YARDBIRDS Lp Original Epic 24210, in Shrink, Fantastic Condition
$
31
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Description
Record...excellent a few marks, super clean copy.
Cover...NM in shrink
The Yardbirds are an English rock band, formed in London in 1963. The band's core lineup featured vocalist and harmonica player Keith Relf, drummer Jim McCarty, rhythm guitarist/bassist Chris Dreja and bassist/producer Paul Samwell-Smith. They worked with several lead guitarists, launching the careers of Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck, all of whom ranked in the top five of Rolling Stone magazine's list of 100 greatest guitarists.[4] The band had a string of hits throughout the mid-1960s, including "For Your Love", "Heart Full of Soul", "Shapes of Things" and "Over Under Sideways Down".
A blues-based band noted for their signature "rave-up" instrumental breaks,[5] the Yardbirds broadened their range into pop, pioneering psychedelic rock and early hard rock; and contributed to many electric guitar innovations of the mid-1960s, such as feedback, distortion and "fuzztone".
The band's influence on both the music of the times and genres to come was great, and they inspired a host of imitators such as the Count Five and The Shadows of Knight.[6] Rock critics and historians credit the Yardbirds with heavily contributing to, if not inventing, "the birth of psychedelic music"[7] and sowing the seeds of punk rock, progressive rock and heavy metal, among other genres.[6][5]
Following the band's split in 1968, Relf and McCarty formed Renaissance and guitarist Jimmy Page formed what became Led Zeppelin.
The band were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992.[8] They were included in Rolling Stone's list of the "100 Greatest Artists of All Time", and ranked No. 37 on VH1's 100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock.[9][10]
The Yardbirds reformed in the 1990s, featuring drummer Jim McCarty and rhythm guitarist/bassist Chris Dreja as the only original members of the band. Dreja left the band in 2012, leaving McCarty as the sole original member of the band present in the lineup.
Beginnings
The band formed in the south-west London suburbs in 1963. Relf and Samwell-Smith were originally in a band named the Metropolitan Blues Quartet. After being joined by Dreja, McCarty and Top Topham, they performed at Kingston Art School in late May 1963 as a backup band for Cyril Davies. Following a couple of gigs in September 1963 as the Blue-Sounds, they changed their name to The Yardbirds, either an expression for hobos hanging around rail yards or prisoners hanging around a prison yard; and a reference to seminal jazz saxophonist Charlie "Yardbird" Parker.
The quintet achieved notice on the burgeoning British rhythm and blues scene when they took over as the house band at the Crawdaddy Club in Richmond, succeeding the Rolling Stones. Their repertoire drew from the Chicago blues of Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, Bo Diddley, Sonny Boy Williamson II and Elmore James, including "Smokestack Lightning", "Good Morning Little School Girl", "Boom Boom", "I Wish You Would", "Rollin' and Tumblin'", "Got Love if You Want It" and "I'm a Man".
Original lead guitarist Topham left and was replaced by Eric Clapton in October 1963. Crawdaddy Club impresario Giorgio Gomelsky became the Yardbirds manager and first record producer. Under Gomelsky's guidance the Yardbirds toured Britain as the back-up band for blues legend Sonny Boy Williamson II in December 1963 and early 1964,[11] recording live tracks on Dec. 8 and other dates. The recordings would be released two years later during the height of the Yardbirds popularity on the album Sonny Boy Williamson and The Yardbirds.[12]
After the tours with Williamson, the Yardbirds signed to EMI's Columbia label in February 1964, and recorded more live tracks March 20 at the legendary Marquee Club in London. The resulting album of mostly rhythm and blues covers, Five Live Yardbirds, would not be released by Columbia for another nine months, and it failed to enter the U.K. album charts.[13] Over time Five Live would gain stature as one of the few quality live recordings of the era, and as a historical document of both the British "rock and roll boom" in the 1960s and Clapton's time in the band.[14]
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