My Top 1000 Songs #500: The Autumn Stone

[I've been writing up my Top 1000 songs on a daily basis--you can see them all in descending order by hitting the All My Favorite Songs tag.]

In a weird-ish coincidence, we hit #500 on the final day of 2023. Do I return in 2024 with the second half of my Top 1000? Or call it a day? Been doing this for 500 straight days, give or take, and these days--with the collapse of Twitter resulting in a lot less traffic than when I started--I'm writing this mainly for myself. I kinda get a kick of waking up each morning and finding a song to write about before starting my day. But, I dunno, diminishing returns.

Anyway, what a great place to land for #500. The final song from the original incarnation of the Small Faces--shortly after recording "The Autumn Stone" in 1968 for a new single (which wasn't released at the time), Steve Marriott left the band to form Humble Pie, and the other guys brought in Rod Stewart & Ronnie Wood to become Faces--"The Autumn Stone" is simply gorgeous. A folk-flavored acoustic ballad that sounds more like Nick Drake than the band's earlier rock/mod/R&B roots, Marriott, backed by acoustic guitars & flute, gets all gushy in love, and it's hard not to be swept along with him. It's a lovely, haunting track, and the band's intended next album would've been a tremendous follow-up to the wondrous Ogdens' Nut Gone Flake had they stuck around a little longer.