By the time MTV got around to taping an Unplugged special with Rod Stewart, the singing soccer fanatic had spent most of the '80s and early '90s churning out albums full of glossy pop songs. UNPLUGGED…AND SEATED found Stewart going back to his earlier material where soul, folk and rock blended together into something special. Stewart made these chestnuts more authentic by reuniting with old mate Ronnie Wood. Backed by a string section, vocalists, and a couple of pianos, Stewart dug deep into his catalog for folk-flavored favorites such as "Handbags And Gladrags," "Mandolin Wind" and "Cut Across Shorty."…
Sir Roderick David "Rod" Stewart, CBE (born 10 January 1945) is a British rock singer and songwriter. Born and raised in London, he is of Scottish and English ancestry. Stewart is one of the best-selling music artists of all time, having sold over 100 million records worldwide. He has had six consecutive number one albums in the UK and his tally of 62 UK hit singles includes 31 that reached the top ten, six of which gained the #1 position…
Versatile is Van Morrison's 38th album, and follows the release of the excellent R&B and blues covers collection Roll with the Punches by less than three months. Like its predecessor, it's primarily a covers set, but its focus is on jazz and pop standards from the Great American Songbook with six originals added for good measure. Historically, these experiments haven't worked for rock artists: Rod Stewart delivered five overblown, badly sung collections from the canon, and Bob Dylan delivered five discs of highly idiosyncratic interpretations of the stuff. Even Boz Scaggs tried them with very mixed results. Morrison fares better than his peers due to experience – standards have peppered his set lists for decades. Versatile is not a pillar in his catalog, but it's not a cynical cash-in, either.
The five albums collected in this 2010 slipcase box – Foolish Behaviour, Tonight I'm Yours, Camouflage, Every Beat of My Heart, and Vagabond Heart – may not be Rod Stewart's best, but they are certainly the ones that capture the singer's '80s work…
Taking its cue from Madonna's ballad collection Something to Remember, Rod Stewart's If We Fall in Love Tonight combines several of his biggest ballads with three new songs. If We Fall in Love Tonight is targeted directly toward an older, adult contemporary audience who no longer wants to hear Stewart's harder-edged material…
Rod Stewart continued to regain his strength with Vagabond Heart, the follow-up to his comeback album, Out of Order. Vagabond Heart is a stronger, more diverse album than its predecessor, featuring a more consistent set of songs, including Robbie Robertson's "Broken Arrow" and the hit "Motown Song," as well as a convincing, impassioned performance by Stewart…