Rod Stewart and Jools Holland have come together to create Swing Fever, a 13-track tribute to the songs of the big band era.
Rod Stewart with Jools Holland - Almost Like Being In Love (Official Visualiser)
The duo have played together live, but not sat down in the studio for proper recording sessions. Stewart revealed in a press release: "I'd already started making a swing album, but it didn't turn out how I wanted it. It was more Frank Sinatra than it was Louis Prima, let's say. So I canceled that, and then I realized the guy I should go to is Jools. Also, our fanatical model railway enthusiasm bonded us together. So we started recording."
While Holland has had an illustrious career in both music and television, he had not formed a long-term relationship with Stewart despite their shared interests. He recounts: "I was just packing up to go away for Christmas, and you rang me. We hadn't really spoken at any length before. I thought 'I love Rod, how exciting,' and you said 'I want to do a record.' I'd been a fan of Rod forever but we realized with the old music that we liked a lot of the same things."
Jools Holland and Rod Stewart are truly swinging!
Over roughly a dozen collective sessions at Holland's studio Helicon Mountain in Westcombe Park, combined with the enduring brilliance of the songbook to create a sound that's infectious and irresistible – and it sounds live because that's what it was.
"I've got to give credit to Jools' orchestra, and especially the drums [Gilson Lavis] and bass [Dave Swift]," says Stewart. "Gilson is the nearest thing I've heard to Charlie Watts, in being able to do a backbeat properly. Great band, and this man Jools with the old piano. Steaming! And his brother Chris on the Hammond. The orchestra rehearsed them a couple of times when I wasn't there, then they went in and did three a day, which is quite remarkable. Jools' studio is so small. It's ok if it's a three-piece band, but we had 18 pieces in there at one time. It just unites everybody.”
Jools Holland at the Cornbury Festival, Oxfordshire, UK, July 10, 2022.
Holland has had a distinguished discography celebrating rhythm and blues and high-profile collaborations with Ruby Turner and Tom Jones as well as his 31-year run with Later... With Jools Holland. Stewart has released five The Great American Songbook albums, covers of pop standards ranging from "The Very Thought of You" to "Moon River."
Holland sums up the spontaneous charm of Swing Fever: "The effect that this music has on me, and whenever I put it on where people are, they feel this thing, they want to move. Music is an expression of a lot of different things, and joy is an important part of what it does. You can feel the joy in this music, and it's unashamed joy as well."
Rod Stewart and Jools Holland - "Raise The Roof" at the Royal Albert Hall, London, June 22, 2022.
Swing Fever is available on black vinyl, color vinyl, CD & digital to pre-order here.
Swing Fever tracklist:
01 Lullaby Of Broadway
02 Oh Marie
03 Sentimental Journey
04 Pennies From Heaven
05 Night Train
06 Love Is The Sweetest Thing
07 Them There Eyes
08 Good Rockin’ Tonight
09 Ain’t Misbehavin'
10 Frankie And Johnny
11 Walkin' My Baby Back Home
12 Almost Like Being In Love
13 Tennessee Waltz
