Atlantic Crossing

Product Information

Interestingly enough, the record was far more successful in Britain than America, helped by the massive success here of number one smash single, "Sailing", a 45 that didn't even trouble the Billboard top 40. The classic recording of "Sailing" (originally by Gavin Sutherland) has made the song a world wide classic (and interestingly, for some reason, the song was an enormous hit in my home Finland in 1978 when it was anything but a new single). Behind him, the Faces careen like well-oiled parts of a perpetual-motion machine gone somewhat daft of purpose, while their leader lines out antics and anthems, holding everything together with the strength and accessibility of his talent and personality.

Two years later, Crossing would deliver yet another hit, when "I Don't Want to Talk About It" was released as a two-sided single with "The First Cut Is the Deepest," a cut from his follow-up effort A Night on the Town. Stewart continued to struggle to gain traction on American radio stations, but Atlantic Crossing was a sizable hit the U.I wanted to do 'This Old Heart of Mine,' y'know, and it was his idea to use Al Green's section and go down to Memphis, which was great.

The original UK Burbank label (CBS pressings) also had a second limited edition run pressed on orange vinyl. With this album, he seems to turn his back on his rock roots and his Faces sound for this more polished sound, but truthfully, this is a good collection of songs and let's not forget that amazing voice that turned everyone on in the first place.

Granted, there's not an original that can stand next to Maggie May or You Wear It Well or Mandolin Wind, but he elevates them with a far more spirited performance than his previous. When going through Stewart's solo early solo records I'm always wary that maybe this one will be the one in which he abandons his early sound for the money-chasing of his later career. Stewart's musical scope, Atlantic Crossing may well be my favourite album featuring him up to the 1975 date. Dobie Gray’s “Drift Away” fits seamlessly with Dowd’s radio-ready schematic and Stewart sounds fairly comfortable in his new surroundings, if not completely settled.

Still Love You" with its use of echo on the title phrase makes an already less-memorable song kind of tacky while "Drift Away" is the weakest overall on the fast side just for being so pedestrian as a cover version. The mood darkens a bit on Mentor Williams’s “Drift Away,” a song which fits Stewart’s persona perfectly, chronicling the mood of a romantic young man who feels he may have missed something essential in his knockabout adventures and now needs a place to escape from it all. With the venerable Tom Dowd behind the board, Stewart has freed himself of technical worries to concentrate solely on his singing.Neil, then, evidently borrowed a melody from this song into his own "See a Sky About to Rain", which (on the other hand) was first recorded by The Byrds (1973). A salty wind blows through this To appropriate and paraphrase another RYM reviewer, this album has the sea breeze gentleness of the best kind of 1970s Los Angeles-born rock and, just as you're getting used to it, the breeze turns into a salty wind from a rocker who still had the rocker in him before turning disco crooner.