Rod | Stewart's Final Wish [exclusive]

"I was an idiot," Stewart admitted, his trademark rasp softening to a whisper. "I thought the money mattered more than the laugh."

But there is a twist. For the last three years, Rod has been secretly writing with his daughter, Ruby Stewart. The project is a raw, acoustic album titled "The Last Grain of Sand." He describes it not as a rock record, but as a "living eulogy." rod stewart's final wish

In the pantheon of rock and roll, there are icons, and then there are characters . Rod Stewart is firmly in the latter camp—though he’d likely correct you and say he belongs in the former, with a whiskey in one hand and a vintage soccer scarf in the other. "I was an idiot," Stewart admitted, his trademark

"I don't need another yacht," he said. "I need to know that a kid in Glasgow hears one of these songs and thinks, 'It's okay to be scared of the end.'" Behind the leopard-print shirts and the bleached spikes, Rod Stewart has always been a family man. With eight children, his final wish extends to them, too. He wants to spend an entire calendar year without a single plane flight. He wants to wake up in his Essex mansion, make breakfast for his grandchildren, and tend to his model railway—a hobby he calls "the only place where I have total control." The project is a raw, acoustic album titled

And no, it wasn't about topping the charts again. For five decades, Rod has been the ultimate survivor. From the folk-rock blues of The Jeff Beck Group to the macho anarchy of The Faces, and through the yacht-rock schmaltz of the '80s, he has zigged when everyone expected him to zag. He has sold over 250 million records. He has been knighted. He has a model train set that costs more than most houses.