Exclusive Official Faces News

This week we reported this exclusive official Faces news in this week’s SMILER news and gossip..

As revealed in our last Faces remaster series news, the next release will be a Record Store Day exclusive, gathering all the surviving sessions the Faces recorded for the BBC from 1970 – 1971.

On Record Store Day, Saturday, 20 April 2024, Warner/Rhino will release a strictly limited edition of 4,000 double LPs worldwide of Faces – ‘The BBC Session Recordings’ (Rhino RCV1 725821/603497829088)

The 2-LP will be pressed on “crystal clear” vinyl and housed in a single, wide spine sleeve with an illustrated 4-panel insert with full session details and sleeve notes by Faces remaster series producer Rob Caiger.

The cover, insert and labels photos are taken by legendary BBC photographer Harry Goodwin. According to Rod: “The picture of the band depicts and portrays what we all stood for …. ‘Five drunks who got away with murder under the guise of music’”

Rob has given SMILER an exclusive heads up that the information provided by Rhino Records to Record Store Day and reproduced worldwide is incorrect, as he says:

“A big apology to Faces fans for the confusion. I’m buried in Faces tapes at the moment in my studio so I’ve no idea how it happened but the information and track listing on the websites and retail stores is totally wrong. This is a collection of all the surviving studio sessions the chaps recorded for BBC programmes like John Peel’s Top Gear. There is NO LIVE CONCERT RECORDINGS on this release. But what we have on this double album is something very special. 

For me, the sessions the Faces recorded for the BBC were vital in starting their career in the UK. Most probably won’t remember the BBC did not take the Faces seriously and refused to add their debut single ‘Flying’ to the playlist for Radio 1.To get around the lack of airplay, John Peel and his producer John Walters championed the Faces to the BBC so the band could record a session for his massively popular Top Gear programme. Within weeks, the duo had the Faces in the BBC studio at the Playhouse Theatre in Craven Street, London, to record their first session on March 9, 1970 – almost a month before their debut LP for Warner Bros was released.

The Faces six BBC sessions ran from 1970 to 1971. Once broadcast, individual songs or whole sessions were wiped – unless songs were taken and later compiled by DJ Brian Matthew for use in his Top Of The Pops radio show, pressed on BBC Transcription Services LPs and sent to overseas broadcasters who had licensed his programme. It is why certain Faces session recordings exist, as many of the broadcast-quality LPs survive. But for sessions not used by Transcription Services, these were lost forever. Unless kindly engineers spirited away tapes or copies were made for band members. I’ll say no more…
For the first time, all the Faces surviving sessions recorded for the BBC have been newly remastered for vinyl and compiled on one album. Tracks have been restored from the best available sources, taken from the Faces, BBC, BBC Transcription Services, Warner Bros. & private collectors’ archives. ‘Devotion’ is the rarest Faces BBC recording on the album. Wiped soon after broadcast, it existed purely as an off-air recording, not circulated amongst fans or bootleggers and was only discovered during 2023. Only one Faces session of three songs remains missing, for Sounds Of The Seventies recorded in 1970.”

SIDE ONE

TOP GEAR — JOHN PEEL 

Broadcast: March 28, 1970 

Wicked Messenger 

Devotion
Shake, Shudder, Shiver 

Pineapple And The Monkey

DAVE LEE TRAVIS SUNDAY SHOW
Broadcast March 15, 1970 

Three Button Hand Me Down

SIDE TWO

DAVE LEE TRAVIS SUNDAY SHOW (continued from side 1) 

Flying
Wicked Messenger

TOP GEAR — JOHN PEEL 

Broadcast September 19, 1970 

Had Me A Real Good Time 

Around The Plynth/Gasoline Alley

SIDE THREE

TOP GEAR — JOHN PEEL (continued from side 2) 

Country Comfort

SOUNDS OF THE SEVENTIES — BOB HARRIS *
BBC Studio 1 (Transcription Studio)

Broadcast May 3, 1971

Had Me A Real Good Time

Love In Vain
Oh Lord I’m Browned Off

SIDE FOUR

SOUNDS OF THE SEVENTIES — BOB HARRIS (continued from side 3) 

Maybe I’m Amazed

TOP GEAR — JOHN PEEL

Broadcast October 6, 1971 

Stay With Me 

Miss Judy’s Farm 

Maggie May

*SOUNDS OF THE SEVENTIES — BOB HARRIS Broadcast May 3, 1971 is the mono broadcast version. The test transmission version in stereo is exclusively available on ‘Faces – Had Me A Real Good Time at the BBC In Session & In Concert 1971–1973’ (Rhino RCV1 725872 / 603497828906) released on Record Store Day Black Friday in November 2023.