Faces - Open to Ideas (1975)

Ronnie Lane left the Faces in June 1973. This departure was a long time coming, seen as many issues plagued the band by the time 1973 rolled around: Lane's folkier tendencies were incompatible with the rest of the band, who much preferred to play rock and roll, and lead singer Rod Stewart's neglected the band due to his concurrent solo career, which was starting to take off in the US. Such was his neglect that the last Faces album to feature Lane, Ooh La La, was almost entirely led by him, with Stewart's contributions few and far between. As if that wasn't enough, soon after the record was released, Rod gave an interview where he badmouthed the album and criticized its songs, which incensed Ronnie and became the final straw: he quit the band and started a solo career. Wasting no time, the group replaced him with Japanese bassist Tetsu Yamauchi, who had already replaced bassist Andy Fraser in Free, and toured for the better part of 1973. For the next year, the band recorded some non-album singles but seemed directionless, with sessions for a purported fifth studio album in January 1975 going nowhere and plans ending up scrapped. After a final US tour in December 1975, Ronnie Wood quit to join the Rolling Stones, with whom he'd already toured, and replace Mick Taylor, and the band finally ended for good. But what if the Faces had managed to release a final studio album?

This post is an update to my June 2018 fifth Faces album, titled Open to Ideas. This time around, we will try to create an album that doesn't feature anything that's already on any albums by Ronnie Wood or Rod Stewart. That way, we'll have something that can coexist with the rest of the Faces' discography as well as their members' solo careers without any issues or overlap in songs. To do so, anything they recorded or released after Ooh La La is fair game for our intent. That means songs from the August 1973 to January 1975 period will be considered, which admittedly is a pretty long span of time. But it's pretty much the only way we could make this work, given the dearth of material available from this time period. All songs will feature Tetsu Yamauchi on bass, as he replaced Ronnie Lane right after the release of Ooh La La, with one notable exception which will be explained later. Again, since there's not much material up for consideration and all the songs are pretty long, I figured eight songs and 35 minutes is more than enough for a full-length Faces album, given their track record. We will be including covers, as the band had the habit of including those in their albums, but the majority of songs on the album will be originals. But even with two songs less, it's still a couple of minutes longer than its predecessor! With that out of the way, here's what our updated Open to Ideas album looks like:

You Can Make Me Dance, Sing, or Anything (Five Guys Walk Into a Bar)

As Long as You Tell Him (Five Guys Walk Into a Bar)

Gettin' Hungry (Five Guys Walk Into a Bar)

Rock Me (Five Guys Walk Into a Bar)

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Pool Hall Richard (Five Guys Walk Into a Bar)

Jodie (The Mercury Collection)

Hi Heel Sneakers/Everybody Needs Somebody to Love (Five Guys Walk Into a Bar)

Open to Ideas (Five Guys Walk Into a Bar)

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Faces - Open to Ideas (1975)

Ronnie Wood and Rod Stewart performing during the Faces' final US tour, late 1975.

Ooh La La outtake "Jodie" was re-recorded shortly after the album's sessions were finished in August 1973 and issued as the b-side to a Rod Stewart solo single. It does feature Ronnie Lane on bass, but given that it was recorded after Ooh La La was finished and wasn't included in any album either by the Faces or Rod, I decided to include it. From November 1973 is the single "Pool Hall Richard", and from nearly a year afterward in October 1974 comes another single, "You Can Make Me Dance, Sing or Anything", along with its b-side "As Long as You Tell Him". All three are pretty good, poppy songs that were probably never meant for an album in the first place, but given our limitations have to find their homes here. From January 1975, come the proper fifth album sessions themselves, which yielded originals "Rock Me" and "Open to Ideas", as well as covers of the Beach Boys' "Gettin' Hungry", and as a rhythm and blues classics medley consisting of Tommy Tucker's "Hi Heeled Sneakers" and Solomon Burke's "Everybody Needs Somebody to Love". Sure, featuring four previously released songs in an album is a bit excessive, but by having those singles serve as side openers and the newly recorded material filling up the record, we can strike a pretty good balance between the old and the new through sequencing, and what we end up with is a pretty cohesive album in spite of its issues.

The album is titled Open to Ideas after the strongest of the original songs, which is accompanied by original artwork I put together with a photo of the band from 1974. Good pictures of the Faces with Tetsu are pretty hard to come by, so it was a lucky thing that photo was available. No new singles would be pulled out from this album as three songs were already released as singles, and frankly, there really aren't any songs left that could do well in the charts. The band certainly suffers from Ronnie Lane's absence, as his songwriting, singing, and bass playing were integral to the band's sound, and however serviceable Yamauchi was as a bass player, he wasn't able to replace Lane to that level. However, this proves that even without him they'd be able to create a perfectly able farewell album that featured what the band could do best: play some good rock and roll. This certainly doesn't reach the heights the Faces reached with their classic records, but I don't think anyone was expecting anything of the sort from a band that was, at that point neglected by their lead singer and double-timed by their lead guitarist, who would become a Rolling Stone later that year. This reconstruction is a great glimpse into an often-forgotten era of the band, giving a home to outtakes and hit singles alike, and chronicling their dysfunctional final days before they either joined the competition or crossed the Atlantic.

Sources:
- Faces - Five Guys Walk Into a Bar

- Rod Stewart - The Mercury Collection

- Woodworks 1957/1975: Ronnie Wood Chronology