Trip to Zara
Rod ended last week with a shopping trip with Penny to clothes store Zara
Talk TV reported that at one point Rod asked âAre you going to be much longer?
“Canât we go back to The Ritz?â
Penny gathered an armful of outfits and went into the changing room and Rod did what any bloke would and found the nearest place to sit and wait.
While talking about the story Kevin O’Sullivan told the story about when his wife was walking down a street in London on her way to a posh do and her heel got stuck in pavement. A taxi came to a screeching halt and a guy got out to help his wife. When she turned around to thank him it was Rod. Kevin said Rod is one of the good guys who does not let fame go to his head.
Meanwhile Penny told HELLO! magazine that there won’t be enough space in their house in Essex, England once most of the children and grandchildren come over for Christmas.
“We’ve got such a huge family Christmas that Rod’s been talking about getting a marquee just for the dining table,”
Rod also said that after Christmas they will be travelling up to Scotland to celebrate Hogmanay.
“We’ve never done a Hogmanay, so this will be our first in Scotland,” . Rod noted “There will be whisky galore.”
And as he approaches his 79th birthday in January Rod insisted that he is feeling as energetic and agile as ever
“I don’t feel my age – I feel great,”
“I work out a lot and look fantastic.”
Mr Wood’s new Faces shirt is a hit with Ronnie
Faces2 the new Faces shirt from Mr Wood’s of London is a big hit with Ronnie. he said he really liked the job they have done with his design
Once the Faces are seen in their shirts it is sure to sell out..get in quick
Christmas with the Stewarts
Rod and Penny kept fans up to date over Christmas with a series of festive posts
Talented Penny also rang the Christmas Eve Bells at Hatfield reform church .
Happy Birthday Mary
And also posted pictures from The Ritz celebrating sister Mary’s 95th birthday
All the SMILER team wish Mary a fantastic birthday week.
This Week’s Rod Art
No Rod art this week..But here is a work of art in it’s self, From the collection of Stephen Voland’s 1970s-1980s Music T-Shirts
A real rare gem from 1971.. Rod Stewart / Faces & Deep Purple Concert T-Shirt from a show in Quebec, Canada. Stephen said “Sadly Purple didnât play that night but the shirt remains!”
Forever Number One!
Congratulations to Daniel Grindstaff Music who’s cover of Rod’s âForever Youngâ ft Paul Brewster & Dolly Parton remains as the #1 song on the Smoked Country Jam & Bluegrass Borderline with Michelle Lee this week.
Rod and Kevin sent their congratulations earlier this year when the song first made #1 in The Bluegrass Chart
âBe courageous and be brave, and in my heart youâll always remain Forever Youngâ
Vinyl is officially back
Great news for artists like Rod this week when it was announced that more than 250,000 vinyl records were sold last week â the most sales in a seven-day period this century!! â and 5.9 million were bought throughout 2023, according to trade body BPI.
And with the new Rod and Jools Holland album being released in all three formats even more good news, Patrizia Leighton, director at HMV, told MailOnline the majority of turntable sales bought at Christmas were either purchased by or for Gen Z-ers â adding that other physical formats were also back in vogue.
She said: ‘Vinyl â as well as CD and to an extent cassette â has been strong all year, as the BPI results found.
‘HMV now makes up around 50 per cent of all physical sales in the UK and Christmas trading was strong for us across vinyl in particular. We also saw continued growth in CD and cassette, albeit the latter from a pretty low base.
‘We can be fairly certain that the upward trend will have continued to the end of the year across the industry.
Sales data appears to confirm the theory Gen Z is driving the vinyl boom. BPI says sales have risen for the 16th consecutive year, up 11.7 per cent on 2022, spurred on by modern pop artists such as Taylor Swift and Olivia Rodrigo.
Three of the UK’s best-selling vinyls are Swift releases with albums from Rodrigo, Lewis Capaldi and Lana Del Rey also making the top 10 list.
Other record store owners believe the appeal of the vinyl lies in supporting artists directly, rather than via streaming revenues â and the sense of ownership fans get by buying something they can call their own, beyond a Spotify playlist.
As with this years first in a series of official Faces releases Independent stores often get exclusive releases, particularly on Record Store Day, the annual celebration of music shops which was established at the start of the vinyl resurgence in 2007.
Getting your hands on exclusive pressings, stores say, taps into the desire to stand out from your friends.
Vinyl is not the only format enjoying a boom â CD sales are steading from a years-long decline, buoyed, the charts would suggest, by older listeners.
Lets hope this all helps the new Swing Fever album and future Faces releases sell by the bucket load.
And Finally..
Don’t forget to join Rod and Jools with an extraordinary all-star lineup on the Annual Hootenanny. If itâs the last thing you do this year, donât miss out on the celebration â Tune in on Sunday 31st at 11:30pm on @bbctwo / @bbciplayer
The SMILER team would like to thank all our members for your support throughout the year , we would not be here without you , And we are working on issue 103 that will be out very soon ..so pop the champagne, lift the Wolfie’s, Happy New Year everybody!…See you next year.
