By Steve Newton
Aw crap! I interviewed guitar legend Steve Cropper today and forgot to thank him for the guitar solo he did back in ’75 on “Stone Cold Sober”, a killer tune he cowrote with Rod Stewart for the Atlantic Crossing album.
As the weird kids say on social media these days, that solo is everything. It kicks off at the 2:54 mark and doesn’t stop till the song is over, getting more and more rockin’ by the second. It’s like a miniature “Free Bird” or somethin’.
If you’re reading this, Steve-O: thanks a lot for that solo, man. It brightened up my teenage years again and again–and I still think it rules.
Now if only you can work that song into the set before you play Vancouver with Dave Mason this September….
They ripped off Happy by the Rolling Stones on this song.
And created a better song!
So if you get Cropper to re-create his lead on Stone Cold Sober with Dave Mason (in the past,now)…. who’s gonna sing it? Haha… only 1 guy that I know of…
I don’t think that is Steve Cropper playing the solo. He co-wrote it, and likely is playing on the track, but the solo is not his sound or his style.It’s the sound of a Les Paul (Fred Tackett maybe?) I’ve noticed some other references to this since your post here online, but no source reference. The original album just lists musicians and not which tracks each one played on.
I guess you could be right. Maybe it wasn’t Steve Cropper. But whoever it is, they smoked on that solo!