‘I always think I make albums for a few friends and this record has that intimacy, I hope,’ Sir Rod Stewart says of his 30th solo studio album, Blood Red Roses. ‘Sincerity and honesty go a long way in life and the same is true in song-writing.’This deeply personal collection of recently-written Stewart originals, with the added bonus of three superb new covers, is simply peak Rod. Blood Red Roses is a great bunch of songs presented, with a winning flourish, in Stewart’s unmistakable style.Love, loss, longing, and addiction are all examined in Stewart’s enviable everyman manner, tempered with a master-craftsman’s attention to nuance and detail.The universally-loved voice, tough and tender in equal measure, is in superb shape. James Brown’s claim that Rod Stewart is the world’s ‘best white soul singer’ still stands.A knight of the realm since 2016, double-inductee to the Rock’n’roll Hall Of Fame, winner of a Grammy and ASCAP song-writing awards, Rod Stewart’s 50-plus year career has amassed sales of more than 200 million albums and won him lifelong fans worldwide. But perhaps more importantly, despite the accolades and the staggering global success, Rod remains one of us.We are more than familiar with Rod Stewart’s singing voice, the wonderfully warm rasp that has sound-tracked our lives but the voice of Rod Stewart, the songwriter, has been frustratingly fitful over the years.He has, of course, put his name to more than his share of stone-cold classics: Maggie May, The Killing Of Georgie, You Wear It Well, I Was Only Joking, Young Turks but he freely admits that the muse has sometimes proved elusive.‘But once I finished my autobiography a few years ago the gates just opened,’ he acknowledges. ‘That was a turning point.’Safe to say, on Blood Red Roses, inspiration has returned in full and the creative juices, and songs, have been flowing. The new songs fearlessly address life’s thornier issues from first infatuation to our final words to a friend, and all the agonies and ecstasies along the way.