Small Faces. Big Sound. There were but four Small Faces.
First, they were the sharp little mod fourpiece of the ‘All Or Nothing’ Decca years, Carnaby Street, Ready Steady Go! and Rave magazine. Then they were the irreverent freakbeat experimentalists of the Immediate years, with ‘Tin Soldier’, ‘Lazy Sunday’ and classic album Ogdens’ Nut Gone Flake. Their hits were praised, covered and imitated by subsequent rock musicians such as Paul Weller and Noel Gallagher.
When The Small Faces split, Steve Marriott formed Humble Pie with Peter Frampton, and the rest of the band became The Faces with the addition of future Rolling Stone Ron Wood and vocalist Rod Stewart. The Faces became one of the biggest rock bands of the seventies via albums such as A Nod Is As Good As A Wink… To A Blind Horse and Ooh La La or worldwide hit ‘Stay With Me’. When those bands came to a natural end, and with ‘Itchycoo Park’ returned to the top ten, The Small Faces reformed for two more albums. Were they ill-advised or are they ripe for re-evaluation? The evidence is laid out here. For this is the full story song-by-song, from the very start, to the end …
Andrew Darlington is a hack writer, a self-educated acrobat juggling words. Jefferson Airplane musician Grace Slick once politely declined his offer of marriage. His latest poetry collection is Tweak Vision: The Word-Play Solution To Modern-Angst Confusion and his Science Fiction Novel In The Time Of The Breaking are both from Alien Buddha Press, USA. He’s also written a biography of Beatles PR Derek Taylor called For Your Radioactive Children: Days In The Life Of The Beatles Spin-Doctor, published by SonicBond, who also published his 2021 book The Hollies On Track. His writing can be found at Eight Miles Higher: http://andrewdarlington.blogspot.co.uk/.
