Well the best was yet to come, as they went on to record the epic musical masterpieces– Let It Bleed, Sticky Fingers and Exile On Main Street, It'sOnly Rock'n Roll.
Then suddenly in ’74, Mick dropped out. Some say he was kicked out– but Taylor simply had enough of the chaos, drugs, and strain that came with being in the Stones. Had he stayed, Taylor adamantly believes that the Stones’ life of debauchery would have killed him.
The one thing no one argues, not even the Stone’s themselves, is that Mick Taylor’s musical prowess far surpassed that of his former band mates. His fluid and bluesy guitar work held the group together through many of Richards’ drug and alcohol binges. The irony is that many fans unwittingly attribute much of Mick Taylor’s picking on countless Stones’ classics from ’69-’74 to guitar frontman, Keith Richards.
In 1969 Mayall recommended the young guitarist to Mick Jagger, who was looking for someone to fill a vacancy in The Rolling Stones.
The Man Who Dared Leave The Rolling Stones, an effrontery which prompted Keith Richards, similarly appalled by Bill Wyman’s departure years later, to state that “No one should leave this band except in a pine box”.
Which was the result of Brian Jones' recent dismissal from the band. Taylor left the Rolling Stones in December 1974, shortly after the release of It's Only Rock 'n' Roll
Back in ’82, the Stone’s management cut-off royalties due to Taylor for his work with the band– essentially screwing him. Adding insult to injury, they threw this tasty gem in the recently released documentary “Stones in Exile”–
He was a very fluent, melodic player... and it gave me something to follow, to bang off," Mick Jagger said of Taylor.
Once, he joined Jagger in the studio in 2010 to overdub guitar onto "Plundered My Soul," a leftover song from the Exile on Main St. sessions. it was one of Mick’s songs. It was among the outtakes that had to be finished.
Taylor recals: "Actually, some of them were finished. But this particular song didn’t have a vocal on it and it didn’t have any lead guitar. It just had Keith Richards, Bill Wyman and Charlie Watts playing on it. So he asked me to step into the studio one afternoon, and I did some guitar in about three or four passes. I thought it turned out well."
"The original track of Plundered My Soul is just sort of Keith’s rhythm guitar, Bill Wyman’s bass playing and Charlie Watts’ drumming, and it’s very raw. But yes, that was the last song I played with Mick. "(Mick Jagger)
Bassist Bill Wyman declares, “Musically he (Mick Taylor) was a better musician than the other guys in the band. Some of the things he did was amazing but he was incredibly boring onstage. He’d do the most amazing licks, riffs and solos but he’d just stand there and look at his guitar.
God, the audience would see the top of his head all the time. I always thought he could’ve been a bit more… but then I’m not a good one to talk. I don’t leap about much. In 30 years with The Stones I’ve probably made three steps on the stage.”
After the Stones, Taylor teamed up with Jack Bruce, toured and played with Bob Dylan and other notables like Alvin Lee, Little Feat and the Grateful Dead, made solo records and even reunited with mentor John Mayall in the Bluesbreakers.
