The Small Faces
The Autumn Stone

"The Autumn Stone" is the posthumous album by the Small Faces, after Steve Marriott left to form Humble Pie.

It is a posthumous collection, but it includes among the few unreleased tracks also the title track (which even inspired my email address, followed by the number "63" - I'll explain why later), "If I were a carpenter" and "Red balloon", as well as an instrumental piece, namely "Wide eyed girl on the wall".

I returned to London a few months ago for a period of language immersion, especially auditory, and had the Small Faces as one of the main soundtracks. In fact, my email address "theautumnstone63" was born in London (I won't tell you with which company!), from the fact that this song (which I greatly love) is from the '60s and the album is from '69 (so from that decade). Initially, the number was supposed to be "70", but due to a mix-up, I then chose "63" (the year of "Laborintus", the poetic work of Edoardo Sanguineti).

One evening in July, before returning home from work, I saw a blue plaque at Carnaby Street commemorating the group's presence in that place (together with their first producer Don Arden), and I started humming in a night with closed shops and quite some silence (except on Regent Street where I took the bus), "Lazy Sunday" which transported me to a world quite different and distant from my own.

Or in September beside Regent's Park in "Cumberland Terraces" where the four made the semi-comic video of "Get yourself together", in which the sign of the square is clearly visible in front of Marriott at the beginning of the video (at that moment I sang aloud, or almost, "All or nothing", thinking of a beautiful young woman just over thirty whom I admired and liked. I must have kissed and hugged her four times in a burst of affection on the Saturday before my departure for London). Whoever should go there should find written in pencil on the sign: "The SMALL FACES were here in the '60s" ("The SMALL FACES were here in the '60s"). It's my handiwork.

What else can I say? Nothing. I just let myself be lulled by the music and the magnificent words of "The autumn stone", the sweet finale of an adventure (that of the Small Faces) ended, on the contrary, bitterly. Goodnight.

I was nowhere

till you changed my mind

love is sent through being good to you.

Then you were somewhere

somewhere hard to find

only what you always were, it's true.

 I'm looking for an open door

where I can sit and play in peace with you. 

Tomorrow changes

fields of green today

yesterday is dead but not my memory.

We were strangers

and then you came to stay

the sweetest spring dawn morning sings to me.

So now I've found a living sound

that moves, that breathes and make love to me.

(I was nowhere / till you changed my mind / and love is sent through being good to you. // Then you were somewhere / somewhere hard to find / only what you always were, it's true. // I'm looking for an open door / where I can sit and play in peace with you. // Tomorrow changes / fields of green today / yesterday is dead, but not my memory. // We were strangers