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  2. Ah, that’s sad. He endured awful health problems of course. I haven’t kept up with his career, but the tones of his voice and guitar were a fabulous combination. I’ve ever cared for Driving Home … but luckily he did have a great Christmas song up his sleeve.

  3. Sad news, he did well to make it to 74 after very serious health problems in the past. I am sorry he won’t be getting in his car this year.

    Will be remembered for that song, but he was an excellent songwriter and a decent singer.

  4. Very sad to hear this. He managed to keep adapting, developing and finding new ways to tell us stuff. Beyond the more ‘poppy’ tracks, I had lot of time for his blues guitar playing and rank Dancing Down The Stony Road and Blue Guitars – yes, all of it – amongst my favourite ‘white-man-sings-the-blues’ albums. I also rated Road Songs For Lovers, his last album which went in a very different direction.

    RIP Chris and travel well down that road ahead.

  6. Sad news. New Light Through Through Old Windows is perhaps all you need (a best of but largely re-recordings of lots of his best work before that sort of thing was fashionable) but it shows him off to be a tremendous writer and performer.

    I may be a little biased being from the same neck of the woods but songs like Windy Town and Steel River encapsulate the north east as well as anything you’ll hear.

  7. That’s a shame, although sadly not a surprise given his health issues over the years.

    I can’t say I was a fan of his more bluesy direction, but he had a lovely warm voice and always got a great tone out of his guitar.

    I don’t need to hear the Christmas song again, as good as it is, and it’s a pity that it’s that one that will dominate the reports of his death when he did, IMHO, many more interesting songs.

    Here’s my favourite, the wonderfully atmospheric and moody Nothing to Fear. Check out the space around the guitar notes in the long intro!

    RIP.

    • Stainsby Girls is an absolute cracker of a song. The later re-recorded version has the edge over the original IMHO. Dogged by the most appalling health issues at far too young an age, Chris Rea looked much frailer than his 74 years. Truly Middlesbrough’s finest, he always seemed such a grounded and modest bloke. Rest in peace.

  10. I had only bought the 5-disc ‘original album series’ album online this afternoon when my daughter shouted upstairs that the man who sang DHFC had died. He had been on my mind since Dave’s post about a week ago…

    • I’m sorry he seems to be being remembered for DHFC. Though it’s a great song, warm and human, I heard the same in “Fool (if you think it’s over”, and “on the beach”. I suppose nobody has control over their posthumous legacy.

      • Indeed. For that matter, it’s not a given that a living artist’s public are going to prefer the work that the artist themselves considers to be their best.

        VdGG recorded a song on this very subject – Bunshō.

  14. There was a time at Andy’s Records when – in the style of The Aristocrats – someone would embark on a lengthy, if improbable, narrative which inevitably culminated in the exchange:
    “And I turn to her and say, “Texas”
    She says, “What?”
    I said, “Texas”
    She says, “What?”
    They’ve got big long roads out therе”.

    Thank you Chris Rea for keeping us sane and entertained under occasionally very trying circumstances.

  15. TRTH came out in 1989, when I was working at hi-fi shows between studies. I’ve never been much of a fan of blues guitar, but hearing that LP played on a Linn turntable through Naim amps and active Isobarik (wardrobe-sized) speakers at deafening volume was enough to convert anyone.

    One of my housemates was Irish and had Shamrock Daries, so TRTH was a bit of blast by comparison.

  16. Aww, man. That’s a real shame. I’d been dipping into his later catalogue too, on the strength of Niall’s thread. He seemed a delightful quiet soul of a man.

    It was Stainsby Girls that made him as far as I’m concerned. Seeing someone playing slide on a Strat on TOTP was encouraging, I thought. There’s a great lyric in it, ‘some girls loved horses. And always stayed at home’. I knew a few just exactly like that. It captured teenage shyness in a very gentle line.

  18. Really, really sad. I loved writing about him a few weeks ago.

    We live not far from him and many years ago we were on a Thames cruiser, negotiating Boulter’s lock. It was a baking hot day and we heard the throaty roar of a Ferrari pull up across the road from an ice-cream van. Out jumped Chris Rea who ran across the road to the van, bought a huge cornet, and got back in the car. As he gunned it away, it played the kind of horn you used to hear on rally cars, as it disappeared in a dusty cloud.

    My kinda rock star. RIP, lovely man.

  19. My favourite track. It’s from 1983’s Water Sign album. I’m a sucker for songs about safety and protection, harbours and havens, and this sustained me many times when things got rough.

  21. The Guardian have done well by him today. This by Alex Petridis is nicely done as is a piece by Michael Hann on Driving Home for Christmas. You have to admire someone who went this own way to the point of making an 11 CD album of new songs exploring various branches of the blues….

    https://www.theguardian.com/music/2025/dec/22/despite-his-knack-for-slick-pop-the-principled-and-passionate-chris-rea-never-took-the-easy-road?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

    • That ‘Blue Guitars’ set of CDs in a lovely LP sized box illustrated by his own paintings is a thing of warm beauty and huge amounts of love. I recommend it to anyone beguiled by his playing and that familiar voice. I am saddened to hear of his passing, and will remember him fondly. Condolences to all his family and friends.

  22. Yes, sad news.
    I only have one album by Chris Rea, and it’s the gargantuan 11CD + 1DVD “Blue Guitars” set.
    137 original tracks: an entire career’s worth of material on one album.
    A lot of it is really good. I’m delighted to have it.
    He always came across as a nice guy. Rest easy, Chris.

  23. I’m taking a dive into his stuff today. I’ve not heard a substantial proportion of it, despite being a fan to some extent. Initial impression: how on earth did he do it? There is a rich seam of quality here. He probably had the rare gift of not over thinking/second guessing. Also: the production and mix on some of this stuff is immense.

    I remembered a cassette single of Stainsby Girls. There were six songs on it, and they seemed to be album-quality. These are on the disc 2 of the expanded Shamrock Diaries. September Blue was the best… confusingly, he used the title more than once. Completely different songs. So these were outtakes… and there was a whole album from this general era that seems to have been kept until a recent box set – One Fine Day.

    I just marvel at his commitment to quality.

    More rambling thoughts from others are welcome! It’s a rich catalog.

  24. I played root note plodding bass in the late 80’s in a band which mainly played ‘indie’ covers. (Think, She sells sanctuary which even I couldn’t mangle.)

    But we also played a version of his song “Working on it” which was fun . MY guitarist was from Middlesbrough .

  25. I’ve also been dipping into Chris Rea’s back catalogue, some of which was a rediscovery of songs I haven’t heard for years, some of it was new to me. I kind of lost interest when he turned to the blues, but his guitar playing was peerless throughout his career. Here’s one I’d forgotten about, with a distinctly Knopfler-esque feel to it, and none the worse for that.

  26. It’s a sad loss. There seems to be a lot of love for Chris Rea and it seems to be entirely deserved. He certainly knew how to write a great song as well. His catchy pop side was still not really pop – there was always something real about them.

  27. This is his theme from Parting Shots, the Michael Winner film he starred in. His character was diagnosed with stomach cancer & given 6 weeks to live. This song is even sadder now.

  28. The media coverage here in Ireland over the last day has reminded me that he was much more popular here from early in his career. David Gray and Josh Ritter had the same experience. I saw an interview from circa 1985 where Chris said that his Irish audience funded his touring in the UK and Europe. I’d forgotten that.

  29. It’s interesting reading his Guardian obituary and its related posts that after being dropped by his record label he managed to sustain a long career on his own terms. Whilst reading it I was reminded of TV show gag, not sure who told it but definitely someone who could deliver a joke with a deadpan manner, perhaps the Two Ronnies? It was something like this; “Two of the UK’s biggest Rock Stars, Dire Straits and Chris Rea have amalgamated to form a new band called …… Chris Straits” Please yourselves!

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