DON'T LET THEM PUT YOU DOWN: The Official ILM Track-By-Track ROD STEWART 1975-1988 Listening Thread

well, Stewart was a better songwriter by himself than Frey-Henley and their bros.

the majority of his Jeff Beck Group/Faces/early solo era is as good as rock music gets for me

Sailing is of course is a cover originally performed by Sutherland Brothers & Quiver.

https://youtu.be/0dSU8XR0Gmc
http://scdb.abradio.cz/uploads/400x400/songs/oldies/s/sailing-3.jpg

The interesting story behind this one of course is that bass player Terry Comer from contemporaneos bar-band Ace was surrepticiously gigging with the Sutherland Bros. without his regular band being informed of this, with the inference he might jump ship if he liked the Sutherlands better. Singer Paul Carrack learned what he was planning, which he turned into a song regarding the situation which became the hit "How Long"

...which we'll be hearing a Rod version of eventually ITT! #WheelsWithinWheels

p sure "Sailing" is his signature song in Denmark

it's not v good tho imo

"Sailing": This has got the classic Power Ballad 'build build build' singalong structure. Pretty tune, although yes it feels a harbinger of rougher sailing (ha!) to come Rod-wise. Isn't this a big football anthem over in Blighty? And on that tip, will "Ole Ola" be part of our revue?

Also, what the hell was this TV show it was the theme of?

Whoo! Let's go to 1976's A Night on the Town!

"Tonight's the Night (Gonna Be Alright)" (Rod Stewart)

https://youtu.be/IZr6AE-u2UM

http://justhungry.com/files/images/70s2.jpg

A classic about which I've nothing to say. Means nothing to me.

"Sailing (Gavin Christopher)"

Who is Gavin Christopher? Written by Gavin Sutherland of course! And, yes, this is probably his most famous/popular song in the UK.

I suppose there's a Scottish thing going on there - musically and lyrically? Possibly?

a typo

xpost

Gavin Christopher was an American singer-songwriter

A young Giles Coren in the photo Alfred posted.

... serving cocktails to Sue Perkins in a wig.

The Great British Fuck Off

Also, I reckon Do You Think I'm Sexy must give Sailing a run for its money as Rod's most popular/well known song in the UK

Grand, warm-hearted sleaze. the French lines in the coda give it a touch of Gainsbourg/Birkin.

Also, what the hell was this TV show it was the theme of?

If you mean "Ole Ola", I don't think it was a TV show theme tune but it was the theme song of the 1978 Scotland World Cup Squad. Not that it did them much good "over there".

... ova tha' surely?

The song itself is dire but the lyrics still raise a chuckle, "'Cause we invented football anyway", aye, you tell 'em, Rod. Getting ahead fo ourselves here though.

love this old warhorse of a tune

this video is something

the Guild/vest/bowtie combo is some peak Rod shit

subquestion: it's always weird when you see basically "music videos" from pre-MTV era, where did these things air and why were they made?

In the UK they would air on Top of the Pops, the weekly chart program, when the acts were too famous or busy to turn up in the studio.

Top of the Pops, certainly. For bands who couldn't or wouldn't appear in person.

xp hah

I remember seeing the video for "Sailing" multiple times on TOTP. Pretty sure he never "sang" it in the studio.

xpost - ah ok that makes sense

If you mean "Ole Ola",

Sorry for the confusion, I meant "Sailing", which has a plug for a BBC series called "Sailor" on the posted 45 sleeve.

Should note that this album again has a FAST SIDE and a SLOW SIDE. But in a reversal of previous practice, the SLOW SIDE is first.

Also, second verse has some of the most LOLworthy lyrics ever

"Tonight's The Night (Gonna Be Alright)": ...and whatever old school Rod tendencies left over on Atlantic Crossing get killed dead right where they stood. Slick Slick and Slicker still, this one continues the chain of Rod ballads ignored by Classic Rock radio (which is kind of weird when you consider similarly styled tracks from Elton, the Eagles, and, er, Journey still achieve microwave rotation at the expense of rockier & just as popular at the time tracks from those same catalogs). A Muzak staple, this number has been sexing up grocery shopping for as long as I can remember. In the famous Greil Marcus essay screencapped way upthread, this was the one post-Mercury Rod record he praised, albeit qualified that it's success was purely down to craftsmanship and formula. A hit by design, capturing the softer side of 70s sexual permissiveness. Can you imagine how many handjobs this has soundtracked?

Also, for some reason I can see Lana Del Rey having fun with this as a cover.

well, Janet Jackson did:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVIeSqJqfTk

^^Forgot both that and the subsequent 7th period art class discussions as to whether or not Janet was a lesbian because she didn't change the lyrics.

"this one continues the chain of Rod ballads ignored by Classic Rock radio "

yeah that's a good point--i don't hear it that much (my sampling is whenever I drive to Connecticut to see my parents--CT is one of the spiritual homes of classic rock). maybe because it was such an AM smash--i think it was one of the biggest US singles of '76-77, up there with "You Light Up My Life"--that a whole generation wearied of the thing

Rod's Classic Rock cannon is surprisingly small: 2/3rds of EPTAS, "You Wear It Well"; "Stay With Me"; "Hot Legs"; and "Young Turks", with a further handful of "Deep Cuts".

"Maggie May" is a staple on our classic station

"The First Cut Is the Deepest" (Cat Stevens)

https://youtu.be/c5NRH_DxWJE

http://freshindependence.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/a-rod.jpg

Straight up love this song

one of those songs that seems to have been around forever but doesn't really have a definitive version---the P.P. Arnold is great but still fairly unknown in the US (there was a sheryl crow hit, too, in the 00s?). This is fine, if a touch shlocky (see the 30-second harp intro), and Rod seems a bit miscast for the lyric, not so much a rueful broken-heart as a guy trying out a line and seeing where it gets him (very Rod)

"Miscast" is an apt descriptor.

yeah Sheryl Crow had a huge early '00s hit w/it

love that much of the video seems to be a promotion for a landscaper/ fountain design company

looooooool that Tonight's the Night video - lyrics too, yikes! Starts of quoting Dylan, soon enough into "Spread your wings and let me come inside" and "Don't say a word my virgin child" territory

First Cut is a fantastic song and imo Rod's version is definitive

However that entire album suffers from a bass-heavy production, sounds kinda muffled - lacking mids and highs. No idea how the achieved this, sounds like a mistake to my ears.

where would these videos have been broadcast btw?

Discussed upthread. Top of The Pops and other TV music shows Rod couldn't be arsed into showing up for. He had enough of these stockpiled that when MTV went on the air he was on like every hour with a different clip.

Haha. Great.

"The First Cut Is The Deepest": Kind of a hard song to go wrong with. Rod handles it well, although it might have cut, er, deeper, with a Mercury-era (or Atlantic Crossing) style arrangement--mandolins, single violin in place of the "Rock" guitar solo. Wasn't that that single release pictured above the thing that kept the Sex Pistols (either "Anarchy In The UK" or "God Save The Queen") out of the #1 spot on the UK singles charts?

The video feels like--minus Rod--a bunch of cutaways from a Radley Metzger film.

Is there some alternate album mix of this? I had a '70s Rod comp on cassette when I was a kid and i swear it had a more rustic sound and no harp intro

Rod handles it well, although it might have cut, er, deeper, with a Mercury-era (or Atlantic Crossing) style arrangement--mandolins, single violin in place of the "Rock" guitar solo.

He did a live unplugged version in 1993 that had an arrangement much like that

"Fool for You" (Rod Stewart)

https://youtu.be/gxODMDa4MqA

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/x9jEWJmnMxg/hqdefault.jpg

http://img-fotki.yandex.ru/get/6701/165187900.1d0/0_c29bd_bb0f3060_orig

A wee bit of nuthin', almost drenched in the L.A. sound.