Records Revisited

Faces’ A Nod Is as Good as a Wink ...

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By Jason Andreasen

Rod Stewart didn’t always sing like he was playing in a suburban retirement home. In fact, when he fronted the British band Faces in the early ‘70s, he probably scared the bejesus out of a grandma or two. Faces, which also boasted the guitar of Ron Wood (who would later join The Rolling Stones), epitomized the idea of a rock band having a good time with roots music.

On their second album, titled A Nod Is as Good as a Wink ... To a Blind Horse, the band was at the top of their game. While “Stay With Me” was the only track off the record to really make it as a hit on rock radio, to dismiss the rest of the tracks would be to limit your view of the band and underestimate the influence that Faces had on rock as a whole.

The album opens with “Miss Judy’s Farm,” which is one of the grittiest songs on the entire album. The song saunters along with such vibrancy that, if you close your eyes, you can see Stewart prancing on stage swinging the mic stand around like a rag doll. The song is defiant and shows off both Stewart’s rasp and the lyricism of the Wood-Stewart songwriting combo.

Growing up in the ‘70s, parents hated rock and roll in part because of bands like Faces. Sex was a given for them. For example, the song “You’re So Rude” is the story of a boy who brings his girlfriend home to see his folks. When greeted with an empty house, he assures her, “I’m sure we’ll pass the time ‘til they come home.” Sung by bassist/guitarist Ronnie Lane, the track has a relatability to it, making the audience recall their own similar exploits. “You’re So Rude” is a timeless tale of young love, just not the way The Osmonds experienced it.

That isn’t to say that the band didn’t have a softer side. Songs like “Love Lives Here” (a reminiscent ballad about days gone by) show that the band could slow things down with introspective lyrics without sacrificing their musicianship. The song that best displays this however is “Debris.” Here, acoustic guitars replace plugged-in Les Pauls providing a song that is whimsical and enticing while unmistakably gut-wrenching.

Faces is a band that strutted their stuff with a guitar pick in one hand and a bottle in the other. They are dirty and defiant, with a sound that is as sensory as it is danceable. Listen to “That’s All You Need,” and you’ll smell the cigarette wedged in between Ron Wood’s guitar strings. Listen to the Chuck Berry cover “Memphis, Tennessee” and you’ll see a father’s heart break. Listen to “Stay With Me” and you’ll taste the film on your teeth leftover from a drunken night spent with a bar room baroness.

The nine tracks that comprise A Nod Is as Good as a Wink ... are some of the most exquisitely simple, fun and raunchy rock songs ever. It’s the sort of album that Saturday nights and bottles of cheap whiskey were made for. There isn’t a track here that doesn’t add to the texture of what we consider rock and roll to be.

Faces was constantly sold short as “the poor-man’s Stones,” though they didn’t sniff such longevity. Perhaps that’s for the best. However, Faces never got their due. Rod Stewart went on to a solo career that took him to the heights of stardom, and the legend that Faces should have enjoyed was never realized.

However, their legend lives in bands that stole from them. The Black Crowes were once famously called the, “Most Rock ‘n Roll band in Rock ‘n Roll,” however they owe so much of their style to Faces. Bands from Van Halen to Aerosmith and countless others owe plenty to one of the most egregiously underappreciated bands in rock history.

If you’re a fan of rock music that is as dirty as it is perfect, you must hear A Nod Is as Good as a Wink ... To a Blind Horse. You might feel hung over, but you won’t be disappointed.

E-mail the author at JasonAndreasen@tigerweekly.com

Originally Published: Issue 595 - January 30, 2008

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