Known as The Female Beatles

"Girls with guitars? That'll never work," John Lennon was rumored to have once said. Little did he know that four fab femmes had been wielding electric guitars in his very own hometown of Liverpool, several years before he and his fellow Beatles took over the world. They named themselves The Liverbirds, for the fictitious Liver Bird that has long symbolized the seaport city, and went on to help define the emerging "Mersey Beat" that would make Liverpool an early rock-n-roll mecca.

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Estelle Axton: The First Lady of Stax

Estelle Axton: The First Lady of Stax

The name Stax Records is synonymous with soul music. But did you know that the legendary label of black artists like Otis Redding, Carla Thomas, Wilson Pickett, and Isaac Hayes was co-founded by a white woman who began her career as a school teacher? In the late 1950s, Estelle Axton began investing in Satellite Records, a small label started by her brother Jim Stewart, a former bank clerk. Satellite evolved into Stax, a premiere recording studio specializing in soul, R&B, funk, jazz, and gospel music. Said Booker T. Jones of the M.G.s, "I doubt there would have been a Stax Records without Estelle Axton." The woman known as "Lady A" marketed the business, ran the Stax record shop, helped choose and develop the label's artists, and provided inspiration, advice, and encouragement to writers and musicians.

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