The one band Rod Stewart was “too frightened” to sing with

Posted On December 24, 2025December 24, 2025

Rod Stewart has strutted onto pretty much every stage worthy of a single step. He has done so with the confidence of a cockerel with new shoes on. Prancing across the boards and delivering the kind of showy songs that make him often considered one of the best showmen around, Stewart has rarely let himself down when given the chance to shine.

Underneath it all, Stewart is able to do that because he has a unique sense of self that says he can. It takes a lot of ego to get yourself up on stage and perform, but to do it as consistently and powerfully as Stewart has done over the years, the singer has one thing in spades: confidence.

That said, Rod Stewart doesn’t seem like an artist who gets scared easily by any musician. Once you’ve turned in time working alongside everyone from Jeff Beck to Ronnie Wood, it’s safe to say that nothing is off the table in terms of which musicians you can collaborate with in the rock sphere. Although Stewart’s signature rasp gave him a distinctive sound in his early years, he knew that no one could touch what The Temptations brought to music.

For all great rock and roll music, it all comes back to the sounds of soul and blues. While many of the greatest British bands were taking the sounds of blues artists like Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf, Detroit was going through its own reinvention in the 1960s, turning Motown Records into one of the biggest power players in the world.

Although label CEO Berry Gordy could spit out hits like clockwork whenever he came out with a new act, no one could surpass the first hits The Temptations had. Much like The Beatles had done for the sounds of rock and roll, seeing the five band members in suits on TV singing ‘My Girl’ with their impressive dance moves made every girl fawn over them whenever they sang.

Even though artists like Smokey Robinson and The Miracles and The Four Tops would be stiff competition for the band whenever they performed in Detroit, there was no way to beat the sounds of David Ruffin’s voice, sounding like smooth butter whenever he opened his mouth. As the years progressed, the band also never wanted to be confined to one sound, eventually embracing the sounds of funk on ‘Papa Was a Rolling Stone’.

While the guy behind songs like ‘Maggie May’ and ‘Mandolin Wind’ doesn’t really strike anyone as the same guy who would love the sounds of The Temptations, Stewart was mesmerised when hearing them for the first time. After getting hooked on the song ‘I Wish It Would Rain’, Stewart would take a deep dive into the band’s repertoire, uncovering one classic after another.

When looking at their records, Stewart would be the one pushing for Beck to put various soulful elements into their own tunes. Even though any Jeff Beck song is going to come out sounding like Jeff Beck by law, it’s easy to see what the band were listening to when paying attention to the backbeat, especially when Beck brought that funk groove to ‘Superstition’.

For all of the great music that Stewart could sing, he knew that he was never going to be able to touch what The Temptations did. Even when becoming friends with David Ruffin later in life, any chance of him sharing the stage with the band was never going to happen.

Discussing the Temptations’ vocal style, Stewart said that he is still too intimidated to go onstage to sing with a band of that calibre, telling Rolling Stone, “My children grew up loving the Temptations, and we tried to see them every time they came to town. They would always pick me out of the audience with a spotlight, trying to get me up to the stage. But I never did. I’m too frightened”.

Then again, it’s not like Stewart is any different from every other singer who has seen The Temptations perform in their prime. He may have some vocal chops, but when you hear Ruffin sing on songs like ‘My Girl’, how the hell is anyone supposed to follow that up?

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