Explain Rod Stewart's Career to Me

I've been listening to "classic rock" more than usual lately and recently discovered how great Rod Stewart's early albums were (+ his work with The Faces). Every Picture Tells a Story has quickly become a favourite album of mine. It surprised me to discover that his music was quite well regarded in it's time. Even, Robert Christgau gave the album Every Picture Tells a Story an A+ rating, and he seems to be particularly hard to please. So, with this in mind... when did Rod Stewart become a joke? When he released "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy?"? When he transitioned to only singing standards? What am I missing? He seemed to "sell out" pretty quickly! Please enlighten me!

In the 80s even he was cheesy but he has good songs.

He wrote and performed a song about homophobia in the early 1970s, THE KILLING OF GEORGIE.

R2 Interesting, I will have to look that song up. I haven't made it past 1972's Never a Dull Moment, yet.

Simple: after several years as a top UK-based blues singer (one of the best, The Faces rocked), he moved full-time out to LA in the mid-70s and went full-on "Hollywood". And his music and image fully reflected this.

First he shacked up with Britt Ekland (who iirc precipitated his cross-national move). Then came George Hamilton's ex, and the first round of kids, mansion in Holmby Hills, parties with old Hollywood socialites, etc. That was around '79, and the disco-influenced, spandex-wearing "Dya Think I'm Sexy" era. A major turning point for him and not considered a high one.

After Hamilton it was onto living with supermodels in the 80s and a turn back to his rocker roots, albeit still in a slick LA-style. The 90s brought his next wife and yet another set of kids, encroaching middle age and the "standards" musical era. He's now back to dividing time between homes in LA and the UK, but at his advanced age a Vegas residency and smallish tours are all he can handle. His voice is still good though, or so I'm told.

Rod sold out when he signed with Mercury in the US and moved to L.A. From that point on, as he admits himself, he became more interested in living the life of a rock star than in being a musician. As he admits himself, he preferred to spend his time boozing, drugging, and sleeping with heautiful women than in writing songs and working on them in the recording studio. Instead, he'd just book a studio, then spend most of the time with the band in a bar drinking - and at the last minute, they'd all work out chords, a tune, and some words to fit to it. That's when he went to releasing crap. But he didn't care, since, as he points out himself, it still sold like crazy and he still filled the stadiums. So long as he made money at it, he felt no pressure to do better.

He is very frank about this in his autobiography.

not all his 80s output was cheesy. “Baby Jane” and “Infatuation” were cool songs, as were some of the tracks on his late 80s album Out of Order like “Dynamite” and “Lost In You.” Also, the title track “Blondes Have More Fun” from the album of the same name.

Never got him myself. Always found him completely dull as a performer and musician. Maybe I missed his prime.

I live in Palm Beach where he lives and I see him quite often - he's disgusting actually, still trying to work that bleach blonde stand up hair and he looks like a damn fool. He also dresses horribly - too tight clothes and he's a mess.

I was just thinking about this today, OP. I also love Every Picture Tells a Story—it’s a wonderful album. But he did go from making great music to being a joke. He’s the musical equivalent of Nicolas Cage, I suppose.

I love him. Something so fuckable about him. Shame his kids are all douches.

His Have You Ever Seen The Rain is one of the worst covers ever

And on the topic, Eldergays

Why did the Urban Legend the Rod Stewart blew an entire football team (or similar) and swallowed so much cum he had to have his stomach pumped stick? Stewart by all accounts seemed to be a very hetero playboy rock star type.

Ditto Richard Gere and the Gerbil. There wasn't really anything particularly effeminate about Gere.

Is that why it stuck? Because both were such unlikely candidates?

Agree with r5, it appears with hit post at the same time and have similar views. I'd note though that the Mercury years were his final UK years, it was actually his signing with Warner Bros in '75 and the Atlantic Crossing LP that brought him to LA and that full-on LA-rock-star lifestyle (it also coincided with his time with Ekland, who was LA-based).

He really did kind of sell out. He made bank, and had a much more elaborate lifestyle than if he'd stayed in the UK, but he was never taken as seriously by his peers and critics after the LA move.

no, because Rod was actually kind of femme. He has gay face, and used to wear pink or red spandex pants and with the frosted hair and earring it was a bit much.

His music was fucking awful.

How about first, OP, you explain YOUR career to us.

Back in the day, Rod and Elton John were so tight everyone assumed they'd had sex at least once or twice. Rod never denied or confirmed it. He played coy, with comments about how he had such a huge sex drive, he could be up for anything. He and Elton had pet (girl) names for each other. And so many rockers were androgynous then, it was easy to believe they had sex with men as well as with, or instead of, sex with women. Hence the readiness to believe the Rod/stomach pump UL.

Which Rod blames on his former publicist, by the way. The guy was a pro at inventing stories and feeding them to the press. Rod claims he invented this one as payback after Rod fired him.

Thanks for the explanation R18

I grew up in the 1980s, so it was after Rod Stewart had crested. I thought he was fearless. I first heard him with songs like "Infatuation" and "Some Guys Have All the Luck." I loved both! I really liked "Forever Young" and "Downtown Train."

"Do You Think I'm Sexy." is fucking epic. One of the best pop songs of all time.

I loved Rod Stewart as well because he came across as completely comfortable in his sexuality. I loved that about him. He had fun with his hair too.

You have that backwards, Backwoods. R4/R13 got it right. His four Mercury albums are his best and most authentic rock 'n' roll records, and his subsequent Warner Brothers stuff - with the possible exceptions of "Atlantic Crossing" and "A Night On The Town" - are dreck by comparison. Sellout, indeed.

I was recently wondering about him too.

He does have an interesting Smokey voice. I absolutely hated If You want My Body because it was so overplayed

He got lucky with his first single and then captured the Glam Rock set (which he wasn't). And eating semen didn't hurt his career either.

Didn't they pump gallons of cum out of his stomach in the emergency room?

If you can acquire "The Rod Stewart Album", "Gasoline Alley", "Every Picture Tells a Story", "Never a Dull Moment", and "A Nod Is As Good As a Wink, To a Blind Horse" (by The Faces), you'll have the reasons he was great.

It all went downhill with the "Ooh La La" album by The Faces, and Rod's dismal "Smiler", wh. followed NADM.

OP here, I suppose what interests me about Rod Stewart's career is that he was *legitimately good* in his early career AND how he seemed to be taken seriously. I've never heard how *good* he was discussed. It just shocks me, because I'm so used to the persona we are all familiar with.

I used to have the privilege of working in a store where THIS played constantly (and it was NOT in the 90s).

ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7pa3TmqOorZ6csm%2BvzqZmraCimq6le5FvbmpoZ2eCbrHLnZyrn5GuwG6x16mjmqGeYr%2BwsIysq56vkafBbr%2BMnJirnZWnerW7jKac