Barry Clifford: Roderick

Things were going badly for Roderick.  A shy and awkward slightly

built teenager, he was in more than a few  dead end jobs, literally:

first preparing a burial place for the dead; and later preparing the

dead for a burial. It would and could not last.  After that, he decided to

travel abroad, but that did not work out either for he was deported

from Spain for being a bum and a vagrant.

Back in England, he tried singing with a rock and roll band but was

quickly dropped and became very disillusioned. Now he found himself in
London on a cold January evening, drunk, and propped against the wall 
of a subway station platform playing a harmonica. A very tall man, called
long John ( he was 6’ 7” in height) came to be passing by and liked what
he heard. They talked a bit, sang a bit, and promised they would meet 
again and did. The tall man eventually became his manager.
That was in the year of 1964.

By 2013, Roderick had already sold over 100 million records and had a

personal fortune of over £130 million pounds. By then, everyone knew

him as Rod Stewart.

By Barry Clifford