Rod Stewart / YMMV

Alternative Character Interpretation:
- Is the main character of "Tonight's the Night (Gonna Be Alright)" a perverted creep trying to force an unwilling virgin to have sex with him, or is he a nice boyfriend who's trying to convince the girl (who truly loves him and wants it as much as he does, but is a little nervous) that everything's gonna be fine?
- Some listeners interpret the narrator of "Mandolin Wind" as a man with a terminal illness, based largely on the line where he tells his lover "I felt ashamed I let you down", though since he previously mentioned that her "face was thin and pale", the lover could be the ill one instead.
Archive Panic: He has over 30 studio albums spread out over five decades. In particular, he was insanely prolific in the 1968-1974 period. During that six year span he released 12 albums as a featured vocalist (two with The Jeff Beck Group, five solo albums, four Faces studio albums, and one live album credited jointly to him and Faces).
Awesome Music: His first four albums, at the bare minimum, are classic rock & roll all the way through. Every Picture Tells a Story is generally considered the crown jewel of his solo discography. He's also been on several classic albums as a member of other groups, including Jeff Beck's Truth and most of Faces' output.
Common Knowledge: It is the woman Rod is singing about in the song who is posing the question, "Da Ya Think I'm Sexy" in the chorus, not Rod himself asking the question.
Covered Up:
- His version of "Reason to Believe" is much better known than Tim Hardin's original version. Likewise his version of "Downtown Train" by Tom Waits was a top three Billboard hit unlike the original.
- There's also "Sailing" (originally by the Sutherland Brothers & Quiver) and "I Don't Want To Talk About It" (originally Crazy Horse) from the previous decade.
- His version of "The First Cut Is The Deepest" is also arguably the most iconic, to the point that most people aren't aware it was originally written by Cat Stevens.
- "Handbags and Gladrags" was written by Manfred Mann's Mike d'Abo and first recorded by British singer Chris Farlowe in 1967, but Rod's take from a few years later is the most famous. Even when Stereophonics did their hit cover in 2001, which inspired the version used as the theme of The Office (UK), it was clearly meant as a nod to Stewart.
- And a notable case where he was the one Covered Up. He recorded the original version of "That's What Friends Are For" for the soundtrack of Night Shift (where it played over the closing credits). A few years later, it was a massive hit for Dionne Warwick (with special guests Elton John, Stevie Wonder and Gladys Knight).
Fair for Its Day: "The Killing of Georgie", from 1976, is about a young gay man (based on an actual friend of Stewart) who moves to New York and lives openly after coming out to his family, only to get randomly murdered on the street. But Georgie is notably portrayed positively and sympathetically. While it was a huge hit in the UK, a lot of American radio stations were skittish about a gay-themed song (along with its Epic Rocking length and Downer Ending), so it only got to #30 in Billboard.
Germans Love David Hasselhoff:
- Up until Every Picture Tells a Story, he was much better-received in America than the UK. The Jeff Beck Group was popular with American ballroom audiences and underground radio, his first two solo albums were praised by Rolling Stone and made the Billboard chart (Gasoline Alley hitting the Top 40), and Faces played sold out shows in America in 1970 and 1971 even as they had trouble getting attention at home.
- "Forever Young". The song did OK but not great in the UK (it peaked at #57 there), but made the top 12 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the States. To quote Mojo magazine's 1995 interview of Stewart:
  Rod Stewart: "I love 'Forever Young', because that was a real heartfelt song about my kids. I suddenly realized I'd missed a good five years of Sean and Kimberly's life because I was so busy touring all the time. With these kids now I don't make that mistake- I take them on tour with me, so I can watch them grow up. So that's another favorite. Unfortunately, it wasn't a big hit in England, but it's like a national anthem here (America)."
Misattributed Song: Zig-zagged a bit with "In a Broken Dream". Yes, that's Stewart singing it, but it's not actually by him, but by the Australian band Python Lee Jackson, who'd relocated to London and recorded it in 1969. The band's singer had trouble hitting the song's notes properly, so they decided to hire an outside vocalist. The band's manager was previously a salesman who'd sold Stewart a car, so he brought in Stewart to sing it, but it ended up not getting released. Then in 1972 the label put the song out to capitalize on his newfound fame (becoming a #3 hit in the UK, and also making the charts in America), and many people just assumed it was by Stewart. However, Stewart did record his own version in 1992, backed by John Paul Jones and David Gilmour. But, history repeated itself and it wasn't released at the time either. It finally came out on a 2009 box set. But then in 2015 the original was sampled in A$AP Rocky's "Everyday" and Stewart got a "featuring" credit for it, and that same year the Python Lee Jackson version was included as a bonus track on Stewart's Another Country album, so it seems to be retroactively considered a Stewart song anyway.
Older Than They Think:
- Okay, you know that really cheesy theme song from Star Trek: Enterprise, "Where My Heart Will Take Me?" Yeah? Well, that was originally sung by Rod Stewart - it was titled "Faith Of The Heart" and it was on the Patch Adams soundtrack.
- His version of The Rolling Stones' "Street Fighting Man" from his debut album amounts to a mashup before they even existed. It starts off with him singing the lyrics, but to a much different musical backing from the original. After a false cold ending, he restarts the song, but does it much closer to the original. Then for the fade, the band jams on a sped-up version of the opening riff of a different Stones song, "We Love You".
Refrain from Assuming: He did not make a song called "Young Hearts Be Free Tonight"; he did, however, make a song called "Young Turks" that has that line in the chorus.
Retroactive Recognition: The girl in the "Young Turks" video is none other than E.G. Daily.
Signature Song: "Maggie May” overall. By album:
- The Rod Stewart Album/An Old Raincoat Won't Ever Let You Down: "Handbags and Gladrags"
- Gasoline Alley: The Title Track and "It's All Over Now"
- Every Picture Tells a Story: The Title Track, and all of Side Two ("Maggie May", "Mandolin Wind", "(I Know) I'm Losing You", "Reason to Believe").
- Never a Dull Moment: "You Wear It Well" and "Twistin' the Night Away"
- Smiler: "Farewell"
- Atlantic Crossing: "Sailing"
- A Night on The Town: "Tonight's The Night", "The First Cut is the Deepest" and "The Killing of Georgie"
- Foot Loose & Fancy Free: "Hot Legs"
- Blondes Have More Fun: "Da Ya Think I'm Sexy"
- Foolish Behaviour: "Passion"
- Tonight I'm Yours: "Young Turks"
- Camouflage: "Some Guys Have All The Luck"
- Out of Order: "Forever Young"
Suspiciously Similar Song: "Da Ya Think I'm Sexy" sounds very close to Brazilian song "Taj Mahal", leading author Jorge Ben Jor to sue for plagiarism. Stewart would later admit the copying, as he heard the song while visiting Rio for Carnival, and tried to compensate by donating some royalties to UNICEF.
- Stewart released "Forever Young" in 1988. Fourteen years earlier, Bob Dylan had released his song "Forever Young". Stewart is obviously a big fan of Dylan, having done several Cover Versions of his songs. While the two songs are different, besides sharing a title and concept, Stewart's song has several lyric lines that seem like rewrites of Dylan's lyrics.^note At some point before his song was released Stewart reached out to Dylan. Dylan didn't object to the song's release or demand co-writing credit, but he was still given a share of the song's royalties.
They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: It's a rare type of Rod fan who's on board with every direction he took musically. The first jump-off for many older fans was "Da Ya Think I'm Sexy" in 1978, and even some of his most devoted fans found the Great American Songbook series in the 2000s extremely challenging of a departure, especially with five total volumes including four in a row.
Unintentional Period Piece: "You Wear it Well", with its reference to collect phone calls and the mention of Madame Onassis as a style icon.
Values Dissonance: "Every Picture Tells a Story" is a cheerful song in which a callow young man talks about traveling the world and, after a series of mishaps, falling in love with a Chinese woman. But the use of ethnically loaded terms like "slit-eyed lady" and "Shanghai Lil" sound very jarring today.

YMMV / Rod Stewart

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