Rock legend Rod Stewart found an unwarranted second career in the new millennium as a crooner of the Great American Songbook. It\u2019s not that the singer couldn\u2019t sing Cole Porter or George and Ira Gershwin. It\u2019s just that he didn\u2019t add anything to songs that have been recorded hundreds of times. But his sojourn to pre-rock pop music was a massive success for the singer, and he found a new audience who bought his standards albums in the millions.<\/p>\n
His post-2010 circle-back to pop and rock met with diminishing returns, so his revisitation of mid-century pop isn\u2019t all that surprising. Hooking up with Jools Holland, the famous bandleader and television personality, is a smart move. Holland has been a champion of swing music, joining a variety of unexpected collaborators to record some out-of-leftfield records.<\/p>\n
But\u00a0Swing Fever<\/em>\u00a0doesn\u2019t feel surprising or fresh. Instead, it feels like a safe way for Stewart to capture some of that commercial sheen he enjoyed in the early 2000s. That doesn\u2019t mean that\u00a0Swing Fever<\/em>\u00a0isn\u2019t enjoyable in brief bursts; Stewart\u2019s weathered, raspy instrument does reasonably well with the tunes. It may remind some of Jimmy Durante, Louis Armstrong, or Joe Prima. No, Stewart isn\u2019t the peer of those greats, but maybe working with Holland has given him a jolt of energy that was perhaps lacking in his earlier standards albums.\u00a0<\/p>\n None of the interpretations on this record is definitive, but Stewart acquits himself fine on most of the songs, and in several, he charms. \u201cPennies From Heaven\u201d is an especially successful performance on\u00a0Swing Fever<\/em>. Stewart\u2019s affection and joy for the song is palpable. His rendition of the Fats Waller classic \u201cAin\u2019t Misbehavin\u2019\u201d is fun, if unambitious. And the album\u2019s version of \u201cThem There Eyes\u201d is also quite good. Though Stewart does solid, personable work on these tunes, it has to be said that the biggest reason that the songs work is Holland\u2019s exciting work.\u00a0<\/p>\n While\u00a0Swing Fever<\/em>\u00a0improves some of the later Songbook albums, it\u2019s still not a particularly memorable work. Stewart\u2019s a legend for a reason. That sandpapery voice is so distinctive and unique\u2014but another album of pop standards seems pointless. Stewart coasts through these numbers at this point and comes off as a bit of a lounge lizard. (Fellow rock god David Johansen did this in the \u201880s with his Buster Poindexter persona, but that was a funny goof.) Frankly, for an artist of Rod Stewart\u2019s particular talents and genius,\u00a0Swing Fever<\/em>\u00a0comes off as filler.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":93,"featured_media":34967,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[10939],"rating":[5614],"class_list":["post-46839","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-rod-stewart-with-jools-holland","rating-rating-c-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/46839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/93"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/46839\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34967"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46839"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=46839"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=46839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}