Back before he was crooning, Rod Stewart was a pretty damn good rock and roll singer. After singing with Jeff Beck Group in the late '60s, Rod the Bod kind of switched off between solo records and recording with the Small Faces reboot, Faces, along with Steve Marriott, Ronnie Wood, Ronnie Lane, Kenney Jones, and Ian McLagan. Faces played a nice, blues-based, sometimes dirty version of bar rock that complemented Stewart's raspy voice.
For me, the ultimate Faces song is "Stay With Me," off of 1971's A Nod is as Good as a Wink . . . To a Blind Horse album (great album title, by the way). It's a raunchy, bluesy song about a one-night stand with some bird named Rita, who was perhaps a meter maid. A nice guitar intro leads into a little slowdown before Stewart delivers one of the great opening lines in rock history: "In the morning / Don't say you love me / 'Cause I'll only kick you out of the door." And then there's the line: "I don't mean to sound degrading / But with a face like that, you got nothin' to laugh about." Yet he wants to bang her anyway and then give her cab fare home. And he will. Because he's Rod Stewart.
The song was the band's highest-charting song in the U.S., reaching #17 on the Billboard Hot 100. It also went Top 10 in the UK (#6), the Netherlands (#4), and Canada (#4). I tried singing this karaoke once, and I will tell you that it was not easy.
Because I love you, I'm going to give you the album version, but before that, a live version from some TV show that features some alternate lyrics and showcases Wood's slide guitar work.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment