Many have long found it difficult to take Rod Stewart seriously.
However, once we get past the awkward stuff--leopard-skin leggings,
bum-wiggling stage schticks, and a hairstyle unseemly for a man of his
age--there remains the undeniable fact that the "Caledonian Cockney" is
responsible for some of the greatest recordings ever made. Again and
again, the combination of his heartwracked songs and gravelly, sensitive
vocal delivery have conjured sonic magic. The bulk of Stewart's classic
recordings were made in the 1970s. His string of albums for the Mercury
label across the first half of that decade sent critics into raptures.
His 1971 album Every Picture Tells a Story is considered by some of them
to literally be the best album of all time. Said semi-decade also saw
Stewart front the Faces, whose often likeably ramshackle albums gave his
fans a double dose of their idol each year. On top of this are
solo-Stewart classics that are neglected because he released them after
a point where his increasingly outlandish image caused some of his
original fans to disdain to any longer take him seriously. They include
the splendid 1976 LP A Night on the Town and his peerless confessional
love songs of 1977 "You're in My Heart (The Final Acclaim)" and "I Was
Only Joking." All of this and more is the subject of Rod Stewart: The
Classic Years. Sean Egan has interviewed at length many of Stewart's
colleagues, collaborators, and cohabitees from the period, including
musicians Micky Waller, Pete Sears, Ray Jackson, Ian McLagan, Kenney
Jones, and Jim Cregan, recording engineer Mike Bobak, manager Billy
Gaff, and Stewart's then-girlfriend and muse Dee Harrington. The result
is a striking and evocative portrait of the most fecund and vital stage
in the life and career of one of popular music's most important
artitsts.
