Ronnie Wood is in characteristically buoyant form as he talks through the Ronnie Wood Foreign Tongues interview circuit, discussing the Rolling Stones‘ latest record and a lot more besides: a possible Faces reunion album, solo tour plans, Keith Richards’ arthritis and a cancer scare that ended, mercifully, with the all-clear just a few months ago.
Foreign Tongues and the return of studio discipline
Foreign Tongues, out now via Polydor, is Wood’s fifty-first year with the Stones, and he is emphatic that it is no nostalgia exercise. Producer Andrew Watt gets much of the credit. ‘It’s down to Andrew Watt, that kind of enthusiasm,’ Wood says. ‘He’s a young guy with a passion, he’s a fan, he can back up what he says because he can play. So we listened to him.’ The comparison Wood reaches for is the Jimmy Miller era, when the Stones were making an album every couple of years. ‘People don’t have to wait ten, twelve years between albums now.’
Watt also brought the discipline the band apparently needs. Wood gleefully recounts how the producer squared up to Keith Richards over guitar parts: ‘He said, “No you won’t. You’ll do them when I tell you. And you’re going to start now.” And he goes, “Oh, okay then.”‘ Wood adds, drily: ‘It takes an unusual man to be able to converse with Keith on something like bossing him around.’
The album opened, briefly and mischievously, under the alias The Cockroaches before the Stones were revealed as the act behind lead single Rough And Twisted. ‘To cause a little stir, a little interest,’ Wood explains, noting that people have seen The Cockroaches play in clubs before.
Political themes and the Ronnie Wood Foreign Tongues guest list
Lyrically, Foreign Tongues takes aim at the present moment. Mr. Charm addresses high-tech billionaires, Side Effects touches on prescription drugs, and In The Stars references ‘a sickness in the land’. Wood does not distance himself from that phrase. ‘We have to try and keep the smile on people’s faces as well as being blatantly honest with them, you know, about that sickness in the land. There’s a lot of bad things going on.’ Climate sits alongside politics in his list of concerns: ‘The hot is getting hotter, the cold is getting colder, and ne’er the twain shall meet.’
The collaborator list is, predictably, vast and, in Wood’s telling, only partly known to him at the time. Steve Winwood was in the studio, bringing ‘a bit of Ray Charles into the room’. Robert Smith contributed backing vocals at the overdub stage. Paul McCartney returned from the Hackney Diamonds sessions, with a second song, Covered In You, kept from that same run of recordings. Bruno Mars came in without Wood even being told: ‘Mick didn’t even tell me that he came in!’ Chad Smith, similarly, got past Wood’s radar entirely.
The album also carries Charlie Watts, after a fashion. Hit Me In The Head is built around an old Watts drum track, and Wood says Mick Jagger holds an archive with more: ‘I’m not quite sure what’s in it, but I’m sure there’s some more Charlie drum tracks. We did some in Paris that I know he could tap into.’
Solo dates, a possible Stones tour and the Faces album
A Stones tour is on the table but not confirmed. ‘Not this year, but maybe next year,’ Wood says. In the meantime, his solo band goes out to keep things sharp. The set will draw on his own catalogue, Stones material including Hey Negrita and Dance, and Faces songs, with Imelda May and Chanelle Haynes on vocals and Andy Newmark on drums.
Then there is the Faces project. ‘I saw Rod the other day,’ Wood says. ‘Maybe towards the end of the year we’re going to go back in the studio and try and finish these tracks that we’ve already started for the new Faces album.’ Rod Stewart‘s involvement is implied but, characteristically, nothing is locked in yet.
Wood signed off the conversation with a line that sums up his outlook: ‘I rode cancer twice, kicked it out, and here I am. I got the all-clear just a few months ago.’ No regrets, he insists. ‘You’ve got to go through it to get to it.’
