Marianne Faithful - mischievous muse...

If your dad is a major in the British Army and a professor of psychology and your mum is a Sacher-Masoch (ie. descended from that Sacher-Masoch), it might not be all that surprising if you turn out to be... well...interesting.

"My first move was to get a Rolling Stone as a boyfriend. I slept with three and decided the lead singer was the best bet."

Mick and the "other two", by the way, arrived on the scene after Marianne had married and had a son with artist John Dunbar. But then, Marianne seems always to have exuded a cocktail of posh-needy-naughtiness that men (well, a hell of a lot of them) found difficult to resist.

Several Stones classics of the sixties owe something to her (she was even - after legal proceedings - given a writing credit for "Sister Morphine").  

"Sympathy for the Devil" (inspired by a book Marianne gave Mick), "You Can't Always Get What You Want" (was this about her or aimed at her?), "Wild Horses" are all linked with Marianne.

Not only that but the Beatles song "And Your Bird Can Sing" as well as "Carrie Anne" by the Hollies both refer to her.

Marianne also developed a career in acting - bringing with her that familiar, irresistible wildness threaded with vulnerability:

"Now you know the thrill of wrapping your legs round a tornado of pounding pistons!" Gulp!

While the seventies were a lost era of addiction and anorexia (with Marianne at one time living on the streets of Soho) the very end of the decade saw her release Broken English an album which relaunched her musical career (and gave her critical acclaim which her work continues to gain for each new album).

Over the years, she has gone through several metamorphoses in each of which she could be described as 'untouchable' (though in vastly differing senses of that word). 

As for Marianne nowadays... ask almost any guy of a certain age... gulp!