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Thoughts on new Rod Stewart album

Posted by Quint (D) on October 20, 2006 at 16:34:29

In one of the smarter decisions I’ve made recently, I decided to listen to the new Rod Stewart covers album, “Still the Same: Great Rock Classics of Our Time,” before buying. (Thank you, Barnes & Noble, for providing listening stations!)

Honestly, despite Rod’s recent devolution into a Tony-Bennett-wannabe-hack, I had moderately high hopes for the new album, given that Rod has always been most comfortable in a rock milieu and that he’s long been a great interpreter of other people’s songs (the wretched “Great American Songbook” series excepted).

Honestly, I shouldn’t have even bothered. What a letdown. His choice of artists and songs to cover is pretty predictable—Eagles (“Best of My Love”), Bob Seger (“Still the Same”), Nazareth and many others (the ubiquitous “Love Hurts”), CCR (“Have You Ever Seen the Rain”—though it was nice to see a Badfinger cover in there (“Day After Day”).

If his song choices are predictable, the arrangements make them look positively adventurous. Rod sticks to the original arrangements with white knuckles, seemingly afraid to stretch and bend the songs like he used to. Which is sad, because I honestly feel he still has it in him . . . somewhere. The overall impression is one of Rod’s voice simply superimposed on the original arrangements—sort of like a karaoke performance.

Anyway, as you can probably guess, I passed on the album. I really thought a return to his rock roots might do Rod some good—his last rock album, “When We Were the New Boys,” was an underrated gem—but instead it continues the trend set in motion by his GASB recordings: pleasant, innocuous, whitebread dreck made for background listening for housewives. Not even calling it a “rock” album can disguise that. Despite all this, it’ll probably still sell in the millions, much like Michael McDonald’s awful Motown albums. Sigh . . . .

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