There can be few people in the western world who are not aware of who Rod Stewart is or heard him belt out a song in his distinctive raspy voice. His fifty years plus career has produced genuine hits from 'Maggie May', 'Tonight’s the Night' and 'The Killing of Georgie' and more recently his 2009 album Soulbook. Stewart has led a very rock and roll lifestyle which he recounts in his new autobiography.

Rod: The Autobiography comes in a year which has seen a number of other aging rockers bring out autobiographies, which have ranged from Pete Townsend’s balls and all self-confession to more circumspect tomes. Stewart’s falls into the latter camp. With eight children with five different women, fidelity has never been his strong point and whilst he discusses his relationships there is a certain gap where the realisation on how much pain his lifestyle must have caused is missing.

I had a good hunt around the book, but try as I might I could see no reference to either a ghost writer or any form of collaboration and, if this is true, Stewart may well have another career calling as an author. Lack of emotional depth notwithstanding, Rod knows how to tell a funny story and tell it well. As well as avoiding many of the more painful aspects of his life, Stewart also appears to be on a mission to, firstly explode his own myth, whilst as the same time being genuinely humble about his success, although it is difficult to agree with him that his career was based mostly on luck rather than talent.

There is a normality which springs out of the page regarding Stewart, his concerns have moved on little from his working class background and his pursuit of booze and birds, wealth and fame have certainly failed to take North London out of him. There are the usual stories of excess and an appropriate amount of name dropping so the reader gets some feeling of being there in their company, but he does not reveal anything which would surprise most people aware of what levels of excess were allowed when you were a rock god.

So it's a good read, which will please Stewart fans, not so sure about the upcoming Christmas album.

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Charles Packer