Tuesday, August 26, 2014

Tuesday Tuneage
Rod Stewart - "My Way Of Giving"
1970

On his early albums, Rod Stewart was a unique, terrific interpreter of others' material. He delivered master versions of songs written or made known by artists such as The Temptations, Jimi Hendrix, Elton John, Eddie Cochran, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Bob Dylan. Perhaps the oddest cover he did was "My Way Of Giving", a song originally done by The Small Faces. Because at the time of Gasoline Alley, from which this tune is lifted, Rod was a member of The Faces - the band The Small Faces evolved into after Steve Marriott left and Stewart and Ron Wood joined. The Small Faces version of the song is two minutes long, a wonder of blue-eyed soul and superb backing vocals. Rod's version is four minutes long and his vocal is conversational and intimate where Marriott's had been restrained and cool. By the end of his version, Rod is attacking the vocal with ebullient whooping and brings the band into the whoosh, only to have it end with simple, touching keyboard notes.

Oh, and that band? Not the typical Mickey Waller, Martin Quittenton, Pete Sears band that showed up on those early Stewart albums, but members of The Faces - Kenney Jones, Ian McLagan, Ronnie Lane instead. (Needless to say, Ronnie Wood was on a track no matter who the rest of the band was.) So we have Rod Stewart covering a Small Faces song and the bass, drums, and keyboards all come from the guys who played on the original. Members of the Faces would show up on other songs on Stewart albums two-through-four also, one wonders how these songs - and especially "My Way Of Giving" - ended up on Stewart solo albums rather than Faces albums. As I have found zero info on this in my research, I like to imagine that Stewart album vs. Faces album involved coin flips or card games.