Al Stewart

Al Stewart playlist

Contributor: Ian Ashleigh

Like many of my contemporaries, my introduction to Alastair Ian (Al) Stewart was with the release of Year Of The Cat in 1976; the title track was played (seemingly) endlessly by Nicky Horne on Capital Radio. Nice song, thought I, but what’s all the fuss about? I wasn’t inspired to explore the album or find out if there was a back catalogue. Roll on two years and a student house on Park Road in Coventry. One of my new housemates had a copy of Year Of The Cat and also Love Chronicles (1969) and Past, Present & Future (1973). I was blown away by both records and thought to reassess Al Stewart. When I heard Time Passages on the local radio station, Mercia Sound, I went out and bought the album – there is not a bad track on it. Funnily enough, my housemate reacted to Time Passages as an album the way I did to Year Of The Cat.

Al Stewart has often drawn on historical subjects for his songs and has always used clever lyrics and occasionally tried to put too many words into too small a space. His tunes always have a quality about them and a production that is always perfect for the song.

Old Admirals is a fabulously evocative song based on the life of Admiral Lord Fisher (1841-1920) who is regarded by some as second only to Lord Nelson in British naval history. I would have liked to include The Last Day Of June 1934 with its ‘bottle green Bentley’ and Post World War Two Blues with its reference to my birth year (1959) but where there are ten or more albums to choose from my ‘Toppermost rule’ is not to bring more than one track from any album. Past, Present & Future also has Nostradamus, Al Stewart’s summary of the prophesies of the medieval seer. That could have been 40% of the tracks from one album.

Life And Life Only from Love Chronicles is a series of character studies wrapped up in a song and brought together on the beach at Bournemouth, and I love the pictures painted by the lyric. For me it’s the best song on the album. I also like In Brooklyn but it tries to be too clever with many short words peppering quavers. The Ballad Of Mary Foster is a bleak story and difficult to follow. The elephant in the room is Love Chronicles itself; an eighteen minute trip though Al Stewart’s personal history with its centrepiece being the confession of naivety and the first mainstream use of the f-word which is, incidentally, used perfectly in context. Did it all really happen that way? How embellished is it? Does it warrant inclusion? Did you know that the electric guitar part is played by Jimmy Page?

There seems to be an unwritten Toppermost rule not to choose the title track of an album or the opening track. Time Passages is both and in a discussion about music on Facebook some time ago I nominated it as an example of a perfect pop song.

In 1992, Al Stewart and Peter White embarked on an acoustic tour, the resultant album was Rhymes In Rooms and is a live ‘best of’. Josephine Baker had originally appeared on 1988’s Last Days Of The Century. Josephine Baker (1906-1975) was an American-born French dancer, singer, and actress who came to be known in various circles as the Black Pearl, Bronze Venus and even the Creole Goddess. She was the first African-American film star.

The follow up to Time Passages was 24 Carrots (1980) and was the first album to be recorded with the band, Shot in the Dark. The album contained the US hit single Midnight Rocks, and two other singles, Mondo Sinistro and my selection, Paint By Numbers. It has a good rock feel and uses art as an allegory for a failed love affair.

In 2005, Stewart released A Beach Full Of Shells that opens with a track called The Immelman Turn, an aerobatic manoeuvre and a theme that Stewart had tried to explore in the song Flying Sorcery on Year Of The Cat. Katherine Of Oregon is a word play on Catherine of Aragon. Somewhere In England, 1915 has all the confusing imagery of a complicated dream and a beautiful tune that I simply adore and which I could not exclude from the list of ten.

Lori, Don’t Go Right Now was a single and opens 1984’s offering Russians And Americans, the title track being an observation on the Superpowers of the time. The Candidate explores what might happen if no-one turned up to an expensively appointed political fundraiser. My choice is a simple love song with a great tune.

OK so I succumbed, there is a track in my Al Stewart top 10 from Year Of The Cat! If It Doesn’t Come Naturally, Leave It is a bittersweet love song with its tongue firmly in its cheek. I nearly chose a live version to ‘hide’ its source but this is simply a bloody good smile of a pop song. I also like On The Border and Broadway Hotel in retrospect but I still don’t get the title track – convince me someone!

Zero She Flies could have contributed four songs; Electric Los Angeles Sunset which I chose on the grounds that it’s a song I return to time after time. I could easily have included Manuscript, Zero She Flies and A Small Fruit Song which I shall quote in full: Said the apple to the orange, “oh I wanted you to come close to me and kiss me to the core then you might know me like no other orange has ever done before.” Marvellous.

My last choice and possibly the most difficult. Between The Wars is set in the period 1918 to 1939 and I could have made a case for the whole album. There is a joyous feel to it and the musical styles fit the period perfectly. Life Between The Wars is a vignette of the period and cites some of the people in the news. Marion The Chatelaine describes a failed actress who runs an alpine hotel. Night Train To Munich was a 1940 film directed by Sir Carol Reed that starred Rex Harrison. The song has more in common with an Agatha Christie thriller than the film itself but the lyric is evocative and the tune perfect for the time in which it is set.

All life is here, and the range of Al Stewart’s work over a 40 year period, and I couldn’t make room for the humour of Hanno The Navigator from Stewart’s most recent release, Sparks Of Ancient Light (2008). I make that a top ten that refers to thirty songs – what a cheat.

Al Stewart – Official Website

Al Stewart biography (Apple Music)

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