Bill Wyman Reportedly Performs on New Rolling Stones Studio Album

Bill Wyman has reportedly reunited with the Rolling Stones in the studio, performing on one track for a new album described as a tribute to drummer Charlie Watts.

According to the Sun, Wyman flew out to Los Angeles several months ago to join the Stones' recording sessions in Los Angeles at the invitation of singer Mick Jagger. "Bill hasn't seen the band together for years, but always loved Charlie," said an unnamed source. "This record's really a tribute to Charlie, so he couldn't say no."

The last Rolling Stones studio album to feature Wyman on bass was 1989's Steel Wheels. He left the band in 1992, eager to live a more normal life. "I had 30 years with them, then a really nice divorce and as corny as it sounds, we are still family," he later explained.

He joined the band onstage in 2012 for a 50th anniversary concert in London, but later expressed disappointment over only being invited to play two songs instead of the whole show. "If you try to go back and have a relationship with someone, it doesn't work, and it's the same musically," he declared in 2013. "It was a one-off. Five minutes. OK, never again. No regrets, we're still great friends."

The Stones have been working sporadically on a new album for the better part of the last decade, with Jagger reporting as far back as November 2016 that the band had "half an album" of new material ready. This would be the first Rolling Stones studio album since 2016's blues covers album Blue and Lonesome, and the first to feature original songs since 2005's A Bigger Bang.

This long gestation period means that Watts, who died in August 2021, will still be heard on the new record. "It was really nice for Mick, Keith [Richards] and Ronnie Wood to be back in the studio remembering Charlie, and playing and singing to drum tracks that are being repurposed and woven into the album," explained the Sun's source.

Paul McCartney will also play bass on one track from the as-yet untitled new album. This week marked the 60th anniversary of the Rolling Stones's debut single, a cover of Chuck Berry's "Come On" and the 45th anniversary of their 1978 comeback album Some Girls.