Not necessarily criticizing this guy - I’m just genuinely curious why he became as critically acclaimed, wealthy and celebrated as he is. He’s always given me the impression of being a standard-issue British rocker, with a large back catalog but a small handful of songs that are familiar (and even those are a bit embarrassing with their sexual lyrics). Am I overlooking something that makes him different?
Distinctive voice, lots of memorable songs, and sheer longevity.
His work with the Jeff Beck Group, the Faces and his solo work like Maggie May and First Cut are what set him apart. Amongst my friends, he is generally described as one of the greatest wastes of talent around ;). I love his voice but hate many of the ways he’s applied it.
I will say this: read his autobio, Rod. The dude can totally tell a story and it is clear he’s a good mate and someone you wanted to hang out with. I bet that went a long way for him.
ETA: if you listen to one of my all-time favorite tracks, Let me Love You by the Jeff Beck Group, he truly dazzles with his call and response work with Beck’s lead guitar. He has an interesting-sounding voice and the chops to know how to use it. But then chose to sing a lot of crap.
Well, Model Railroader’s recent articles on the ginormous H0-scale empire he’s built in his home, based on the US Northeast in the 1940s, for one thing. The jaw-dropping level of detail, especially the large port city that makes up the bulk of the layout, could reasonably be called legendary.
I understand he’s also a musician.
Rod’s work with the Faces gets him a lifetime pass for anything else he did subsequently. And Three Button Hand Me Down has the best bass line in history {and a pre-Stones Ronnie Wood killing it on guitar}.
If he’d died in, say, 1973, he’d be a critically acclaimed legend nowadays, and rightly so.
It’s just that he’s spent the last four decades concentrating on making money rather than art.
Well, not than *anything * I’d say- his first post-Faces album Every Picture Tells a Story is an outstanding rock album (except Maggie Mae, which I hate as a piece of pop fluff). The track I’m Losing You is simply one of the greats.
Ronnie Lane on bass!! I love that song.
ETA: if you want to feature the opening bass, you should hear the studio version: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DlFuXwAGURw
I’ve long considered “Stay with Me” the ultimate rock and roll song, not in small part due to Rod’s vocals.
mmm
Yep.
I agree; it’s got to be the model railroading.
Slight hijack…never heard that song before (and the bass line is killer), but as mentioned in the video’s comments - boy, is this a ripoff of “Some Kind Of Wonderful” or what? :dubious:
Ronnie Wood also plays that bass line! Stood in for regular bassist Ronnie Lane on that track.
He did a nice duet with Long John Baldry in “Mother Ain’t Dead”.
Why is he a legend? Why NOT? He’s got it all, as mentioned above (or should that be, he had it all). Charisma, longevity, familiarity. Some have it, some are just ‘that singer from the past, whats his name’).
Besides, “our song” (the one when we hear it we reach for each others hands and listen wistfully) is “I’m Losing You” :D.
(Also ‘Tonight’s The Night’ but that was with someone else altogether).
I’m not sure about ‘legendary’ railroading. Even in the previous article, several years ago, I noticed how red everything is in his layout. Then in the new article, he admits to being color blind.
So to be truly legendary, he needs to get help with the colors. It looks like someone messed up the printing of the photos, but that’s how it really looks.
I have to admit, he’s got talent. Usually, you expect rich celebrity types to farm out that layout work, but he does most of his own. He could be a custom builder for others! That layout is amazing.
Don’t forget he has totally reinvented himself by going back and singing standards in his Great American Songbook.
I’m not sure if you think this is a point in his favor or not. I kind of just pretend that this never happened.
But in a tribute to the power of marketing, my 83-year-old mother ordered the first CD after seeing it shilled repeatedly on TV. If you had played Rod to her in the early 70s, she would have said, “Turn that off! It sounds like he’s gargled with razor blades!”
Seriously, as others have said, his early solo work (and the Faces stuff as well) is top-notch, and he occasionally proved himself to be a worthy interpreter after that (e.g., his versions of Crazy Horse’s “I Don’t Want to Talk About It” and Ace’s “How Long”).
But those flashes of brilliance were pretty rare, and among discriminating music fans, he’s been a joke for quite a long time. That doesn’t take away, though, from how good he was in the beginning.
Really? Wow - didn’t know. Lord knows, Woody can play bass. He’s such a wonderful guitar player in the Faces.
And yeah, the chorus sounds like Some Kind of Wonderful - I prefer this track…
If you’re talking about that video, that’s definitely Ronnie Lane playing bass.