Belting out his number one hit Sailing, a sea captain’s hat tilted rakishly atop the famous blond mane, Rod Stewart did more than just command Glastonbury’s ‘Legends’ slot during his last live show in mainland Britain.
asserted
Stewart → belt → Britain
He seemed to prove that he was a force of nature – one who shrugged off the ravages of time with the same nonchalance he once shrugged off lovers.
asserted
he → seem → lovers
There he was last June, an octogenarian and still having a ball – even if, for safety reasons, he was no longer booting them into the crowd.
asserted
he → have → crowd
Watching him strut alongside backing singers young enough to be his granddaughters – all wearing the green and white hoops of his beloved Celtic – fans could almost have believed the road went on forever for this most robust of rock stars.
uncertain
road → watch → stars
What a difference a year made.
asserted
year → make → difference
Almost exactly 12 months later, in the high-altitude air of Utah, the singer looked perilously close to collapse.
asserted
singer → look → Utah
Even as he sang ‘Young hearts be free tonight, time is on your side’ he was struggling badly to hold back its tide.
asserted
he → sing → tide
He gripped a piano for support, then lurched towards the Perspex sound barrier surrounding the drums and simply hung on.
asserted
He → grip → drums
Finally help arrived from backstage in the form of an oxygen tank and the singer could be seen taking gasps through the mask placed over his nose and mouth.
uncertain
singer → arrive → nose
Turning to his increasingly concerned audience, he declared that ‘the show must go on’, adding that he had ‘nearly f****** fainted there’.
asserted
he → turn → audience
He took a seat for his next number and, seemingly running on fumes, managed to deliver the rest of the set.
asserted
He → take → set
Where his Glastonbury performance hinted at immortality, this one rang alarm bells.
asserted
one → hint → bells
But, after more than 60 years on the road, how ready was Sir Rod to hear them?
asserted
Rod → hear → them
Not ready at all, it would appear.
asserted
it → appear → ?
He refused to throw in the towel, grinding through several more gruelling US dates until, on arrival in Cincinnati, it was clear his body could take no more.
uncertain
body → refuse → more
Hours before the doors were due to open for the show, it was cancelled due to what his PR described as ‘a minor medical procedure’.
asserted
PR → open → procedure
Two days later, the rest of the tour was cancelled too.
asserted
rest → cancel → tour
In fact, he was having an operation to improve the blood flow through his coronary artery by fitting a stent.
asserted
he → have → stent
Which brings us to this week’s announcement, delivered with ‘sadness’ by a rocker finally facing up to the inevitable.
asserted
Which → bring → inevitable
Cynics may point out that we have been here before.
uncertain
we → point → ?
Didn’t he crisscross the globe a few years back on the Farewell Tour?
asserted
he → crisscross → Tour
Wasn’t this year’s one cheekily titled One Last Time?
asserted
one → title → ?
Why should 2027 dates, billed as The Final Encore, be any different?
asserted
dates → bill → Encore
The answer may lie with the six-foot blonde enforcer to whom he is married.
‘We’re not letting him get away with it,’ Penny Lancaster said last month.
uncertain
Lancaster → lie → it
‘He has to do as he’s told.’
asserted
he → have → ?
Yet, as she admits, playing health warden to one of rock’s most hyperactive senior citizens is an exhausting task.
asserted
playing → admit → citizens
When his heart scare forced the cancellation of his 2026 dates, she had to personally explain the realities of a Rod Stewart gig to his cardiologists.
asserted
she → force → cardiologists
‘He doesn’t just sit down on a stool or behind a piano,’ she noted.
asserted
she → sit → piano
Instead, she compared her husband to a boxer heading to the ring, or a racehorse exploding out of the starting blocks.
asserted
she → compare → blocks
Even with a coronary stent, he was nearly impossible to slow down.
asserted
he → slow → stent
‘I can never find him,’ she
asserted
I → find → him
‘He’s got his hobbies, I mean he’s just been in the gym working out, but we were under strict instructions about the level of workout he could do, and it’s a gradual, build him up, build him up, kind of thing.
uncertain
it → get → thing
The compromise, it seems, is The Final Encore tour in 2027.
asserted
it → seem → 2027
Strikingly, its first mainland UK date brings him to Glasgow’s OVO Hydro on April 29.
asserted
date → bring → April
It will be his first performance on these shores since he left the Glastonbury stage nearly two years prior – and, with no other Scottish dates on the itinerary, could represent his last curtain call north of the Border.
uncertain
he → leave → Border
For a singer who has spent his entire career as popular music’s lone ‘Cockney Scotsman’, starting his final British tour in Glasgow will strike a deep personal chord.
asserted
starting → spend → chord
He has always treated the country as his ‘spiritual homeland’ – a convenient expression, perhaps, for a star who has never actually lived in Scotland or sounded like anything other than a north London geezer.
asserted
who → treat → geezer
He once said – quite convincingly – that every time he plays north of the Border, he thinks of his father, Robert.
asserted
he → say → father
Rod belting out his greatest hits at last summer's Glastonbury festival
A plumber by trade, Robert left Edinburgh a few years before his son was born, but he instilled a deep-seated sense of manners and humility in his son that survived the decades of global hedonism.
asserted
that → belt → hedonism
And the older the star became, the more his father’s innate sense of propriety seemed to reside in him.
asserted
sense → become → him
…and 61 more, not listed.
The Aporia
