It's Not Only Rock 'N' Roll

It is 9:30 a.m., prime sleeping time for rock 'n' rollers, but Michael Cohl is wide awake and well into his first pack of cigarettes. The Canadian concert promoter is padding around his Philadelphia hotel suite shoeless--scanning faxes, taking phone calls, and sweating the details of his latest venture: the Rolling Stones' 1994-95 world tour, Voodoo Lounge. Mick Jagger and the other Stones will open the first of two shows at Veteran's Stadium in 12 hours. And in the meantime, Cohl has a business to run: "In our minds, we try to approximate your ordinary go-to-the-office kind of company," he explains.

Only the most callow of rock fans would be surprised to learn that the current Stones tour--like the band itself--is fundamentally a business. The wild excess and seat-of-your-pants planning documented in Gimme Shelter, the 1970 film about the band's notorious Altamont concert, is long gone. If one were to remake that film today, it could well be called Gimme Tax Shelter.