Stone Free

when it comes to music conference keynotes, the speakers who provide the best edutainment bang for your buck aren't usually the smiling superstars or glad-handing business barons who've learned to be cautious in public forums.

This is definitely a job for the losers, and the bigger the better. It's sorry bastards like former Rolling Stones manager/producer Andrew Loog Oldham, who've had it all and pissed it away, who have really engaging stories and the most useful life lessons.

Fortunately, the 58-year-old raconteur has come out of a drug and alcohol haze with his memory and biting wit intact, which his colourfully recounted memoir, Stoned (St. Martin's Press), the first volume of a planned "triography," clearly demonstrates.

However, that book only covers the years 1960 to 64 from the vantage point of a Mary Quant employee who gave up a proper career in fashion for the dirty business of rock 'n' roll. Things don't really start swinging until his highly anticipated second volume, 2Stoned (St. Martin's Press) Ð due out in October Ð which documents the Rolling Stones' rise and fall.

"The first book was like Little Women," clarifies Oldham from a stop in Niagara Falls. "The second is more like In Cold Blood." Now here's the sort of character you'd like to hear tell a few sordid tales. He knows where the bodies are buried.

With a speaking engagement and a book launch looming, the seasoned spin doctor with an impeccable sense of timing is clearly careful about spilling the juicy bits early.

Ask him about Eric Clapton's alleged bisexual escapade with Mick Jagger and Oldham dismissively snorts, "He wishes," while the popular one about Brian Jones's death is sidestepped reflexively with "There are no such things as accidents."

The question of how he came to be replaced by Allen Klein at the Stones' helm has him reaching for an onion analogy. "Ah, there are many layers to it...." The old onion bit comes up quite often in our conversation.

He tends to be much more direct when talk turns to his own mysterious past. We can presume he's not living in Bogot‡ for its tropical climate alone, which Oldham confirms.

"I came out of the 60s with only so many marbles left and I decided to dedicate them to getting the one thing I'd never had Ð a personal life.

"Why Colombia? Well, during the period of my intoxication, which is behind me now, there's something to be said for a country with wholesale prices. I did work a little bit, but only to make it appear as if I did."

He has taken the odd production job when the money or learning potential proved too enticing to pass up Ð as with Bobby Womack's classic Poet II session. "And then Bobby turned to me and asked, 'You don't freebase, do you?'"

Once you've been in the music business as deeply as Oldham, however, you never really get it out of your system. And he still feels the old excitement at spotting a rising talent who may need representation.

"It's in my blood. I can't help it. But now I just try to put talented artists in touch with the right people. I can't say why, but Remy Shand interests me at the moment. I just saw his video and was fascinated."

Oldham does seem to be getting over his fascination with the Stones.

"I saw them the last time around and I thought the show was dreadful. Of course, it went over well in Argentina, because they don't understand the lyrics."

Still, he's not against the idea of the elder statesmen preparing for yet another world tour.

"It beats solo records, right?"