TV Pop Diaries
Pop Music on British Television 1955 - 1999

From Record Mirror October 1965 "The trials and tribulations of a band rushing round the country for a hectic weekend will be shown in "Rod The Mod," a film about blues singer Rod Stewart on Rediffusion on November 2. The film was made by Francis Megahy, a former ATV documentary director. Initially, it will be shown locally, but it is hoped to network it later. Long John Baldry will be featured talking about the blues and many well-known clubs are shown."

Originally scheduled for 26th October 1965, it had been delayed by a week for no particular reason. From TV Times "Rod Stewart wears mod gear but sings old style blues. In this off-beat record of a week-end in the life of this young featured singer with the Long John Baldry Band, we enter the private world of those who play the one-night stands." There would be footage of John Baldry's Hoochie Coochie Men at the Marquee, the band on the road and a chat with his mum and dad at the newsagents they ran.

Despite its origins as a documentary about a young singer, with presumably an intended young audience, it was curiously broadcast late on a Tuesday night, 11.07 - 11.37 pm. The show has also been seen credited with the (presumably working) title An Easter With Rod.

This wouldn't be the only TV footage of Rod this year as ABC's Shindig in the USA showed a compilation of the Richmond-On-Thames Jazz Festival including Steampacket, Rod's new group. On the 10th November 1965 Steampacket were meant to make their UK TV debut on TWW's Discs-A-Gogo, but that edition probably wasn't broadcast. More bad luck came with what was to be their own TV show on Monday 15th November 1965, courtesy of Tyne Tees, but The Steam Packet Show was also not shown. The group, despite making recordings, never had anything released in their short lifetime.

His old nickname would reappear eleven years' later in an Omnibus documentary for the BBC. Rod the Mod Has Come Of Age similarly followed Rod around, but this time on a tax break trip to the UK, and an unfortunate visit to Radio Luxembourg where he gets stuck in a lift and is then insulted by an interviewer.

Rod The Mod/An Easter With Rod, as broadcast, no longer exists but the unedited film reels have survived and some of it was shown to Rod in an Imagine documentary on the BBC in 2015, while Rod also attended a screening of the footage at the BFI in London April 2018.

ROD THE MOD

Rediffusion

2nd November 1965