Jun 252008
 

In 1973, the Stones follow up their most ambitious album, Exile On Main Street, with Goats Head Soup. Exhausted from weeks of all-night sessions and covering for Wyman’s bass responsibilities, Keef takes a virtual leave of absence from the Stones and lets the Micks work out the next album. The big hit single from Goats Head Soup is “Angie”, in which Mick Jagger and the boys take on Rod Stewart in the most mawkish part of Stewart’s game. Big whoop! Are you proud of this effort, Stones loyalists? Stones fans are generally unimpressed. The Stones have entered the period in their history when they’re expected to make the playoffs, when they can’t sell out playoff games on their own turf.

Before moving on, to ensure clarity in the guidelines under which this examination is being conducted, it should be noted that the best song the Stones would record in 1973, the initial tracks for “Waiting on a Friend”, does not qualify for inclusion.

Some time back we discussed Goats Head Soup and how it compared unfavorably to an album beyond the scope of our current investigation, the vibrant, Ron Wood-inspired boys’ club racket of Some Girls. Click here to revisit that post and sample some of the songs from that album, if you’d like. They’re not that good, and they’re pretty lousy by previously established Rolling Stones’ standards.

Faces, “Cindy Incidentally”

Faces, “My Fault”

Rod Stewart, wisely, took a year off from releasing a solo album. With Faces, however, he took part in what I believe is the band’s most consistent, emotionally charged album, Ooh La La. Taken as a whole, I liken this album, in the band’s brief existence, to their version of the Klassic Kinks‘ late-60s run. It represents all sides of what made the band, occasionally, great and very little of what made them easy to write off when compared to titans like the Stones. It’s the “smallest” of Faces albums, thanks in large part to Stewart’s limited involvement on lead vocals. However, according to the methods we have set for this examination, we will not consider the great tracks sung by Ronnie Lane (“Glad and Sorry”, “If I’m On the Late Side”, “Flags and Banners”) or Ron Wood (the title track) other than to say that they may not have been heard by all but a few record nerds like ourselves if not for the involvement of the more commercially viable Rod Stewart. I know this will pain some of you, but let’s give it up for the trickle-down effect of Stewart’s marketing clout!

I’ve included two of the Stewart-sung tracks for your pleasure, the gently rollicking party song, “Cindy Incidentally”, and the unharnessed soul shouter “My Fault”. Neither is a fantastic song or work of high art, but both are songs I never tire of cranking up and simply digging! Kind of how I enjoy logging on and digging the rock chatter wiht you. Like the best of Rod Stewart’s work during the period under examination, these tracks make me feel like hanging with my friends, eating hot sausage off the grill, and just shooting the breeze. The best music of Faces, in particular, makes me appreciate other people in my life.

I can’t say the same for the music of Goats Head Soup. That’s one misanthropic, self-centered album. “Love me, 19-year-old Brazillian hottie!” is the underlying message I get from it. “I’m so alone, baby, can I snort some coke off your nipples?” The music’s nothing to write home about either. It’s OK…for an Aerosmith album. You know where the judges are heading in 1973, don’t you?

First there’s one more thing I want to discuss regarding the ways in which rock nerds dismiss even Rod’s best works. As this examination has progressed, I’ve seen a lot of shots taken at Rod’s Rasp. Deal with it. The guy’s a straightforward soul singer, not a character actor. Do you complain about James Brown‘s lack of variety in his vocal delivery? Otis Redding‘s? David Ruffin‘s? I thought not, but they were never hunchbacked white guys with a big honker, a shag rug, and wearing a pink leotard and satin acqua jacket. James Brown actually looked good in tights. Before you get all worked up over the nerve of my comparing Rod’s vocals to those “authentic” soul legends, let’s get real: In his prime, Rod Stewart’s take on soul shouting never reached the depths of a Michael Bolton. In his prime, before he went on a rampage of Rock Crimes, the guy was an energetic, emotive, effective rock ‘n soul singer. And yes, he covered other people’s songs, just like David Ruffin.


Singers sing. Actors act. Jagger was more an actor than a singer. I admire both strong singers and strong actors. Strong actors, however, are more reliant on a good script. Rod, at this time I’m sure you’ll agree, could have made the phone book sound like “Maggie May”. The songs on Goats Head Soup don’t give Mick much to work with. Keef’s not holding down the fort like we expect him to do. I can’t wait for Mick Taylor to leave this band already!

ROUND 5: Stewart

Previously…

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  9 Responses to “Battle Royale, Round 5: Rod Stewart vs The Stones, 1973”

  1. BigSteve

    The Mod says [of the songs on GHS]:

    …they’re pretty lousy by previously established Rolling Stones’ standards.

    This I think is the crux of the problem. We’re judging the artists in question by different sets of standards. We’re not measuring Stay With Me, one of the best performances [of a pretty offensive song] Rod/Faces have to offer, against Jumpin’ Jack Flash. We were asked to put it up against a deep cut on an album the Mod can’t bring himself to own. But anything the Stones record in the 70s is beat with the 60s Stones stick, even though for most of the 60s the Stones were a great singles band with very spotty albums.

    And the issue with The Rasp is not that it exists, but that it is applied in exactly the same way no matter what the material. Rod sings a wistful song like Gasoline Alley with exactly the same voice he’d use on a crude rocker. JB, Redding, and Ruffin all had much more variation in their vocal approach.

    And speaking of the Kinks … I don’t think this came up in the interview about the Ray Davies bio, but Ray and Rod went to the same school, and Rod was briefly a member of the Ray Davies Quartet. Gee, I wonder why Ray couldn’t handle a guy who would later join an established band, turn it to his own ends, and then prove unable to remain faithful to it. One of the great rock what-if’s though.

    And btw I like Goats Head Soup. I may be “misanthropic and self-centered” but I liked it when it came out, and I like it now. Is it as good as Exile or even Between the Buttons? Probably not. But it’s still an enjoyable record. I mean, you’re not going to make an album on the epic scale of Exile every year.

  2. Mr. Moderator

    Good stuff, BigSteve, but I take it you admit that Ooh La La is the better of these artists’ two releases in ’73? Let me know if I’m not reading between the lines properly. Thanks.

  3. BigSteve

    No, I’d have to hear it in its entirety to make that call. I may have done so years ago, but not a single song title in the tracklisting rings a bell. That might be bad news, or it might mean I could hear it with fresh ears. Still, I can’t go along with the premise of judging the album by leaving half of the songs out of consideration.

  4. You’re cracking me up, Mod. Rod wins, you say, at least party because he doesn’t make any music under his own name. He’s not even as big a presence as usual with Faces this year. So you can’t even judge Goat’s Head against Ooh La La, right? You can only judge it against the few songs Rod participated in on that album. I hadn’t calculated on silence as a possible winning blow here. It’s hard to judge whether what Rod didn’t do is better than what the Stones did. So we go on what he did do: a couple of playable rocking, shouting numbers.

    Despite its murkiness, I dig the mood on Goat’s Head. There are some pretty tunes and “Heartbreaker,” if not quite genius, is convincingly brutal.

    I’m going to take GH over the several Faces tunes, but not by much.

    My score has Stones 4, Rod 1. But I have to admit, it could very easily be 3-2.

  5. Mr. Moderator

    Your admission of how close the battle has been, Mwall, is something I’m sure Rod is proud of seeing reported here. It surely makes me feel like I’m doing a good job. The next few years though – whew – it’s going to be hard work.

  6. alexmagic

    When the crumpled-up paper and water bottles hit the ring after the fight, they’re going to look back at the scoring of this round.

    Say what you will about Angie – and I’m not much of a fan, either – but if a tired Stones can throw out a song that might have been Stewart’s biggest hit, they already own this round. There’s nothing wrong with Rod’s songs here, and I think Silicone Grown is a winner, but are they better than Heartbreaker? Nah. And Rod would have killed to have a song like 100 Years Ago in his repertoire. Winter, Can You Hear the Music or Dancing With Mr. D won’t make the Stones’ highlight reels, but they at least keep pace with the competition here.

    If all of Ooh La La was in this, it’d be a great fight. But Rod is going this alone, and now he’s fighting with his own corner. He’s about to chase Ronnie Lane off, getting himself into post-D’Amato Mike Tyson territory. And considering that he refused to sing a song like “Ooh La La”, I’m not even sure he’s answering the bell for this round. No wonder Wood is looking across the ring and thinking about switching camps. Stones win ’73.

  7. Mr. Moderator

    As much fun as I know you’re all having with arguing over the Winning and Losing of particular rounds (and that goes for those of you sending offlist messages of support to the judges for their official scoring to date), let’s keep in mind the hypothesis that’s being tested: From 1969-1976, Rod Stewart, including his work with Faces, released music on par with or better than the Stones.

  8. This has certainly been enlightening. I always assumed it was Ronnie Lane singing Ooh La La. Was it Ron Wood? I thought Ronnie wrote it so I assumed that he sang it as well. Did Rod really refuse to sing it?

  9. Mr. Moderator

    Yes, it’s actually Ron Wood singing, and the story is that Stewart felt Lane’s composition was in the wrong key for Rod’s Rasp.

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