SIR ROD STEWART
I'VE ALWAYS WANTED TO ASK YOU,ROD...
Sir Rod Stewart tells Guest Editor Bryan Adams about his music, being on tour, trying to get paid when he was in the Jeff Beck Group, his model-railway passion, being “one of the lucky ones”, and more.
Last year, after Sir Rod Stewart filmed himself filling a pothole near his home in Harlow, Essex, the video went viral. The local council had repeatedly failed to address the issue, so the former Faces frontman leapt into action, wearing a in high-vis jacket, spade in hand. It’s this kind of man-of-the-people approach that has turned him into a star; the Jack the Lad with the voice of a god. It’s no wonder CR’s Guest Editor Bryan Adams wants to interview him.
Adams is at home in Vancouver. Meanwhile, Stewart, in his apartment high in Beverly Hills, is playing Rod Stewart perfectly: the open shirt, the carefully unkempt hair, the glint in the eye, the ever-present chuckle. He’s watching football at the same time as he does the interview with Adams,and there’s as much gossip and mickey-taking as there is talk of Long John Baldry, Jeff Beck and others. But first there’s the extremely important subject of gravel shovelling to discuss.
BA: How are the potholes down where you are?
RS: All fixed. I put the council and the government to shame.
BA: What’s wrong with the councils, honestly?
RS: Like most councils – especially in Britain and everywhere – no one’s got any money. Same thing here in California. Schwarzenegger went out and did it. Did you see that? [Arnold Schwarzenegger filled a pothole in his neighbourhood in Brentwood, Los Angeles, after residents’ complaints to the authorities fell on deaf ears].
BA: I did, yeah. You’re inspiring people all over the place. I love that story. And I’m sure you don’t have potholes in California, though. Do you?
RS: Yeah, of course we do.
BA: At your place?
RS: Not actually round my house. But I live up in the hills – in a private enclave, if you don’t mind. When you get down into town it gets a little rough. The worst place was when I was in Mexico City. That’s the worst for potholes. You’re lost in them for days.
BA: That’s probably why they had to come down there, to fill in a few holes…
Rod, I know when I first started to become a singer, I know the moment when I felt like: “This is good. I’ve got a voice”. What was the moment for you that you thought: “Oh, I can sing”?
RS: When I was a youngster, six or seven, we had huge family parties. My parents, my brothers, they all had voices, they could all sing. So I was surrounded by would-be singers. But in my beatnik days, down in Brighton Beach when I was ab
