Six-year-old Charles Weber was blissfully ignorant that he was about to be exploited as a child drug mule for some of the world’s top rock artists as his father taped a kilo of cocaine to his back and chest using gaffer tape.
He was beaming at Heathrow Airport in London as he flew to southern France to see Keith Richards and Mick Jagger, the Rolling Stones’ front man who had become family friends – and who also happened to be A-list clients of his drug smuggler father Tommy Weber.
His brother Jake, only a year-and-a-half older – who would later become a Hollywood actor starring alongside the likes of Patricia Arquette – was also loaded with packets of the party drug.
‘I wasn’t nervous at all,’ Charles, now 57, told the MailOnline this week, ‘I didn’t really know how bad it was at the time, although I do remember the look of horror on my father’s face when my packet was suddenly sticking out of my shirt, but he dragged me to the bathroom and quickly fixed me up.’
While it may seem shocking by today’s standards, this was 1971, at the height of the ‘counterculture’ era, when hedonistic hippies ruled and psychedelic drugs came hand-in-hand with rock’n’roll.
Fleeing the taxman, the Stones had absconded to Villa Nellcote in Villefranche-sur-Mer, Côte d’Azur, where they spent a legendary six months creating some of their best work while hosting a non-stop house party – with a lot of the drugs supplied by Charles’ father.
The stunning property, rented by Sir Keith, now 78, had previously been owned by the Gestapo, the Nazi’s secret police force, in the 1940s. The rockers, of Satisfaction and Brown Sugar fame, would record their hit album Exile on Main St there that summer, in what has become the stuff of legend among fans.
And right at the heart of it was Charles, whose drug-dealing father proved essential in keeping the party going.
The handsome racing car driver-turned-film producer-turned-drug trafficker was sought by huge stars and figureheads of the counterculture revolution, from Jimi Hendrix to fugitive psychiatrist Timothy Leary – who Charles later met in Switzerland after he had managed to escape a low-security US jail by climbing over the fence along a telephone wire.
Despite his young age in the summer of 1971, Charles could recognise the star quality oozing from the Stones from the moment he arrived at Nellcote Villa.
‘We got to France and there was a limo waiting for us,’ recalled Charles, ‘we pulled up to the villa and there was Keith waiting for us like we were long lost family – although I suspect he was also very interested in what was strapped to my body.
‘They were all just so magical and cool, I remember they had such an aura about them.
‘Charlie Watts was an absolute sweetheart.’
‘And bassist Bill Wyman loved his women, we would visit his house, also in France, and he had two beautiful blonde Swedish lovers and I remember thinking: ‘How has he managed that?”
Charlie sadly passed away at the age of 80 last year.
Charles would spend six months at the stunning 16-bed property, hanging out with the biggest rock stars in the world and even helping roll their joints: ‘We never smoked it of course, but we certainly knew how to roll them,’ he said.
He was joined by photographer Dominique Tarle, who captured the summer in a huge set of now-iconic photographs, which will feature at an exhibition in Saint Remy de Provence in France this summer.
‘We would go on boat rides to Cannes, Keith would always be talking and then suddenly stop to write down a song idea in his tiny notebook,’ Charles added, ‘he’s a genius really.’
Charles was asked to be a page boy for Mick Jagger’s wedding to Bianca Perez-Mora Macias – now Bianca Jagger.
‘I remember handing her a flower and giving her a kiss, but when it was Keith’s son Marlon’s turn he refused, so I took his flower and gave her another one,’ he remembers, laughing.
‘Keith had found a Nazi coat on the property and so wore that. It was all rather wild.
‘It was an incredible time really, we had food cooked by French chef Gerard Mosiniak and we were looked after, no one was ever abusive.’
A host of famous faces visited the sprawling estate, including legendary singer-songwriter Eric Clapton.
‘I do remember him jamming with the Stones, but he spent a lot of his time sick in his room from heroin,’ recalled Charles.
The Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door singer would later open up about his heroin addiction in his autobiography Clapton, released in the 2000s – in which he revealed he was spending the equivalent of £8,000 a week on the drug, before he kicked the habit in the late 70s.
He continued to use cocaine and alcohol before becoming sober around 1987. He remains sober to this day.
Charles does not recall ever seeing people ‘shoot up’, at the villa but he was aware that heroin was being taken by many.
One incident in particular sticks in his mind.
Sir Keith and Tommy had gone go-karting when the rockstar tried to take over his father on a bend.
‘It was a silly idea really because of course my father was a racing driver,’ said Charles, ‘but Keith’s car toppled over and he was left with a huge terrible scar on his back, it looked like raw meat.
‘He told my father: ‘You better get some strong stuff for me’, which I assume was heroin, because the pain was just too much.’
The drug use was so prevalent that a doctor used to visit regularly to give guests vitamin B12 shots.
‘I was terrified of him, I used to hide behind the curtain when he came,’ Charles said.
Taking part in the 2010 BBC documentary Stones In Exile, Charles’ brother Jake said that while the Nellcote Villa in France was filled with drugs, he and his brother were never harmed.
He said: ‘You would have to be blind not to see it. There was dope and lots of cocaine. People would be wasted but no one was ever unkind to me and my brother.
‘We were allowed to wander freely around. There was no such thing as “bed time” – you just took yourself off when you felt tired. The days were endlessly sunny. We had a series of chefs who would cook you anything you wanted.
‘My brother and I never drank or did drugs. We were too young. We would dance around the room to Brown Sugar while everyone else got stoned.’
Charles’ father was also a film producer who had worked with the likes of Jimi Hendrix – to whom he also supplied drugs.
Charles met the icon through his father at a concert in the Albert Hall.
‘I remember him putting me on his shoulders and running me around his dressing room.
‘He was magical to me. I remember being so fascinated with him and bobbing my head along to his music.
‘There’s a very famous clip of me running on stage and whispering in his ear.’
He added that his father was highly intelligent but extremely hedonistic and attracted to the lifestyle that smuggling brought him.
But it was actually through his mother that the Stones connection was made.
She had been staying at the Warneford psychiatric hospital in Oxford with Anita Pallenberg, Sir Keith’s girlfriend at the time.
‘The story is that Keith would sneak in at night and party with both of them,’ Charles revealed.
‘Anita then told my mother how the Stones were planning to move to southern France, but they were concerned about who could supply them with drugs, which is when my mother suggested her ex – my father – Tommy, and the connection was made.’
Less than a year later, Charles and his brother were on a flight to France with two kilos of cocaine strapped to their bodies.
It is just one in a litany of jaw-dropping memories which feature in Charles’ recently released book Ragamuffin’s Tale: Growing up in Counterculture Central’, available on Amazon.
But their stint in southern France almost turned sour when his father was accused of sleeping with Anita while Sir Keith slept nearby.
Charles explained: ‘A drug dealer known as Spanish Tony claimed he saw them going at it and told Keith.
‘Keith later sent my dad out on a drugs run and told him: ‘By the way, for a vegetarian, you certainly seem to be helping yourself to my meat.”’
While the pair never fell out, the ‘party was over’ when Charles’ mother tragically took her own life in June.
Charles, Jake and Tommy left shortly after hearing the news.
After his stint in southern France, Tommy took his sons around Europe, including Switzerland, Marbella and Amsterdam.
In one shocking story, Charles reveals how he escaped death when the IRA allegedly blew up a boat they had been on moments earlier.
‘We were on a ferry with a Dutch drug dealer en route to Amsterdam,’ he recalls, ‘But me and my brother were so bored that we begged them to let us off the boat until they finally gave up, docked the yacht and we drove to Amsterdam.
‘Around 15 minutes later it exploded. It had been targeted by a bomb because my father and his associate had doubled crossed the IRA.’
While Charles recalls his memories with humour, he reveals it was ‘not all roses’, particularly in his teenage years, when his father became a user of heroin himself and his home environment became the scene of repeated raids and police busts.
While his brother had been taken in by a wealthy family in California, plans for Charles to join him fell through.
On his father he said: ‘It was dark and difficult to see what heroin can do to people.’
After a brief stint in prison, Tommy gave up dealing and using but sadly passed in 2007.
Charles became a music video producer, working with the likes of Roger Taylor and David Cassidy, before moving to the States where he became a TV and film editor.
His brother got a scholarship to Juilliard and became a famous actor, starring in shows like Medium and the film Meet Joe Black.
But the pair led very different lives after being separated in their formative years, and ultimately grew apart.
Charles spent two years writing his book, which was officially released in February and is available on Amazon.
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