"Every Picture Tells a Story"

I guess the days are past now when a kid could leave home and travel the world with a guitar and a backpack, hang out in exotic places that hadn't been discovered by the masses, become an adult the hard way and come home with a treasure chest of stories and experiences to sustain his or her old age. Must have been a 60s thing. Anyway, Rod Stewart seems to have written a load of songs on the back of this kind of experience - Maggie May, Stay With Me, for example - and this, which is a true classic and serves to remind us that he was, once, a serious songwriter with huge talent. I don't suppose we should begrudge him his comfortable dotage, so that he can reflect on his well-spent youth. This song fairly gallops along with the occasional pause for sober reflection, underpinned by a beautiful-sounding acoustic guitar and Rod's younger, less-ravaged soul howl. There's sadness, nostalgia, joy, the ebullience of youth and wisdom all wrapped up in six minutes. What more can you ask for?