During a December 3, 1965 concert, a stunned audience at Sacramento Memorial Auditorium hears a loud pop and sees an eruption of blue sparks as Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards is thrown backwards and lies unmoving on the stage. The neck of Richards’ electric guitar has touched an ungrounded microphone as he steps forward to sing the chorus of the Stones’ current hit, “The Last Time.”
Mick Jagger stands over his unconscious “Glimmer Twin.” The curtain falls and the show ends. Promoting his autobiography, Richards tells the New York Times in an October 20, 2010 interview that of the electrical shocks he’s received over the years “my most spectacular one was in Sacramento.” Then, says the Times, Richards engages in a “fond-sounding reverie that involves a guitar string touching an ungrounded microphone and clouds of smoke billowing out of his mouth.”
The incident occurs four songs into the second of two shows at Memorial Auditorium, admission starting at $2.75 and maxing at $4.75.
Richards, 21, is taken to a local hospital and tells the Times he remembers a doctor saying, “Well, they either wake up or they don’t.”
Richards says another doctor tells him the insulation from his rubber-soled Hush Puppies saved his life.
Hush Puppies touts this in a 2008 promotion marking the company’s 50th anniversary.
Richards is advised to rest but performs in the band’s San Jose shows the following night.
Handbills asking “Can You Pass the Acid Test?” and providing the address of a nearby house are given to departing San Jose concert goers. It’s an invitation to the second of theLSD-infused “Acid Tests”hosted by author Ken Kesey and his Merry Pranksters. The house band isThe Grateful Dead. Keith Richards: The Biography by Victor Bockrissaysan apparently fully recovered Richards and fellow Stones’ guitarist Brian Jones attend the party.
