The release last year of the exceptional boxed set called "Five Guys Walked Into a Bar ..." served as a reminder that international superstar Rod Stewart once sang with a group called Faces. The only other hint of the band's existence seems to come only when an oldies station decides to cue up "Stay With Me," Faces' only American Top 40 hit.
Rod, of course, went on to sell trillions of records in his solo guise, which actuallly ran concurrent to the Faces' tenure in the late '60s and early '70s. And while he could be brilliant - many sources list his "Every Picture Tells a Story" as one of the best rock albums of all time - his output during the past few decades has been a mixed bag, and we'll leave it at that.
But the man always could sing, with that unmistakable gravel voice seemingly made for rock & roll. Jeff Beck's first two albums, "Truth" and "Beck-Ola," make for great listening, but without Rod's voice, they wouldn't quite qualify as the classics they are. (Just check out Jeff's follow-ups with other singers, before he went the strictly instrumental route.)
When the Jeff Beck Group imploded in mid-1969, Rod headed for a job opening. Steve Marriott, leader of the Small Faces, had bolted that band to team up with a kid named Peter Frampton for a project called Humble Pie, which was in the process of hitting the British Top 10 with "Natural Born Bugie." The transition from Steve to Rod wasn't seen as that drastic, as they both sang in a similar style. The only problem was that Steve served as the band's guitarist, while Rod was strictly a singer.
That wasn't a problem, though. Another man displaced by the Beck dissolution was Ron Wood, who had been playing bass in that group. He also was adept on the six-string, and the three remaining Small Faces (Ronnie Lane, Kenney Jones and Ian McLagan) welcomed the pair aboard. And, the story goes, because Stewart and Wood were much taller than the other guys, they decided to drop the "Small" from the band's name.
Thus ended the story, more or less, for one of the more successful British bands of the mid-'60s. At least in their home country, that is. The Small Faces had exactly one song make any impact over here, a phase-shifted bit of psychedelia called "Itchycoo Park," which had the right sound for the right time in late 1967.
In the U.K., though, the Small Faces hit the Top 40 with a dozen singles, topping the charts with a tune called "All or Nothing" and repeating the feat with their 1968 LP "Ogden's Nut Gone Flake." A huge favorite of fans of '60s rock, "Ogden's" was distinctive for its cover, a round design made to emulate a tin of pipe tobacco. It also is credited as among the early rock operas, predating The Who's "Tommy" by a year: the entire second side is a suite of songs documenting the travels of one Happiness Stan, complete with a cockney narration that sounds like the intonations of a leprechaun.
Marriott supposedly left the group after its label, Immediate Records, released a single he didn't particularly care for (the anthemic "Lazy Sunday," which hit No. 2), while the song he really enjoyed, "The Universal," didn't have nearly as much success when it hit the shelves later. He teamed up with Frampton, who had been playing with a band called The Herd, and bassist Greg Ridley of Spooky Tooth, to form a new band to record on Immediate.
Unfortunately, Immediate folded shortly after that, leaving historians decades to sort through the welath of material recorded for the label in a relatively brief time. Humble Pie later signed with A&M Records (at least, that was their American label) and hit the big time in 1972 with "Smokin'," a harder blues-boogie outing featuring the drug-referencing "30 Days in the Hole." The big time didn't last long, though; three subsequent Humble Pie outings sold in increasingly smaller numbers, and that was that.
Frampton, meanwhile, had departed for a solo career by the time of "Smokin'" (Colosseum guitarist Dave Clempson took his place), and he doubtlessly regretted the decision until his long-haired visage hit the stores in 1976 on the cover of "Frampton Comes Alive," which had sales rocket up to the stratosphere for reasons that still aren't clear to this day.
By then, Faces was long gone, as well. For a while, it was a true group effort, especially with Ronnie Lane contributing plenty of songwriting and singing. (He had done so in the Small Faces, too, only not quite as much.) When he departed, the band morphed into Stewart's backing group - in fact, some singles and a live album appeared under the moniker Rod Stewart and Faces. Eventually, Stewart figured the "and Faces" part wasn't worth the effort, and by '76 his album "A Night on the Town" was selling right up there with "Frampton Comes Alive."
And it was just about that time that a Mr. Keith Richards talked with Wood about possibly joining Richards' band, which had lost guitarist Mick Taylor. (I've read where Keith and Ron developed a friendship after Keith had a fling with Ron's wife - that's rock 'n' roll, I guess.) And Ron Wood still is a Rolling Stone, 30 years down the road.
Meanwhile, Marriott wasn't exactly lighting the world on fire with his solo career, and with some of his former bandmates looking for work, the Small Faces reunion took place. (Lane opted out, and Rick Wills - who previously had played with Frampton, as well as Pink Floyd's David Gilmour - filled in on bass.) An LP from the revamped group, "Playmates," was almost universally reviled, and a second album, "78 in the Shade," didn't do much better. And that was that.
Frampton saw his fortunes decline precipitously with "I'm In You," his "Comes Alive" follow-up (Frank Zappa did a tremendous parody called "I Have Been In You") and the disaster that was the film version of "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band." I've heard Peter's a great guy personally, but repeat success has eluded him for decades now.
Perhaps that wouldn't have been the case had a reunion with Marriott in 1991 come to full fruition. They'd recorded some music together for the first time in 20 years, and the tracks have recently appeared on an interesting-looking Marriott collection called "Rainy Changes." But on April 20 of that year, Steve died in a fire at his home in Essex, England. He was 44.
Ronnie Lane no longer is with us, either. He recorded some quality albums throughout the '70s, culminating with his collaboration with Pete Townshend, "Rough Mix." Toward the end of the decade, he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, and the disease finally claimed his life in 1997, when he was 51.
Kenney Jones also had a connection with The Who, of course, as the man who replaced the man who couldn't be replaced: He took over on drums after Keith Moon's untimely death. Unfortunately, Jones' tenure with the rock giants is considered by many as best forgotten, although I thoroughly enjoyed seeing The Who in Pittsburgh during its, ahem "Farewell Tour" in 1982.
Ian McLagan followed Ron Wood into the Rolling Stones, although as a much-lower-profile keyboardist on some of the band's gargantuan tours.
As for Rod Stewart ... when you hear his name, please, please don't think about "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy," or whatever that song/video was that he did with Sting and Bryan Adams, the one that had Beavis and Butt-Head screaming on their series. Cue up some early Jeff Beck, some Faces or "Every Picture Tells a Story," and enjoy
Rod, of course, went on to sell trillions of records in his solo guise, which actuallly ran concurrent to the Faces' tenure in the late '60s and early '70s. And while he could be brilliant - many sources list his "Every Picture Tells a Story" as one of the best rock albums of all time - his output during the past few decades has been a mixed bag, and we'll leave it at that.
But the man always could sing, with that unmistakable gravel voice seemingly made for rock & roll. Jeff Beck's first two albums, "Truth" and "Beck-Ola," make for great listening, but without Rod's voice, they wouldn't quite qualify as the classics they are. (Just check out Jeff's follow-ups with other singers, before he went the strictly instrumental route.)
When the Jeff Beck Group imploded in mid-1969, Rod headed for a job opening. Steve Marriott, leader of the Small Faces, had bolted that band to team up with a kid named Peter Frampton for a project called Humble Pie, which was in the process of hitting the British Top 10 with "Natural Born Bugie." The transition from Steve to Rod wasn't seen as that drastic, as they both sang in a similar style. The only problem was that Steve served as the band's guitarist, while Rod was strictly a singer.
That wasn't a problem, though. Another man displaced by the Beck dissolution was Ron Wood, who had been playing bass in that group. He also was adept on the six-string, and the three remaining Small Faces (Ronnie Lane, Kenney Jones and Ian McLagan) welcomed the pair aboard. And, the story goes, because Stewart and Wood were much taller than the other guys, they decided to drop the "Small" from the band's name.
Thus ended the story, more or less, for one of the more successful British bands of the mid-'60s. At least in their home country, that is. The Small Faces had exactly one song make any impact over here, a phase-shifted bit of psychedelia called "Itchycoo Park," which had the right sound for the right time in late 1967.
In the U.K., though, the Small Faces hit the Top 40 with a dozen singles, topping the charts with a tune called "All or Nothing" and repeating the feat with their 1968 LP "Ogden's Nut Gone Flake." A huge favorite of fans of '60s rock, "Ogden's" was distinctive for its cover, a round design made to emulate a tin of pipe tobacco. It also is credited as among the early rock operas, predating The Who's "Tommy" by a year: the entire second side is a suite of songs documenting the travels of one Happiness Stan, complete with a cockney narration that sounds like the intonations of a leprechaun.
Marriott supposedly left the group after its label, Immediate Records, released a single he didn't particularly care for (the anthemic "Lazy Sunday," which hit No. 2), while the song he really enjoyed, "The Universal," didn't have nearly as much success when it hit the shelves later. He teamed up with Frampton, who had been playing with a band called The Herd, and bassist Greg Ridley of Spooky Tooth, to form a new band to record on Immediate.
Unfortunately, Immediate folded shortly after that, leaving historians decades to sort through the welath of material recorded for the label in a relatively brief time. Humble Pie later signed with A&M Records (at least, that was their American label) and hit the big time in 1972 with "Smokin'," a harder blues-boogie outing featuring the drug-referencing "30 Days in the Hole." The big time didn't last long, though; three subsequent Humble Pie outings sold in increasingly smaller numbers, and that was that.
Frampton, meanwhile, had departed for a solo career by the time of "Smokin'" (Colosseum guitarist Dave Clempson took his place), and he doubtlessly regretted the decision until his long-haired visage hit the stores in 1976 on the cover of "Frampton Comes Alive," which had sales rocket up to the stratosphere for reasons that still aren't clear to this day.
By then, Faces was long gone, as well. For a while, it was a true group effort, especially with Ronnie Lane contributing plenty of songwriting and singing. (He had done so in the Small Faces, too, only not quite as much.) When he departed, the band morphed into Stewart's backing group - in fact, some singles and a live album appeared under the moniker Rod Stewart and Faces. Eventually, Stewart figured the "and Faces" part wasn't worth the effort, and by '76 his album "A Night on the Town" was selling right up there with "Frampton Comes Alive."
And it was just about that time that a Mr. Keith Richards talked with Wood about possibly joining Richards' band, which had lost guitarist Mick Taylor. (I've read where Keith and Ron developed a friendship after Keith had a fling with Ron's wife - that's rock 'n' roll, I guess.) And Ron Wood still is a Rolling Stone, 30 years down the road.
Meanwhile, Marriott wasn't exactly lighting the world on fire with his solo career, and with some of his former bandmates looking for work, the Small Faces reunion took place. (Lane opted out, and Rick Wills - who previously had played with Frampton, as well as Pink Floyd's David Gilmour - filled in on bass.) An LP from the revamped group, "Playmates," was almost universally reviled, and a second album, "78 in the Shade," didn't do much better. And that was that.
Frampton saw his fortunes decline precipitously with "I'm In You," his "Comes Alive" follow-up (Frank Zappa did a tremendous parody called "I Have Been In You") and the disaster that was the film version of "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band." I've heard Peter's a great guy personally, but repeat success has eluded him for decades now.
Perhaps that wouldn't have been the case had a reunion with Marriott in 1991 come to full fruition. They'd recorded some music together for the first time in 20 years, and the tracks have recently appeared on an interesting-looking Marriott collection called "Rainy Changes." But on April 20 of that year, Steve died in a fire at his home in Essex, England. He was 44.
Ronnie Lane no longer is with us, either. He recorded some quality albums throughout the '70s, culminating with his collaboration with Pete Townshend, "Rough Mix." Toward the end of the decade, he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, and the disease finally claimed his life in 1997, when he was 51.
Kenney Jones also had a connection with The Who, of course, as the man who replaced the man who couldn't be replaced: He took over on drums after Keith Moon's untimely death. Unfortunately, Jones' tenure with the rock giants is considered by many as best forgotten, although I thoroughly enjoyed seeing The Who in Pittsburgh during its, ahem "Farewell Tour" in 1982.
Ian McLagan followed Ron Wood into the Rolling Stones, although as a much-lower-profile keyboardist on some of the band's gargantuan tours.
As for Rod Stewart ... when you hear his name, please, please don't think about "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy," or whatever that song/video was that he did with Sting and Bryan Adams, the one that had Beavis and Butt-Head screaming on their series. Cue up some early Jeff Beck, some Faces or "Every Picture Tells a Story," and enjoy
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