(Credits: Far Out / Warner Bros. Records)
Wed 31 December 2025 12:00, UK
Despite not achieving any semblance of chart success during the 1960s, the Rod Stewart who emerged as the frontman of The Faces and as a solo artist during the 1970s is one who it feels impossible to separate from the highest level of performance.
His early years were largely characterised by his involvement in various groups, with session appearances and unsuccessful blues ventures alongside Jeff Beck and others, but this wouldn’t always be the case, as he would eventually rise to stardom after a decade of plying his trade in these formative projects.
He emerged with a truly revitalised energy in the ‘70s, and while his next band project, The Faces, also weren’t massive chart toppers, despite the foundations having been laid out by Steve Marriott and the Small Faces before them, Stewart was almost untouchable during this period as a soloist.
He’d eventually turn towards this as his primary outlet, disbanding the group in 1975, and he reached a point in tandem with the band’s final years where he was releasing hit after hit. This fruitful period was one where he ended up topping the charts six times in the UK during this decade alone.
Not only did success come in the form of hit singles, but he also scored five consecutive number one albums during this period, which should also go some way towards explaining his evergreen stay in the spotlight.
However, not everyone can retain this high level of output, and towards the end of the decade, things began to peter out significantly, with him spending large portions of the ‘80s and ‘90s in the creative wilderness. It’s not the easiest thing for anyone of any stature to be able to navigate, but for Stewart, tumbling down after such a successful period was a bitter blow for him to take.
He saw this as being his dark era, and one that he’d prefer not to look back upon. But, like many great artists, he wasn’t willing to give in easily and wanted to return to the spotlight, which is exactly what happened in 2013 when he released Time, his first UK number one album in 37 years following A Night On The Town.
Speaking to The Quietus during an interview in 2015, he claimed that this was the album that gave him a newfound confidence in his work again and that he was able to feel himself creatively again. “Time got this tremendous response from fans, and that gave me encouragement,” he argued. “I was a little hesitant – it’d been a while, what would I write about? But I thought: be as honest as you can, and that’ll see you through. There’s a song about growing up in London after the war, and one about putting my kids to bed, and one about football, and even a reggae song.”
While he wasn’t necessarily sure as to how to return in such an impactful way, it would appear that time was generous to Stewart, and the release of this album, followed by 2015’s Another Country, gave him a new lease of life and brought some much-needed vigour back into his career.
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