The Yardbirds
The backbone of the rock band The Yardbirds consisted of vocalist Keith Relf, rhythm guitarist Chris Dreja, bassist Paul Samwell-Smith, and drummer Jim McCarty. However, they were most famous for their succession of luminary lead guitarists, Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, and Jimmy Page. Under Clapton the Yardbirds played high-energy R&B with long improvisations called "rave-ups" in which they would alter tempo and volume, building to a climax before returning to the song. Although the recording technology is poor by today's standards, Five Live Yardbirds (1965) reveals a tight unit of talented musicians. Inspired by the phenomenal success of the Beatles, the Yardbirds then recorded the pop song, "For Your Love," written by Graham Gouldman, and this became their first hit. The song featured a harpsichord and bongos, but very little Clapton. Uncomfortable with the band's commercial direction, Clapton left to pursue pure blues in John Mayall's Bluesbreakers.
Guitar wizard Jeff Beck then joined the band and transformed the Yardbirds into trailblazing musical pioneers. Innovating with fuzztone, feedback, and harmonic sustain within the medium of Gouldman-penned pop songs, they produced classics such as "Evil Hearted You" and "Heart Full of Soul." Their first original studio album, The Yardbirds (1966, renamed Over, Under, Sideways, Down in the U.S., but commonly known as Roger the Engineer in either country) is a tour de force on Beck's part. When Samwell-Smith left the band, session musician Jimmy Page was recruited as bassist until Dreja could learn the bass, then Page moved up as second lead guitarist alongside Beck. The Beck-Page lineup recorded only four songs, one of them being "Stroll On" (a version of "Train Kept ARollin"'), which they performed in Michelangelo Antonioni's 1966 film Blow-Up, a cult classic of the Swingin' London scene.
When Beck left the group, Page introduced his own musical visions and recorded Little Games (1967). An odd mixture of pop songs and virtuoso guitar playing, this album is most intriguing as a document of Page's early development, displaying many riffs and effects which were later redeveloped in Led Zeppelin. Especially noteworthy is the instrumental "White Summer," later reworked as "Black Mountain Side" and the introduction of "Over the Hills and Far Away." When the remaining members left, Page recruited vocalist Robert Plant, bassist John Paul Jones, and drummer John Bonham, and debuted the band as the New Yardbirds, later renamed Led Zeppelin.
In 1984, ex-Yardbirds Samwell-Smith, Dreja, and McCarty formed the band Box of Frogs (Relf had died in 1976, electrocuted by a guitar). Although some tracks from Box of Frogs (1984) and Strange Land (1986) featured guest guitarists Page and Beck, these heavy-metal offerings made little impact.
The Yardbirds are aptly called "legendary," for although their recordings have lapsed into obscurity, their influence on guitar-driven rock is enduring and pervasive. Clapton, Beck, and Page gave rise to the "guitar hero," displacing the singer as the focal point of the rock and roll band, and a legion of 1970s guitarists cited the Yardbirds as a major influence. In spite of their uneven recording history, the Yardbirds' small, experimental body of work places them just behind the Beatles, the Stones, and the Who as a major band of the British Invasion.
Further Reading:
Mackay, Richard. Yardbirds World. Mackay/Ober, 1989.
Platt, John A. The Yardbirds. London, Sidgwick & Jackson, 1983.
Russo, Greg. Yardbirds: The Ultimate Rave-Up. Floral Park, New York, Crossfire Publishers, 1997.
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