A new month, new luck: Rod Stewart is spending the tour break until the next show on 23 April in Kaunas with a short family holiday in the south of France. The Stewart clan posted a few snapshots on their social media channels. We are once again using the concert break to take a look at the musical work of the music legend.
Did you know that some of Rod Stewart's most successful songs were released in April? These include the hits THE FIRST CUT IS THE DEEPEST and LOST IN YOU. But an album was also released in April. But first things first.
Let's start in 1976: Rod Stewart had already made a name for himself as a solo artist, he had made his big breakthrough five years earlier with MAGGIE MAY and SAILING, his anthem from 1975, also made it to number one in the charts.
Reason enough to release the first BEST OF album in April 1976.
THE BEST OF ROD STEWART is an album compilation released by Mercury Records to fulfil Stewart's contract before he moved to Warner Bros. and relocated to the United States. It contains tracks from all of his Mercury albums and some non-album singles from the same time period. It was released as a double album and was re-released on CD in 1998. THE BEST OF ROD STEWART did not attract much public attention. The disc only made it into the charts in Australia and the United Kingdom. However, at number nine (Australia) and number 21 respectively, the placement was not particularly noteworthy.
The single THE FIRST CUT IS THE DEEPEST, which was released a year later, did better. The song, which is still one of Sir Rod's great classics today and a permanent fixture in concert setlists, reached number one in the UK and stayed there for 13 weeks. In the USA, THE FIRST CUT remained in the charts for twelve weeks, peaking at number 21.
Once he had acquired a taste for it, Sir Rod added the song I WS ONLY JOKING a year later, in April 1978. The song was written by Stewart and Gary Grainger and was the third single from the album FOOT LOOSE AND FANCY FREE. In England and Ireland, the single made it into the top five of the charts, in the USA it reached number 22.
And Stewart kept to the rhythm, releasing the title track of his album of the same name BLONDES HAVE MORE FUN as a single in April 1979.The Blondes were not particularly successful, in the UK the song only reached the top 70 and landed at number 63, in Ireland it reached number 23.
After that, it was nine years before Sir Rod released another single in April. LOST IN YOU (from the album OUT OF ORDER) was the album's lead single and was written by Stewart and Andy Taylor. The song climbed to number three in the US charts, reached number 21 in the UK and number 25 in Germany.
Rod Stewart also released the song CRAZY ABOUT HER from the OUT OF ORDER album in April 1989 as the fourth and final single from this longplayer. CRAZY ABOUT HER reached number one in the USA, number seven in the Netherlands, number 11 in England and number 17 in Belgium. The single was not particularly successful in Germany (number 60).
In 1992, Sir Rod presented his fans with a cover version of Elton John's YOUR SONG. This version had already been released in 1991 on the John album TWO ROOMS and was also released as a single in April 1992. The single CD also included the Stewart songs BROKEN ARROW, MANDOLIN WIND and THE FIRST CUT IS THE DEEPEST.
In April 1993, the unplugged version of HAVE I TOLD YOU LATELY was released as a single. Stewart's performance of the Van Morrison song at the MTV concert with Ronnie Wood was particularly memorable because Rod became very emotional during the song and shed a tear or two at the end. This is probably one of the reasons why the single reached a strong fifth place in the charts in the USA and England.
In 1999, we note the last April release of a Stewart song to date. FAITH OF THE HEART was released a few months before the start of the new millennium. The song was part of the soundtrack to the film PATCH ADAMS and reached number four in the Canadian charts, while FAITH OF THE HEART reached number three in the USA and only number 60 in the UK.
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