Aug 16 AOTD: Rod Stewart - Every Picture Tells a Story

Aug 16 AOTD: Rod Stewart - Every Picture Tells a Story

1971

This is a team effort that raised Rod to super star status.  But the team - all the members of the Faces and Madeline and Maggie Bell - already knew the power of this weathered vocalist.  After all, Jeff Beck (during  the mid-60's) had hand-picked him to front the Yardbirds and the Jeff Beck Group. Though most of the album consists of covers or was written by other composers, Rod DID write the three biggest hits on the album: Every Picture, Maggie May and Mandolin Wind.

But it’s that voice, a good half decade before transitioning to glam pop and disco, that captures the zeitgeist of merging blues, country and rock - a grainy, earnest rasp bespeaking the adventures, joys and pitfalls of a young man's life.

The album itself is a crossroads of everything that rock could successfully blend: violins, blues, Motown, country, folk, roots.  A slide guitar introduces Rod's gospel-drenched voice in "Amazing Grace," and both sounds take the listener to church, to faith, a sanctuary to a lad setting out, so that when the album next slides into Bob Dylan's "Tomorrow is a Long Time," we hear the constant pull between the spiritual and the material. Here, if a woman would only lie "beside him," would he come to "rest." That it's Bob Dylan's song nods to the then current crop of rockers learning their way from a road paved by troubadours going back to Guthrie. A bow to his roots can also be seen in his choice to cover Elvis Presley's first hit single, "That's All Right" (which, speaking of looking back down a long road, was covered by Elvis in 1954, first written and recorded by Arthur Crudup in 1946 ... AND has traditional blues verses that can be traced back to Blind Lemon Jefferson recordings from 1926!).

It's that now-classic radio staple "Maggie May" that forms the heart of "Every Picture." It begins with a simple plucked acoustic guitar (this is actually an intro, called "Henry"), pauses, then continues with a strumming guitar and bass accompanying. The lyrics incorporate both sunny images of an alluring older woman as well as the bruised-heart feeling of young man who's been "led away from home." The simplicity of the guitar solo at three minutes (repeated later) is recorded so much forward in the mix that it seems like another vocal, simply retelling the story. And then that sunny mandolin part, a brightness that almost overshadows Rod's last vocals wishing that he "had never seen her face" and declaring that he will get home one day. The song works metaphorically for anything that pulls someone from "home" or simply derails him from a youthful dream, and then dissolves into disillusionment.

The album really flexes its muscle three minutes into "I know I'm Losing You," second from the finale, when the drums pound like an avalanche of boulders and the guitar electrically emerges from the piano and drums like a saw cutting its way through that avalanche, just as desperate to be heard. And then at 5 minutes, Rod seems to pull up on the reigns (drums slow dramatically, guitar withdraws) with "Your love is fading/I can feel it fading/I am losing you."

This is one of the few albums I keep coming back to that has no filler, not a single misstep, not one boring song, plenty to satisfy every taste bud in a classic rock listener's palate.

The album was the first ever to hit the number one spot in the UK and America simultaneously (not Elvis, Beatles or Stones).

And one last fun fact: Maggie May was NOT a single release. Rather ... it was the B SIDE!!! of "Reason To Believe," the last song on the album.