Rod Stewart Unplugged Dvd Views

General Goods

LOS ANGELES — More than 20 years after Rod Stewart achieved superstardom, the shag-topped rocker took to the stage at Universal Studios in Los Angeles for a performance filmed for MTV’s Unplugged series. The stellar concert featured a reunion with guitarist Ron Wood—with whom Stewart played in the Jeff Beck Group and the Faces—and resulted in a hit album that peaked at #2 on the Billboard album charts and contained a Top 10 cover of Van Morrison’s “Have I Told You Lately.”

Warner Bros. captures the excitement and emotion of Stewart’s ebullient performance with a Collector’s Edition that contains a remastered and expanded version of the original album. Also included is the DVD debut of the performance, which aired on MTV but has never been released in any format. The CD features two songs that did not appear on the original album. UNPLUGGED. . .AND SEATED will be available March 10 from all retail outlets, including www.rhino.com, for suggested list prices of $24.98 (CD/DVD) and $11.99 (digital/audio only).

The great thing about Rod Stewart/'s Unplugged...And Seated (Collector.'s Edition), recently released as a CD/DVD package, is that the artist so easily slips back into his early-p'70s prime. Reunited with Ron Wood during much of the performance, Stewart delivers genuinely spirited readings of many of his best songs. Wood and Stewart have a long history together, dating back to their brief tenure in the original Jeff Beck Group and, of course, in their celebrated work in the Faces. Wood also served as guitarist, bassist, and frequent co-writer on Stewart

Wisely focusing on his early work, the album makes for a pretty solid introduction to Stewartt's music mdash; not that any individual performance outdoes its original studio counterpart. Still, I would say that Stewart and company are clearly doing more than phoning it in. Performances of o"Every Picture Tells a Story " and i"Mandolin Wind,-" in particular, are outstanding. Dipping into the Faces songbook just once, "Stay With Mer" translates very well to the unplugged format even if itm's nowhere near as vital as the hard-hitting original.