{"id":1505,"date":"2008-06-24T00:51:42","date_gmt":"2008-06-24T04:51:42","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2009-02-07T10:49:25","modified_gmt":"2009-02-07T10:49:25","slug":"battle-royale-round-3-rod-stewart-vs-the-1971","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/battle-royale-round-3-rod-stewart-vs-the-1971\/","title":{"rendered":"Battle Royale, Round 3: Rod Stewart vs The Stones, 1971"},"content":{"rendered":"<iframe class='youtube-player youtuber' type='text\/html' width='425' height='355' src='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/3ABX2-4RTrY?rel=0&amp;fs=1&amp;ap=%252526fmt%253D18' webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen frameborder='0'><\/iframe><p>Here&#8217;s where I expect sparks to fly. The Stones opened <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/index.php\/2008\/06\/21\/battle-royale-rod-stewart-vs-the-stones-1969\">Round 1<\/a><\/strong> with a furious set of haymakers. Rod Stewart had his best work stripped from him and added to its proper place in 1970, leaving him nearly defenseless against my favorite post-Brian Jones-era Stones album. However, despite chronological inaccuracies, my writing on Stewart&#8217;s early strengths was so strong that I managed to keep him standing and alert when the first round ended. In <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/index.php\/2008\/06\/22\/battle-royale-round-2-rod-stewart-vs-the-1970\">Round 2<\/a><\/strong>, Rod Stewart established his footing and skillfully accumulated points from the judges compared with the Stones&#8217; party-hearty, contractually obligated &#8220;live&#8221; album. Now, as we enter Round 3, covering the artists&#8217; 1971 releases, both contestants answer the bell looking to score an early knockout!<\/p>\n<p><iframe class='youtube-player youtuber' type='text\/html' width='425' height='355' src='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/0_AM2Zgm6RY?rel=0&amp;fs=1&amp;ap=%252526fmt%253D18' webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen frameborder='0'><\/iframe><br \/>\nThe Stones release of <em>Sticky Fingers<\/em> is loaded with radio-ready rockers and the richest ballads they&#8217;d displayed to date. There&#8217;s <strong>&#8220;Brown Sugar&#8221;<\/strong>, &#8220;Wild Horses&#8221;, &#8220;Can&#8217;t You Hear Me Knocking&#8221;, and &#8220;Bitch&#8221; for starters. There&#8217;s also the overrated <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/index.php\/2008\/02\/09\/missing_the_point_incredibly_stupid_cove\">&#8220;Moonlight Mile&#8221;<\/a><\/strong> among other highly regarded <em>deep cuts<\/em>. That&#8217;s cool: we&#8217;re all entitled to overrate a deep cut or two per great album. <\/p>\n<p>Despite my never loving the album or feeling the need to own it, <em>Sticky Fingers<\/em> is a powerfully crafted album &#8211; <em>and we&#8217;ll want to consider issues of craft in 1971&#8217;s tightly fought Round 3<\/em> &#8211; and the first Stones studio album to prominently feature the fretwork of <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/index.php\/2008\/01\/18\/mick_taylor_s_mick_taylor\">Mick Taylor<\/a><\/strong> &#8211; and not an album too soon! As the times demanded extended jams and more stringent <strong>blues credibility<\/strong>, Taylor brought chops to the band that were already in place in upstart hard rock bands like <strong>Humble Pie<\/strong> and <strong>Faces<\/strong>. As great as his work in this period was, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/index.php\/2008\/01\/30\/keith_richards_most_memorable_guitar_sol\">Keef wasn&#8217;t going to cut it as a lead guitar hero<\/a> in the post-Altamont landscape.<\/p>\n<p>In setting up this Battle Royale, I pledged to center the examination around the music, at least in the early rounds, but before we move on <a href=\"http:\/\/sleevage.com\/the-rolling-stones-sticky-fingers\/\" target=\"_blank\">I&#8217;ve gotta give <em>Mad Props<\/em> to the album cover<\/a>. Here&#8217;s a definite, early advantage for the Stones in comparison with the typically <em>blah<\/em> album covers associated with most of Stewart&#8217;s work during this period. <\/p>\n<div class=\"image_block\" style=\"text-align: center;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/media\/blogs\/rth\/anod.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"\" width=\"301\" height=\"300\" \/><\/div>\n<p><em>Now&#8230;<\/em><\/p>\n<p><big><ins><strong><em>CRANK IT UP!<\/em><\/strong><\/ins><\/big><\/p>\n<p><strong>Rod Stewart, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/RockTownHall\/EveryPictureTellsaStory.mp3\">&#8220;Every Picture Tells a Story&#8221;<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Faces, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/media\/blogs\/rth\/BadnRuin.mp3\" title=\"\">&#8220;Bad &#8216;n Ruin&#8221;<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Rod Stewart, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/media\/blogs\/rth\/IKnowImLosingYou.mp3\" title=\"\">&#8220;(I Know) I&#8217;m Losing You&#8221;<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em>Then&#8230;<\/em><br \/>\n<!--nextpage--><br \/>\n<small><ins><strong><em>cool it down<\/em><\/strong><\/ins><\/small><\/p>\n<p><strong>Faces, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/RockTownHall\/SweetLadyMary.mp3\">&#8220;Sweet Lady Mary&#8221;<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Rod Stewart, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/media\/blogs\/rth\/MandolinWind.mp3\" title=\"\">&#8220;Mandolin Wind&#8221;<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>This takes us to 1971, Rod&#8217;s rock &#8216;n roll <strong>coming of age<\/strong>. Most impressively, Stewart releases <em>Every Picture Tells a Story<\/em>, the solo album that would make him a household name. This album features his signature hit, <strong>&#8220;Maggie May&#8221;<\/strong>, as well as the rambunctious, single-minded title track; a barrelhouse take on The Temptations&#8217; &#8220;(I Know) I&#8217;m Losing You&#8221;; the folky &#8220;Mandolin Wind&#8221;; the soulful folk of &#8220;Reason to Believe&#8221;; a rocking take on &#8220;That&#8217;s All Right&#8221;, and more. It was the biggest-selling album of 1971 &#8211; and deservedly so! It&#8217;s a no-nonsense synthesis of all was learned from Dylan&#8217;s <em>Blonde on Blonde<\/em> album, &#8217;60s soul and folk-rock, and the Stones&#8217; own late-&#8217;60s move into British Americana, beginning with 1968&#8217;s <em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/index.php\/2007\/06\/27\/takin_it_to_the_main_stage_lemgbeggars_b\">Beggars Banquet<\/a><\/em>. It might be argued that <em>Every Picture Tells a Story<\/em> codified these experiences into rock&#8217;s first <strong>Classic Rock<\/strong> album.<\/p>\n<p><iframe class='youtube-player youtuber' type='text\/html' width='425' height='355' src='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/yEcSj4mh-Dc?rel=0&amp;fs=1&amp;ap=%252526fmt%253D18' webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen frameborder='0'><\/iframe><br \/>\n<em>BUT THAT&#8217;S NOT ALL!<\/em> <!--nextpage--><br \/>\nWith Faces, Stewart released two albums, <em>Long Player<\/em>, a half-studio\/half-live mixed bag of some extremely tasty delights, AND <em>A Nod Is as Good as a Wink&#8230;To a Blind Horse<\/em>, which was also a Top 10 lp and is considered by many Faces fans (this fan excluded) to be their best album. <\/p>\n<p><big><ins><strong><em>TURN IT UP, NOW!<\/em><\/strong><\/ins><\/big><\/p>\n<p><strong>Faces, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/media\/blogs\/rth\/StayWithMe.mp3\" title=\"\">&#8220;Stay With Me&#8221;<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Do the math: that&#8217;s three albums of Rod Stewart-driven material in 1971 &#8211; and not a stinker album in the bunch! Not including the excellent songs sung by Faces mates Ronnie Lane and Ron Wood, there&#8217;s a solid album and a half of killer Rod performances. <em>Let&#8217;s examine a few of them in detail.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Earlier I spoke of pledges, and you&#8217;ll recall in setting out the guidelines and methodology for this examination I also pledged not to post an mp3 of &#8220;Maggie May&#8221;. But I am free to discuss it. Like me, you&#8217;re probably sick of that song 8 out of 10 times you hear it these days and embarrassed to find yourself still loving it the other 2 times. But let&#8217;s face it: It&#8217;s a <strong>stone cold, mortal lock<\/strong> of a rock classic. I don&#8217;t know how the women of Rock Town Hall feel about it, but what boy who came of age in the &#8217;70s didn&#8217;t fantasize about living through at least some of the details of Rod&#8217;s coming of age tale? How emotionally attuned to the pathos of a mannish boy is that song? It&#8217;s up there with a <strong>&#8220;Satisfaction&#8221;<\/strong> and other early Stones hit for its ability to get to the heart of the matter without bringing &#8220;learned&#8221; issues of spirituality, the blues, and hot-button racist\/sexist stereotypes into the equation. (Not that there&#8217;s anything wrong with any of these devices when they so well serve a song as well as the hot-button issues serve &#8220;Brown Sugar&#8221;.) &#8220;Maggie May&#8221; is an instantly memorable, naive, dramatic song of a storyteller, in all the ways that the <em>VH1 Storytellers<\/em> and <em>MTV Unplugged<\/em> series would have liked to have more frequently captured artists in staged performance.<br \/>\n<!--nextpage--><br \/><iframe class='youtube-player youtuber' type='text\/html' width='425' height='355' src='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/q_OEPOkkoew?rel=0&amp;fs=1&amp;ap=%252526fmt%253D18' webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen frameborder='0'><\/iframe><br \/>\nRod has come into his own; he&#8217;s not yet grasping for new ways to pick at the same old pains. The Stones are the veterans in this battle; they might wear the kid down yet, but Stewart&#8217;s going toe to toe. He&#8217;s <em>going for it!<\/em> Whether a line in &#8220;Maggie May&#8221; is true or not, it <em>seems<\/em> truer than anything we might have ever experienced &#8211; and it&#8217;s all out on the table: driving acoustic guitars and drums, melodic guitar lines that echo the vocals, Stewart&#8217;s best rock take on <strong>Sam Cooke<\/strong>, and that awesome mandolin part that takes the song out. Stewart had this template in the works on prior albums, but he perfected it on this recording.<\/p>\n<p>In the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/index.php\/2008\/06\/21\/battle-royale-rod-stewart-vs-the-stones-1969#c17343\">Comments on Round 1&#8217;s analysis, <strong>BigSteve<\/strong> aptly wrote<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>What I&#8217;m saying is that Gimme Shelter and You Can&#8217;t Always Get What You Want have enough weight to offset all Rod and the Faces have.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>I&#8217;ll make the claim that &#8220;Maggie May&#8221; and &#8220;Every Picture Tells a Story&#8221; alone pack enough wallop to overcome the collective punch of <em>Sticky Fingers<\/em>. &#8220;Brown Sugar&#8221; is tremendous; it&#8217;s as honest and seamless as anything Stewart would produce in 1971, but the other best Stones songs from this year have their holes: &#8220;Bitch&#8221; runs out of gas; &#8220;Can&#8217;t You Hear Me Knockin'&#8221; goes into that questionble Santana jam&#8230; &#8220;Wild Horses&#8221; is especially great in concept, but it&#8217;s no &#8220;You Can&#8217;t Always Get What You Want&#8221;. There&#8217;s a hint of Mick playing to the ladies, a la the future&#8217;s <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/index.php\/2007\/09\/06\/showdown_goats_head_soup_vs_some_girls\">&#8220;Angie&#8221;<\/a><\/strong>, if you ask me. Clearly Rod the Rod was not averse to throwing the ladies a bone, but in 1971 he did so a little less transparently.<\/p>\n<p>What <em>Sticky Fingers<\/em> lacks, in comparison to Rod Stewart&#8217;s 1971 output, is a Hall of Fame counterpart to &#8220;Brown Sugar&#8221;. If &#8220;Maggie May&#8221; is <strong>Michael Jordan<\/strong>, then &#8220;Every Picture Tells a Story&#8221; is <strong>Scottie Pippen<\/strong>. Or whatever Hall of Fame sports tandem works for you. &#8220;Brown Sugar&#8221; carries a much heavier burden on <em>Sticky Fingers<\/em> than any one song Stewart cranked out in &#8217;71.<br \/>\n<!--nextpage--><br \/><iframe class='youtube-player youtuber' type='text\/html' width='425' height='355' src='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/m4PXMCCTMwM?rel=0&amp;fs=1&amp;ap=%252526fmt%253D18' webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen frameborder='0'><\/iframe><br \/>\nNext, let&#8217;s compare the highly skilled contributing players in 1971: <\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>&#8220;Bitch&#8221; and &#8220;Can&#8217;t You Hear Me Knocking&#8221; vs &#8220;(I Know) I&#8217;m Losing You&#8221; and &#8220;Stay With Me&#8221;: <em>Advantage Stewart<\/em>. <\/li>\n<li>&#8220;Sway&#8221; and &#8220;Moonlight Mile&#8221; vs &#8220;Reason to Believe&#8221; and &#8220;Sweet Lady Mary&#8221;: <em>Advantage &#8220;Maggie May&#8221; and &#8220;Every Picture Tells a Story&#8221;<\/em>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In 1971, the Stones have entered the world of <strong>Arts &amp; Crafts<\/strong>. Not until they move to France, get really wasted, and turn in their masterpiece of an EP masquerading as a sprawling double album do they fully achieve the Keef and Mick-driven potential of the Mick Taylor era. In 1971, the Stones find themselves playing on Rod&#8217;s field, and Rod&#8217;s the one who&#8217;s been developing this more <strong>synthetic<\/strong> approach to big stage, soulful, folky, blues rock in an effort to establish his career. On his big solo album it&#8217;s Stewart who sets the pace for where &#8217;70s AOR intends to head. You think Dylan modeled the arrangements of <em>Blood on the Tracks<\/em> after Stewart&#8217;s breakthrough album or <em>Sticky Fingers<\/em>? Stewart showed &#8217;em the way!<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, on two albums with Faces, Stewart was able to get his ya-yas out and celebrate what it means to be one of the boys. Rod Stewart&#8217;s feeling free to be Rod Stewart during this year of self-realization. The Stones, who once defined what it meant to be among &#8220;the boys,&#8221; had splintered. Taylor, Wyman, and Watts were passing up boys&#8217; night out. Mick and Keef had to bring in the likes of <strong>Bobby Keys<\/strong> to pump up <em>the boys<\/em> factor. As a further sign of the band&#8217;s growing alienation, Mick, in 1971, continues to adopt vocal poses: on one song he&#8217;s the nasty, intelligent Mick we grew up digging. Then he&#8217;s toothless, country bumpkin Mick. Then he&#8217;s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/index.php\/2007\/05\/21\/films_that_don_t_rock_da_blooz_exorcist_\">blooz exorcist Mick<\/a>. Mick, phone home.<br \/>\n<!--nextpage--><br \/><iframe class='youtube-player youtuber' type='text\/html' width='425' height='355' src='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/GF-Rm2psLz8?rel=0&amp;fs=1&amp;ap=%252526fmt%253D18' webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen frameborder='0'><\/iframe><br \/>\nLooking ahead a bit, what Keef brought to the table in spades in 1971 was the mystique associated with his ever-present <strong>bottle of hootch<\/strong> and who knows what &#8220;works&#8221; tucked away backstage. Check out the opening to this 1971 butchering of your Moderator&#8217;s most beloved rock &#8216;n roll song. As this examination stretches into its last 5 years, the factor of each band&#8217;s <strong>partying capabilities<\/strong> will increase in influence. With Faces at his back, Stewart seems primed to keep the pace, but his solo activities will be threatened.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Round 3:<\/strong> Stewart wins handily despite a fierce flurry of well-crafted rock songs by the Stones.<\/p>\n<nav class=\"page-links\"><strong>Pages:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/battle-royale-round-3-rod-stewart-vs-the-1971\/\" class=\"post-page-numbers\"><span class=\"page-num\">1<\/span><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/battle-royale-round-3-rod-stewart-vs-the-1971\/2\/\" class=\"post-page-numbers\"><span class=\"page-num\">2<\/span><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/battle-royale-round-3-rod-stewart-vs-the-1971\/3\/\" class=\"post-page-numbers\"><span class=\"page-num\">3<\/span><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/battle-royale-round-3-rod-stewart-vs-the-1971\/4\/\" class=\"post-page-numbers\"><span class=\"page-num\">4<\/span><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/battle-royale-round-3-rod-stewart-vs-the-1971\/5\/\" class=\"post-page-numbers\"><span class=\"page-num\">5<\/span><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/battle-royale-round-3-rod-stewart-vs-the-1971\/6\/\" class=\"post-page-numbers\"><span class=\"page-num\">6<\/span><\/a><\/nav>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Here&#8217;s where I expect sparks to fly. The Stones opened Round 1 with a furious set of haymakers. Rod Stewart had his best work stripped from him and added to its proper place in 1970, leaving him nearly defenseless against my favorite post-Brian Jones-era Stones album. However, despite chronological inaccuracies, my writing on Stewart&#8217;s early <a href='https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/battle-royale-round-3-rod-stewart-vs-the-1971\/' class='excerpt-more'>[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[342],"tags":[42,149,45],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1505"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1505"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1505\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}