It isn’t every day that you spot a multi-millionaire travelling on the London Underground. That isn’t usually the style for men who are famous all around the world, who have swanky houses, dozens of gold records, and a long list of the phone numbers of beautiful blondes in their old address books. But that’s what singer Rod Stewart did, along with his wife, Penny Lancaster, this week, as, along with 20,000 fans, he made his way to the 02 Arena at Greenwich – where he would be appearing later in his own sold-out concert. That’s pretty cool, isn’t it – a famous star, leaving one of his expensive cars and driver at home, and, instead, hiding behind a pair of sunglasses and an expensive looking duffle coat and squeezing on to the Underground to go to his own gig. That must have taken him back to his busking day, because, let’s face it, there isn’t much in life quite as egalitarian as a ride on the London Tube when every roaring inch of space can be squashed and precious. Then again, there isn’t much in London life quite as difficult as getting to the 02 Arena by car, no matter how flashy and expensive your motor. Traffic jams have no respect for stardom. Who knows why Rod went to his job by Tube? Most probably he just fancied a day out riding the rails before getting down to work, but somehow I can’t see Beyonce doing that. Nor his old friend Elton John? But isn’t that the reassuring point about him? Instead of out-growing his working class roots, when as a little boy he would stand at his bedroom window and watch the trains shunting backwards and forwards in the marshalling yard below his North London home, he’s spent his life and career wearing them like a badge of honour. And at 72, having spent decades being feted in the glare of international spotlights, he still clearly enjoys being ordinary. And he’s always had a soft spot for trains since his father, a plumber, bought him his first train set when he was seven. His background was hardly promising. Never academic, after failing the 11-Plus, he left his secondary modern school in London with no qualifications, the only hopeful avenue for him being a football trial at Brentford Football Club. When that led nowhere, he ended up measuring the ground for graves at Highgate Cemetery. He did, however, have a few untapped talents. He had a very distinctive, croaky voice, a winnings cheerful Cockney charm and perfect timing for a would-be rock star. For his fifteenth birthday his father have him a Spanish guitar (‘I’d been hoping for a wooden Tri-ang model railway station’, he would later joke), and, though unable to play it, he joined a skiffle group. A trudge through various pop and rhythm and blues groups in the early to mid-Sixties followed as he learned his musical trade, while working for his father’s new business, delivering newspapers, while still living at home. He’d thought his nose was too long for him to be a pop star, and that his voice was too raspy, but people liked the way he looked and sounded. His confidence grew, which led to the event which would years later be rock-immortalised in his first solo hit Maggie May — when he lost his virginity to a much older woman in a tent at the Beaulieu Jazz Festival. His musical version of the event has to be among the most unromantic morning-after lyrics ever written, when he sang ‘the morning sun, when it’s on your face, really shows your age’. He wouldn’t have actually said that, of course. He always knew what to say to women. But he was on his way. It took time, as he moved around the London club circuit, but eventually he was the Rod the Dandy we all know, in his tight trousers and with his hair gelled up and spikey like a cockatoo, as he sang with the Jeff Beck Group and then the Faces. At which point he went solo, and became almost as famous for his relationships with beautiful blonde ladies as for his music. There was Britt Ekland, Alanna Hamilton, Joanna Lumley, and cricket scores more. He was a babe magnet, and loved every minute of it. But that only happened because he had a gift for choosing the right songs. From Reason to Believe to Sailing and I Don’t Want To Talk About It his taste was spot in. And when he helped in the writing of the songs he sang he was no less astute. Think only of You’re In My Heart when he gives his girl the greatest compliment he can think of by saying to her ‘You’re Celtic United’. Why Celtic, you might think, for a boy who was born just up the road from Arsenal Football Club. It’s all to do with his dad again, who was Scottish. Because of him, Rod’s has supported Celtic all his life, even wearing tartan from time to time. The wild life of the rock star (and for him there is no better life imaginable), living mainly in Hollywood and surrounded by all the hedonistic temptations that fame and stardom beckon, might in someone less grounded have been disastrous. But, despite flirtations with drugs years ago, the groupies and his failings as a husband, particularly towards his second wife, New Zealand model Rachel Hunter, he appears to be the same chirpy Rod he’s always been. Obviously he’s had to reinvent himself as he’s grown older, but Hollywood hasn’t changed him, despite his successes with his Great American Songbook albums. His accent is still chirpy Cockney with that catchphrase which snared so many pretty girls. ‘Hello, darlin’, what’s that you’ve got in your basket’. And football is still his second love after singing. For years he played with an Over-Fifty Los Angeles team, made up largely of British ex-pat actors, while the house he owned for years in Essex had its own full sized football pitch. Somehow he has remained on good terms with his two ex-wives and most of his ex-lovers, and though there have been problems with some of his five older children, two in their forties (what Hollywood star doesn’t have problems with his kids?), he’s remained close to them and his brothers and sister. Sadly his father, who did so much to shape and encourage his son in his early career, died in %%%% before seeing the rewards his efforts would bring. When we think of Rod Stewart, it’s difficult not to smile. For decades he’s been Jack the Lad, the incorrigible flirt who got luckier than any young man could possibly have imagined, the down to earth lover of British pubs and the football fan at the World Cup,. And now he’s the pensioner dad in his seventies with the two little boys, Alistair and Aiden, he’s had with his wife, Penny. Will they be allowed to play with his fifty foot train set at home in California when they get a bit older? They’ll never know what it was like to watch the steam trains from their bedroom windows and have the dreams that a poor, ordinary, not particularly clever boy had. They’ll have a lot of other things, no doubt but they’ll be missing something, too. There’s a lot to be said for those who come from modest backgrounds, make a success of themselves and retain the common touch In 2007 when Stewart was given a CBE in the New Year Honours list for services to music, he said. ‘It’s a marvellous occasion. We’re the only country in the world to honour the common man.’ That isn’t actually true. But it was good to hear someone happy to describe himself as a common man. Some might even say that for his very ordinariness, for his cheekiness and sense of fun, Rod Stewart is almost a national treasure.
