INEVER thought I’d see the day when I could
witness Rod Stewart in concert virtually on my
doorstep. When my all-time favourite superstar
singer appears at Plymouth’s Home Park football
stadium on July 2, a 10-minute bus ride will deliver
me to the venue to hear a dream set of greatest hits
among fellow devotees.
It’s a major coup for the club to secure Rod’s only
UK date of the summer, and a personal delight for
me. Rod and I go back a long way, and I can honestly
say that he changed my life.
The first time I saw him live on stage was the first
time I’d ever been to a “proper” gig; there had been
the odd fledgling band making a racket in the local
youth club, but this was going to be something else.
1972 and the gravel-voiced, spiky-haired satin-clad
Maggie May crooner was going to be on stage at The
Rainbow in Finsbury Park with the super-cool
raggle-taggle bunch who completed The Faces –
Ronnie Lane, Ronnie Wood, Kenney Jones and Ian
McLagan.
I’d seen their ramshackle, danger-filled,
breathtaking performance on Top of the Pops,
blasting out Stay With Me. When I saw the
announcement for the gig in the Melody Maker I
knew I just had to be there.
I lived in London, but the Rainbow was in the alien
north, uncharted territory for a naive, barely teenage
softy southern schoolgirl. With websites and
Internet purchases not even a dream on the horizon,
the tickets went on sale at the venue’s box office on
January 15 – my mother’s birthday. I cruelly
neglected her and spent from dawn till dusk with my
friend Susan in a queue that snaked around the
theatre’s perimeter, to secure a pair of coveted passes
to musical mayhem and magic.
On the day of the show, a few weeks later, we were
delivered in style by my uncle in his dusky pink
Hillman Husky, dispatched by my parents so that we
wouldn’t be travelling alone after dark.
After a great warm-up set by Scottish band
Nazareth, suddenly they were there on stage and I
found myself open-mouthed with awe, standing just
three rows back, midway between Rod and Woody,
as the crazy party got started.
The infectious honky-tonk bluesy rock and roll
sound, Rod’s deliciously husky tones, his cheeky
grin, the way he swung his mic stand around, his
tight trousers, silky scarf and leopard-print jacket,
the bottles of hooch the band swooped from the
stage-side bar, Woody’s ever-present fag in the
corner of his mouth; it all struck a massive chord that
confirmed my destiny as a rock-and-roll-loving
gig-goer. Mesmerised, it took me a few seconds to
realise that Susan wasn’t right next to me, similarly
enchanted; she was slipping to the floor in an
overwhelmed faint. That could have been the end of
my night, but the St John Ambulance man was
charm personified and personally guaranteed her
welfare while I charged back into position in time for
the glorious finale and the start of a lifelong
passion.
Oddly, although I’ve seen hundreds of other artists
live in the intervening decades, I didn’t make it to see
Rod again until a couple of years ago when I took a
friend to see him at Sheffield (the only weekend show
a working girl could get to) as a surprise gift for her
50th birthday. I have to say it was a night just as
fabulous as that first evening in Rod’s company.
We’ve both matured in our musical tastes, he’s still
brim-full of fun and enthusiasm and perpetuates the
cream of a bottomless back catalogue delivered in a
voice that’s matured like a vintage champagne.
It was like being an honoured guest at his personal
party, with a singalong spirit that spilled into a
spontaneous version of I Don’t Want ToTalk About
It on the tram-ride back to our hotel.
Rod even spoke to me. When he told the
13,000-strong crowd he was going to sing a song that
was the B-side of the Maggie May single and asked if
anyone knew its title, I shouted out the answer,
thinking I’d be one of many. Mine was a lone voice
yelling: “Reason To Believe”.
“Thanks, darlin’,” called Rod, waving.
I have great expectations for his Plymouth show.
● Rod Stewart plays Home Park, Plymouth, on
Thursday, July 2. Tickets, priced £65 and £55 are
available from Home Park box office (0845 338 7232,
www.pafc.co.uk), Ticketmaster and See Tickets.
Reproduced with kind permission from Jackie Butler and The Western Morning News