Al Stewart

Al Stewart is a British singer/songwriter/guitarist known particularly for exemplifying the 'confessional' school of songwriting in his early years and for his single 'Year of the Cat'


 * Concept Album. 'Past, Present and Future' was a historical based album with a song for each decade of the twentieth century. 'Life Between The Wars' did the same for the period 1919-1938. 'Down in the Cellar' was a concept album inspired by wine.
 * The Gump: Al himself is a real life example. He met Yoko Ono before any of The Beatles and shared a flat with Simon and Garfunkel (and was their roadie on their first big tour).
 * Hey, It's That Guy!. Yes, it is that Roger Taylor on percussion on Past, Present and Future.
 * Hipgnosis: Did the cover art for five of his albums.
 * Lyrical Dissonance: 'Post World War II Blues'. The tune is bouncy, the lyrics are a catalogue of almost every major tragedy of the post 1945 years.
 * Precision F-Strike: On the song 'Love Chronicles'. Bonus points for using it in its literal sense as well.
 * Shown Their Work: Exemplifies this trope with his historical songs which are all thoroughly researched and contain all manner of references to obscure individuals and little known historical incidents and anecdotes.
 * Word Salad Lyrics: Generally Al works hard on the meaning of his lyrics but this trope came into play in 'Red Toupee' which was originally merely meant to be guide lyrics to a backing track from co-writer Peter White. However, they both thought the lyrics sounded so good they kept them as they were.