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About The Rolling Stones and Cezh president Vaclav Havel
The Voice of a Revolution: Vaclav Havel’s Unyielding Spirit
Vaclav Havel was more than a dissident or writer—he was the eloquent conscience of a people silenced by decades of Communist rule. His sharp intellect and poetic grasp of language gave form and voice to the frustrations of millions living under oppression. Some even called him the “rockstar president with a heart,” a leader whose words stirred hope and courage when silence felt safer. Havel’s speeches and writings were not just art—they were acts of rebellion that resonated beyond borders, fueling the peaceful revolutions that toppled the Berlin Wall. His power lay in his ability to expose the absurdities and cruelties of dictatorship with clarity and humanity, helping inspire a movement that demanded freedom without firing a single shot.
From Dissident to President: Leading the Velvet Revolution
As The New York Times highlighted, Havel’s moral authority and masterful use of the Czech language made him the undeniable figurehead of the 1989 Prague demonstrations. Behind the scenes, he was the chief negotiator who shaped the Velvet Revolution’s peaceful transfer of power, ending over 40 years of Communist control in mere weeks. When the dust settled, Havel was chosen as the first president of post-Communist Czechoslovakia—a role he accepted as duty rather than ambition. After the country peacefully split in 1993, he continued his leadership as president of the newly formed Czech Republic, cementing his legacy as a man whose words changed history.
Keith Richards on Rocking Prague: When The Stones Rolled In After the Revolution
“At the tail end of the Steel Wheels tour we liberated Prague, or so it felt. One in Stalin’s eye. We played a concert there soon after the evolution that ended the communist regime. Tanks Roll Out, Stones Roll In was the headline”, says Keith Richards in his own book Life. “It was a great coup by Vaclav Havel, the politician who had taken Czechoslovakia through a bloodless coup only months earlier, a brilliant move. Tanks were going out and now we’re going to have the Stones. We were glad to be apart of it.”
More from Keith: “Havel is perhaps the only head of state who has made, or would imagine making, a speech about the role that rock music played in political events leading to a revolution in the Eastern Bloc of Europe. He is the one politician I am proud to have met. Lovely guy. He had a huge brass telescope in the palace, once he was president, and it was focused on the prison cell where he did six years. And every day I look through there to try and figure things out.”
Richards continues: “We lit the state palace for him. They couldn’t afford to do it so we asked Patrick Woodroffe, our lighting guru, to relight the huge castle. Patrick set him up, Taj Mahal’d him. We gave Vaclav this little white remote control with a tongue on it. He walked around lighting up the palace, and suddenly statues came alive. He was like a kid, pushing buttons and going, whoa! It’s not often you get to hand with presidents like that and say , Jesus, I like the cat.”
The Stones would meet Havel again in 1995 when they played the Strahov/Spartakiadni Stadion in Prague on August 5, 1995.
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