This week’s news and gossip

First Old Firm

Rod had a great start to the week singing with fellow fans at the Celtic v Rangers game at Celtic Park on Sunday in the first Old Firm showdown of the season as Celtic won 3-0.

Rod also met former Nardini’s owner Scott Walker.

Human player apprehended

Steve Piggott who played keyboards and bass on the tracks “Loveless”, “If I Had You” and “It Was Love That We Needed” on Rod’s 2001 Human album was was apprehended after over a decade on the run when he returned to the UK for his daughter’s wedding.

Piggott was jailed for leading a £40 million tax scam, involving other music industry bosses, he disappeared – still owing HMRC over a million pounds.

However a new court ruling unearthed that he had been living abroad under a fake name and was only captured when he visited the UK for his daughter’s wedding, The Times reported.

Pigott was first sent to prison in 2005 after confessing to money laundering and dodging tax payments in an elaborate scheme where he purchased mobile phones VAT-free in the EU before flogging them in the UK.

Still…Any excuse to talk about this class album…

Wolfie’s Rod Cut Out

Here are more pictures of the Wolfie’s Rod cut out out with the ladies in Vegas

Iris, Judy and Glenna had a great night with Wolfie’s Cut out Rod , if you bump in to him send in your snaps and we will put them in the news.

The Mercury

We have not featured any art for a couple of weeks but Ronnie Wood unveiled his new portrait this week ‘The Mercury’. A portrait of Freddie Mercury.

The painting depicts the Queen singer in his iconic yellow jacket worn during the 1986 Wembley concert and Ronnie has made available and personally signed 250 of his digital numbered Freddie prints.

“The Mercury” is available to order now.

FACES AT THE BBC

The legendary BBC recordings of the Faces from 1970-1973 box set has finally been released today.

Many years ago [around seven or eight] I spoke to the Faces team leader Rob Caiger about his plans to bring Faces fans everything they deserve to have, not on dodgy old poor sounding cassette tapes but fully remastered to the best sound quality and with everything that was missing included!

Some of the SMILER team joined Rob and his team and helped in our small way with information and the knowledge we had as fans of the number one peoples band

A big part of Rob’s passion was Faces at The BBC so to actually see after all these years of work by Rob and the team the ideas he had in his head come to life in this exclusive 8-CD + Blu-ray collection that marks the first time these recordings have been officially released together. Recovered from the BBC and the Faces own archives, including a previously un-broadcasted concert, complete with a 48-page fully-illustrated book with commentary from band members and revealing behind-the-scenes stories is truly amazing.

We at SMILER are mega proud to have played our small part and know you will be blown away with the quality of these recordings

Faces fan Martin Burgin was one of the first to buy a copy of the box set and told SMILER ‘The quality and presentation of The Faces box set is Excellent, the sound unbelievable and the blu ray so clear a great achievement. Photos and booklet with great information takes you back in time, great work, most exciting box set it’s a must have for any record Collection and true Faces fan’.

Another Faces fan who got an early copy was Charlie Shillibeer who added ‘What a surprise when I got home from work today! Faces box set sent out a day early! Well done HMV!! Couldn’t wait to get this ready for a severe blasting! Firstly the packaging, excellent! And now for the Blu Ray! Oooof! What clarity, Rod just effortless, confident! Woody on slide, you can actually see the makers mark on his guitar. This is how clear it is! Laneole shuffling around excellently to my favourite Three Button. They say Plonk was the engine of the band, but Mac was the integral part of the Faces too. That leaves Kenney, absolute genius on the kit. That’s the boys out of the way! The first Cd is a stormer, John Peel adding his anecdotes to the songs and to the guys!! The sound Quality is A..Maz..Ing. Full review when I’m back from holidays! Enjoy Faces friends, play it loud as they say! I would go as far as to say Faces were the band. Knocked spots off The Stones. And that Ladies & Gentleman is MY HONEST OPINION!!! Enjoy’…😎

And Finally ..

Rod ended this week with a flight back to the US so anyone attending Saturday’s show at Uncasville Mohegan Sun Arena please send in any photos or thoughts from the show.

SMILER ended the week thinking of our team member Don Stewart who we all lost two years ago today

And after a week of playing the new Faces box set we will see you next week..