- Jan 7, 2002
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The Yardbirds are an English rock band, noted for starting the careers of three of rock's most famous guitarists: Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page. A blues-based band whose sound evolved into experimental pop rock, they had a string of hits including ?For Your Love?, ?Over, Under, Sideways, Down? and ?Heart Full Of Soul?. They were a crucial link between British R&B and psychedelia.
The Yardbirds were pioneers in almost every guitar innovation of the '60s: fuzz tone, feedback, distortion, improved amplification, and were one of the first to put an emphasis on complex lead guitar parts and experimentation. The term, "Yardbird" is used in the southern United States as slang for 'chicken' (as in poultry), and it is a slang expression for "prisoner".
The group's move into pop outraged lead guitarist Eric Clapton, at the time a no-holds-barred blues purist, who had already doubted the ability of "nice college kids" like bassist Paul Samwell-Smith to play the "real blues". Clapton left the group in protest.
The loss could have been devastating to the Yardbirds; Clapton had already shown the striking, stabbingly virtuosic style he would later expand and deepen with Mayall and unfurl as a full-fledged virtuoso statement with the improvisational blues rock/psychedelic Cream. Clapton recommended Jimmy Page, a studio guitarist he knew (and with whom he would soon cut a series of stirring blues guitar duets, including "Tribute to Elmore" and "Draggin' My Tail"), as his replacement, but Page?uncertain at the time about giving up his lucrative studio work and worried about his health?recommended in turn his friend Jeff Beck, whose fleet-fingered style and bent for experimentation pushed the Yardbirds to the direction from which they became widely credited for opening the door to "psychedelic" rock. Beck played his first gig with the Yardbirds only two days after Clapton's departure.
The Yardbirds were pioneers in almost every guitar innovation of the '60s: fuzz tone, feedback, distortion, improved amplification, and were one of the first to put an emphasis on complex lead guitar parts and experimentation. The term, "Yardbird" is used in the southern United States as slang for 'chicken' (as in poultry), and it is a slang expression for "prisoner".
The group's move into pop outraged lead guitarist Eric Clapton, at the time a no-holds-barred blues purist, who had already doubted the ability of "nice college kids" like bassist Paul Samwell-Smith to play the "real blues". Clapton left the group in protest.
The loss could have been devastating to the Yardbirds; Clapton had already shown the striking, stabbingly virtuosic style he would later expand and deepen with Mayall and unfurl as a full-fledged virtuoso statement with the improvisational blues rock/psychedelic Cream. Clapton recommended Jimmy Page, a studio guitarist he knew (and with whom he would soon cut a series of stirring blues guitar duets, including "Tribute to Elmore" and "Draggin' My Tail"), as his replacement, but Page?uncertain at the time about giving up his lucrative studio work and worried about his health?recommended in turn his friend Jeff Beck, whose fleet-fingered style and bent for experimentation pushed the Yardbirds to the direction from which they became widely credited for opening the door to "psychedelic" rock. Beck played his first gig with the Yardbirds only two days after Clapton's departure.
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