What does it sound like?:
When Steve Marriott left Small Faces in 1969 to form Humble Pie, the remainder of the band, Ian McLagan keys, Ronnie Lane bass and Kenney Jones drums, recruited Rod Stewart vocals and Ronnie Wood guitar from The Jeff Beck Group, and shortened their name to Faces. They had an unusual contractual arrangement to tiptoe around. Faces were signed to Warner Brothers and Stewart, as a solo artist, to Mercury. Lines were blurred by Faces musicians regularly appearing on Rod Stewart records. It certainly kept them all busy. Faces released four albums during the period covered by this box, First Step, Long Player, A Nod’s As Good As A Wink… To A Blind Horse and Ooh La La and Stewart four, An Old Raincoat Won’t Ever Let You Down, Gasoline Alley, Every Picture Tells A Story and Never A Dull Moment, plus, most of Smiler was recorded. They had a lot of material to tap into when they played live. Fortunately, they toured constantly.
A Faces gig was a boozy night out with your mates, rumbustious, teetering on the edge of chaos. Unlike many Rock bands of the time, they were unafraid to embrace fun. This huge box brings together all of their live recordings at the BBC, often performed to an adoring audience, cheered on by an enthusiastic John Peel, a man otherwise known to be dour and taciturn. In the booklet, Wood, Stewart and Jones are effusive over Peel’s unwavering support at a point in their career when many others didn’t take them seriously. Lavishly illustrated with many previously unseen photos, the 48 page booklet, written by BBC broadcaster Gary Crowley, details every Faces BBC session, concert, and broadcast and includes a new interview with Jeff Griffin, who produced all of the band’s BBC concert appearances. Much of this box was initiated by Peel. CDs 1 & 2 are John Peel’s Sunday Concerts, broadcast July 5th, November 29th 1970 and May 23rd 1971. CD 3 and the Blu-Ray are the Sounds For Saturday performance of April 1st 1972. CD 4 is another Sunday Concert of February 26th 1972. CDs 5 & 6 are In Concerts of February 8th 1973 and April 23rd 1973. The former was never broadcast because it was considered too rowdy. In truth, the crowd are voicing their appreciation in a boisterous manner in keeping with Slade Alive!, if not quite the uninhibited worship on Bob Marley & The Wailers at The Lyceum and the hushed awe of Buena Vista Social Club at Carnegie Hall. The final two discs are sessions recorded without an audience, Top Gear March 28th 1970, Sounds Of The Seventies May 3rd 1971 and Sounds For Saturday April 1st 1973. John Peel’s Christmas Carol Concert of Boxing Day 1970, featuring Stewart singing Away In A Manger, is tacked onto the end of CD 7. Of a total of 85 tracks, 67 have never been previously released.
Listening to these recordings, with many songs repeated (six of You’re My Girl, for example), it often seems that the band were learning the songs as they went along, but they were actually accomplished musicians. In the middle of all the bedlam, before, during and after the gigs, they were a collective that had the skill to circle a black hole without falling in. Kenney Jones might not have been a metronomic drummer but he knew how to use his kit to generate energy. At one point, he plays a cymbal solo whilst maintaining momentum, as if he was taking a breather as he continued to run. Ronnie Lane was never a mere root note plodder. He was proficient at blending in fifths, sixths, minor sevenths and octave-to-ninth hammer-ons to create a pleasing flow. He brought life and a vibrancy to the party. Ronnie Wood excels on these discs, flourishing in the live setting, making an outstanding racket, especially on the many extended songs or medleys that were a feature of their sets. He gives slide a good go, too. Rod Stewart could sing the blues in a deep hue and rock with the hedonism of a star, yet still exude ordinary-bloke charm. This was before transatlantic fame, leggy blondes and spandex turned his head. However, keyboardist, Ian McLagan was their secret ingredient. He combined the quick thinking of a jazz pianist with an ear for a melody and a sixth sense of where he was on the musical page. Rock pianists of the seventies were often underappreciated. If McLagan had been in a Prog band, and on the Top Gear recording he and the band make a very good stab at Prog, he would have enjoyed centre stage. Together, they were five guys whose playing spoke to each other.
Their own material errs on the side of tight, poppy constructs with memorable choruses, such as Stay With Me, Cindy Incidentally and Three Button Hand Me Down. The selection of Soul and Blues covers follows suit from Ike and Tina Turner, to Big Bill Bronzy and The Temptations. They invite direct comparisons with The Rolling Stones by covering It’s All Over Now, Train In Vain, Street Fighting Man and Country Honk. Alas, they do not have an ounce of malice, the guitar is deficient in subtlety and fluidity, and the drumming is fixed on top of the beat, unable to swing. However, during these years, The Stones became increasingly distanced from their audience, whereas Faces were right in the thick of the crowd. It’s their physicality, simultaneously arrogant and humble, that shines through on this set, more than off-setting any short-comings in nuance, sophistication and finesse. The little rascals obviously prefer the rough and tumble of the live bear pit to the spit and polish of the studio.
As time went by, and Stewart’s star rose, some Faces felt relegated to being his backing band. Studio versions of My Way Of Giving, You’re My Girl, (I Know) I’m Losing You, True Blue and Angel are all choice cuts effectively recorded by Faces but appearing under the Rod Stewart name. To begin with, they’d managed to find a way to blend the songwriting and vocal talent but Lane, in particular, became more isolated. Many of his best songs are noticeably largely absent here. He stepped up to take a lead role in recording Ooh La La because Stewart was focussed on other things, only to find the album disparaged publicly by their lead singer. Lane voiced his objection to promoting Stewart product and quit. The band carried on for another tour and the live album Coast To Coast: Overtures And Beginners that didn’t do them justice. Stewart became a superstar, Wood sacrificed his songwriting for The Stones, Jones replaced his great friend Keith Moon in The Who and McLagan formed the Bump Band and was a much sought after session musician. Lane’s own band, Slim Chance, had initial success but his career was curtailed by Multiple Sclerosis, a condition that ran in his family. His old band of brothers rallied round towards the end, when he lived in America. Stewart, Wood and Jimmy Page paid his medical bills. Jones’s eventually successful pursuit of old Small Faces royalties came too late.
At The BBC is comprehensive and lengthy, but it is warm and unpretentious. It has a joyful consistency Faces studio albums lacks and is far more representative of their mischievous spirit. It is enhanced by the inclusion of Stewart songs, such as Maggie May, True Blue and Angel They, their audience and John Peel sound like a gang of lads having the time of their lives for the whole of these four years. The result is an exuberant, exhilarating, life-affirming box with so many treasures to savour that, to coin a phrase, there is never a dull moment.
What does it all *mean*?
It’s not cheap but what price happiness? It should delight those that felt last year’s RSD Had Me A Real Good Time… was woefully inadequate, being just one disc long.
Goes well with…
If you want a definitive collection capturing Faces in their pomp, file At The BBC next to Five Guys Walked Into A Bar, the best box set ever, according to Stephen Thomas Erlewine at Allmusic
https://www.allmusic.com/album/five-guys-walk-into-a-bar-mw0000204778
Release Date:
Out now
Might suit people who like…
Having a real good time
Tiggerlion says
Faces – Three Button Hand Me Down (Live on Sounds For Saturday, BBC, 4/1/72)
deramdaze says
Help me to understand this.
A reasonably priced compilation (see: The Beatles, two in their case) of the Faces’ BBC recordings does not exist on CD, but a 2-LP version does, because it’s like RSD, and it’s on like sacred vinly.
Meanwhile, for the £100+ option, for some reason sacred vinly can not fulfil the job, and so CDs are employed to lift the heavy load.
I’ve got that right, yeah?
Tiggerlion says
Market forces, innit.
For a comprehensive collection, popular with longstanding fans and enthusiastic youngsters, CD box sets are the only way to include everything. Slimmed down highlights for vinyl. I suspect the companies don’t think slimmed down CD sets will sell enough.
Those Beatles BBC sets came out when CDs sold more.
RSD is entirely vinyl focussed.
Junior Wells says
Dylan sets seem to be the exception.
Great review Tig….
I am now going over to the shelf and taking out 5 Guys Walked Into A Bar*
Steve Walsh says
Hmm… I wonder if this release will push up the second-hand prices for 5 Guys Walked Into A Bar. Is that a good set, Junior?
deramdaze says
So vinlys aren’t fit for purpose. Is that an unreasonable assumption?
The record industry c. 2024 (bung in the ticket side of it too) seems to take its template from that Father Ted episode where he taps away at a dent in the car until the car is complete shite!
dai says
If it was a vinyl box set then assuming the CDs are full you are looking at 16LPs probably, that’s too much for most acts. Some releases give you a choice CDs or vinyl for box sets. In general I prefer vinyl but for such box sets with outtakes, live performances etc I think CDs (or downloads) are a better format. You probably don’t want to hear everything on them every time so skipping tracks is easier and you can get more into live shows if you don’t have to change a side every 20 minute. Points off for The Beatles last couple of box sets with the CDs being half full matching the vinyl versions, also not including a Blu-ray any more. So I stopped buying them.
Podicle says
In our house, that is known as “Father Tedding” something.
Junior Wells says
I think v good. McLagan curated it. You don’t get overwhelmed with multiple versions of the same song as per this release Tigger has reviewed. Lovely version of I’d Rather Go Blind.
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-album-reviews/five-guys-walk-into-a-bar-181227/
Steve Walsh says
Thank you. I’ve ordered it on eBay.
Steve Walsh says
Thanks again. I’ve got it now and am knocked out by just how good it is. They really were a cracking band weren’t they?
Tiggerlion says
Excellent.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
I spent half an hour in a bar just off The Aldwych with The Faces and John Peel. All were merry but Peel was falling-down, near-comatose drunk. The Faces autographed a beer mat which I lost on the way home.
Saw them play many a time back then and, to be honest, a good proportion of those gigs were shambolic musically yet an unrestrained delight .
Like Bolan, Stewart dumped Peel when famed waved its poisoned hand.
Five Guys Walk Into A Bar is indeed majestically wonderful.
Ah, remember the days when Rod included a Dylan track on every lp…..?
Junior Wells says
Peel probably made the mistake of going drink or drink with them. Was listening to Wicked Messenger just now.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
Snap!
Drinking heavily was not particularly hip back then but I always thought The Faces were mostly drunk on stage rather than stoned…
Junior Wells says
Partying too much to have been stoned.
Black Type says
To be fair, Peel was equally the dropper in the case of Bolan, sniffily adjudging him to have ‘sold out’. He could be rather silly sometimes.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
Sneak preview – this is next in Bingo’s Best Ever. His review starts “I’m still amazed …”
NigelT says
Rod Stewart, along with the Faces, were very much responsible in 1971 for me realising that what we now know as prog rock wasn’t really for me and I should just listen to music for enjoyment rather than what I felt I should like. It was a damascene conversion.
Lodestone of Wrongness says
You joined a very long queue
Jaygee says
Damascene Conversion
Three more ambitious triple-concept albums from them later…
Rigid Digit says
Faces are one of the bands (alongside The Jam) on the “please reform and play live again” list. Bit difficult being 2 members down I know.
Sounds For Saturday is the closest I got to seeing them live (me too young), but is I’m told a better representation than Overture For Beginners, their one proper live album.
Tiggerlion says
2 members down has never stopped the Stones. It would, however, be a Stewart/Wood combo with Kenney Jones added in. Lane and McLagan are big misses emotionally and musically.
Colin H says
The notion that Ron Wood had to set aside his songwriting – surely one of rock’s great tragedies.
Tiggerlion says
Hello, Colin! I’m surprised to see you here. 😘
Colin H says
It’s a bit like a car crash – one cannot help but rubber-neck…
Jaygee says
@Tiggerlion
RS’s unplugged album with Ronnie Wood from the mid-90s was pretty good.
While RL’s non- involvement was understandable, IM would have made the album even better
Calling, @Colin-H! Art world on line 5 and offering to pass Ronnie Wood back to songwriting
Sadly songwriting’s
Tiggerlion says
It is a decent Unplugged album but very definitely a Rod Stewart one. There are three other guitarists to cover for Wood, though he does sing a bit, too.