Ronnie Wood was "especially affected" by David Bowie's death because they were the same age and had "a lot in common".
The Let's Dance star died in January 2016 at the age of 69 after a battle with liver cancer, while the Rolling Stones rocker, who was also born in 1947, recently revealed earlier this month (Aug17) that he had secretly been fighting lung cancer and had been given the all-clear following surgery to remove a cancerous lesion on his left lung.
In an interview with the Guardian, Ronnie, 70, has admitted he knew something was wrong with Bowie in the months before his death, but he was still affected when he passed away.
"It especially affected me with Bowie because we were the same age – both 1947 models. David and I, we never saw a lot of each other, but when we did, we had a lot in common," he said.
"With the cancer, he pulled the short straw. I knew he had a stroke as well. Since he hadn’t been doing concerts or public appearances, I knew something fishy was going on with his health. I knew something was up. I was lucky, I got the long straw with the cancer."
Ronnie had revealed his cancer battle was "some price to pay" for smoking heavily for 50 years and he gave up last year thanks to stop smoking tablets, and he doesn't think he could have done it without them.
"Without the Champix, I don’t think I could have given up for more than a few weeks at a time," he said. "The old feeling would have come back, the old excuses – 'Oh sod it, I enjoy it!' And I really did enjoy it."
He admitted that although the operation made him feel vulnerable, he surprised the doctors by leaving hospital the following week and getting back to work.
"You’re not supposed to get better that quickly," the drummer explained. "A lot of it was celebration in the fact that I was still alive, that it hadn’t spread. There was so much gratitude in the air."
