The Faces ‘A Nod’s As Good As A Wink’ Turns 50

The Faces classic ‘A Nod’s As Good As A Wink … To A Blind Horse’ has just turned 50 years old.

‘A Nod’s As Good As A Wink’ was the third album for The Faces. It was released in 17 November 1971.

The Faces’ lead singer Rod Stewart had released his solo album ‘Every Picture Tells A Story’ in May 1971. The Faces album came along just as Rod’s ‘Maggie Mae’ was a huge hit all over the world.

The Faces were Rod Stewart (vocals), Ronnie Wood (guitar), Kenney Jones (drums), Ian McLagan (keyboards) and Ronnie Lane (bass). Lane died in 1997, McLagan in 2014.

‘A Nod’s As Good As A Wink’ reached no 6 in the USA, no 4 in Australia and no 2 in the UK giving The Faces there first international chart success.

The album was recorded between March and September 1971. The band shared production duties with Glyn Johns who had recently worked with The Beatles on the ‘Get Back’ album (recently released in the Let It Be box) and The Who’s ‘Who’s Next’. He went on to produce the first two Eagles albums after The Faces.

‘A Nod’s As Good As A Wink’ featured ‘Stay With Me’.

The Faces morphed out of the earlier Small Faces with Steve Marriott. Mariott left to join Humble Pie, Wood and Stewart were recruited and The Small Faces became The Faces.

The Faces only released four albums:

First Step (1970)
Long Player (1971)
A Nod’s As Good As A Wink (1971)
Ooh La La (1973)

In 1975 after Ronnie Wood left to join The Rolling Stones, the band split.

In June this year it was reported that Jones, Stewart and Wood were working on new music. There has been no word on that since.

Rod Stewart was on The Graham Norton Show this week performing his new song ‘One More Time’. His new album ‘The Tears of Hercules’ was released last week.

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