Yardbirds.US: Press

ICONIC British rock band The Yardbirds are embarking on their first UK tour since the launch of their last album Birdland four years ago being accompanied by The Zombies.

The Yardbirds laid much of the groundwork for rock guitar as we know it today with legendary members including Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page and most recently Gypie Mayo. Together with rhythm guitarist Chris Dreja and drummer Jim McCarthy they created driving rock from a blues-based background.

Chris Dreja said: “I think the bill is very interesting with The Zombies and The Yardbirds who are both electric bands, but of different styles. I’d known Rod Argent (of The Zombies) for some years and we talked a couple of years ago about touring, but it just didn’t happen but I’m very happy to be working with them now.”

Having taken a sabbatical during most of the 80’s and 90’s The Yardbirds have reformed with new members and collecting a whole new legion of fans.

Chris said: “Obviously being originally a 60’s band there are a lot of people who were interested in us who are still around and will come, which is very flattering. But we are also getting a lot of newer fans, I guess it’s a real mixed bag - it is very nice gathering new fans at this stage in our careers. After shows we meet the audiences and it’s amazing that we have more people coming now than in the 60’s.”

In recent years the Yardbirds have played a variety of smaller summer festivals but now hope that with their upcoming tour they will be back at the front of people’s minds and will find a new fan base.

Chris said: “Judging by the festivals that we’ve played in recent years we get a fairly equal balance of fans, we played The Wicker Man festival (a large independent music festival in Scotland) and that was a whole new audience for us. We are one of the only large scale bands left and I think that gets across to a new generation of listeners. It is great to have teenagers come up to you after a show saying that you’re the best live band they ever seen.”

Chris added that he was surprised that their legacy had lasted so long because when the band ended in the late 1960’s they thought that the band would only be remembered for a few weeks rather than touring again some 40 years later.

Back when the Yardbirds were touring regularly life on the road was not as luxurious as it is now and bands were forced to do many more shows to make it, all of which were a lot more basic than the shows we see today.

Chris said: “Actually we got burned out in the 60’s with too many shows - it was very primitive then, but maybe more glamorous. Technically, in those days all of the sound came from the stage, the PA system was ineffective, now there are very advances PA desks so you can control sound and now there are much better lighting rigs, so you can put on a better show.”

Unlike other bands, the Yardbirds don’t go for over the top flashy shows and would rather let their legendary sound do the talking for them.

Chris added: “We don’t rely on pyrotechnics of anything like that, we rely on our music and the energy of the show more than others - it’s a very electric show, but there are no explosions - keeping it real is what the Yardbirds are about.”

The Zombies/Yardbirds, Sands Centre, Carlisle, Friday, May 16...
DESPITE the billing this was not a Zombies gig. Rod Argent and Colin Blunstone performed just a few numbers from that band’s back catalogue.

There was She’s Not There and a couple of tracks from the 1967 album Odessey and Oracle, which has been cited by artists from Weller to Slash as their all time favourite. But that was more or less it.

What we got instead, however, was not disappointing. There were Argent’s hits from his eponymous set up of the early Seventies, Blunstone’s solo numbers and another from the Alan Parsons Project. It’s easy to forget just how much they’ve contributed to popular music over the past 40 years.

Blunstone’s distinctive vocals haven’t diminished over time either. Sometimes there’s a sense of lost glory when artists reunite after a gap of decades. Argent and Blunstone were great then and they are now.

As are the Yardbirds. There’s no Clapton, Page or Beck on lead guitar these days, of course, but they do have a magnificent successor in the form of Ben King. Like The Zombies there are just two of the original line up left. Jim McCarty on drums and rhythm guitarist Chris Dreja.

The band’s hit singles led the way yet this is a group that’s still very much on the blues scene – they’ve just released an album of a recent performance at BB King’s in the United States.

Two bands with roots in the Sixties – but still with something to say in their Sixties.

WILL CONCHIE

Steve Winwood and former Yardbird Eric Clapton rocked the Garden Monday night.

They didn't actually bill themselves as Blind Faith.

But the band that played the Garden Monday night boasted the two most esteemed players from that sanctified '60s act, and they featured its signature material.

While the classic-rock pair in question - Eric Clapton and Steve Winwood - teased the world with a quickie warmup set at the Crossroads guitar festival in Chicago last July, they had not shared a stage for an entire evening since the dying days of Blind Faith in 1969.

The two appear again tonight and Thursday with their unnamed band at the Garden. No other dates are scheduled.

As such, the Garden shows have as much importance by definition as Cream's reunion concerts from two years ago, if not quite the earth-shattering resonance of the Led Zeppelin reunion from December.

So did the night live up to the epic expectations? In places, definitely.

Especially the Blind Faith songs. The rub is, there aren't many of them. The band produced only six in all (one a jam). Last night, the band offered four, adding a fifth piece left off the original LP (the rote "Sleeping in the Ground," instead of the far more revelatory "Sea of Joy.")

They opened the nearly 2-1/2-hour show with "Had to Cry Today" with both stars taking fierce leads.

Throughout the night, Winwood offered the more trenchant guitar work, hewing closer to the tune, while Clapton spun fancifully around it.

Winwood's voice showed no loss of its choirboy purity. The range of his vocals - the wind he can whip up - still dazzles.

On the Faith material, the players - which also included bassist Willie Weeks, keyboardist Chris Stainton and drummer Ian Thomas - cohered as an organic band. But in much of the rest, it seemed more like stars sitting in on each other's songs.

That quibble didn't hinder a rash of highlights. Winwood's highflying vocals added soul to Clapton's "Tell the Truth." The latter's solos brought Traffic's "Pearly Queen" to fuller fruition. And for Jimi Hendrix's "Little Wing," they both fell utterly into sync.

Peaks that stellar allowed the show's more workmanlike moments to be forgiven, and made one hope we don't have to wait another 40 years to see these two hook up again.

Live At BB Kings-The Yardbirds

I was lucky enough to attend a Show at the very end of the same Tour that this Recording is from. South Lake Tahoe, is one of the current Band's favorite stops, and I'll be there when this Great Group returns here.

The Yardbirds are BACK, and they meen business. This Combination of Players {Two Seasoned Veterans and Three Exciting New Players} is a Full on Force of: Blues/Rock,Pop Greatness!

With Ben King following in the steps of Clapton/Beck and Page, the Band is at a Peak, not seen in Concert since 1966. And this CD is the Document of just what they now do every night on Stages around the World.
This is NO Tribute Band, it's The Real Deal...The Yardbirds are back, and they DO put on a Great Show!

From the Opener: "Train Kept a Rollin' thro to; "Happenings 10 Years Time Ago", the Great Classics are mixed with New Tunes. And here are 19 reasons of why anyone who has seen the Current Band is Raving about these Guys.

No, this isn't the Full Concert (That would take 2 CD's) but it is more than a Sampler of their Show. And it is the best Blues and Rock played with absolute Fire, that I have heard in years. Rock is Dead they say, Long Live Rock...Great Band, Great CD !!!

Yardbirds, Live at B.B. King's Blues Club (released 3/07): Revived bands are a tricky proposition, especially when, as in The Yardbirds' case, the original members are (with all respect) not the iconic players and singers the band was best known for. The Yardbirds defy the odds by a) boasting a singer who sounds uncannily like the late Keith Relf, only maybe even a bit more versatile; b) continuing to employ hotshot guitarists who, if they don't completely measure up to the standards of Clapton, Beck and Page, certainly don't disgrace it; and c) playing with a solid approximation of the fire and desire of the original band. The old material eclipses the newer stuff, as is nearly inevitable, but there's plenty to enjoy here. (USA Today)

The Yardbirds Reunion Jam Vol II


When Chris Dreja jumped up on stage with the Jim McCarty Band, at London's 100 Club in 1992, it was just a couple of old bandmates having a blow for Auld Lang Syne. No one, the two musicians least of all, could have imagined that, 14 years later, they would still be playing together, and driving that most sainted of all 60s icons, the Yardbirds, into the hearts of an entire new generation. That decision came later, although listening back to tapes of the show, it's hard to see how they could have arrived at any other conclusion.



The lion's share of this momentous show was released back in 1999, and quickly sold out. Volume Two, as its title might suggest, wraps up the remainder of the concert, the bits that didnt fit on last time around. But before you groan into your British Invasion teacup, there's not a track on here that didnt deserve inclusion last time around Indeed, with Shapes Of Things and Over Under Sideways Down kicking off the disc, and For Your Love and I'm A Man wrapping it up, Volume Two is arguably the stronger of the two discs.



In between times, the album powers through a frenzied snapshot of all that made the Yardbirds slice of the Sixties so memorable , a pounding 10 minute romp through Gloria, a speeding Route 66, an electrifying Talkin Bout You, and a positively spellbinding Hey Joe, caught somewhere between Jimi Hendrix's blueprint and Roy Buchanan's reinvention, and sounding just as fresh as either.



The spirit of the Yardbirds is one of those elusive beasts that almost every past member of the band has tried, at some point, to capture it primarily because, they tried too hard. McCarty and Dreja were not trying this particular night; they were just having fun. And that turned out to be the missing formula. Reunion Jam Volume Two, like the Reunion Jam that preceded it, is fun. And it sounds so much like the Yardbirds that it became them.

Jeff Beck at
Ronnie Scott's


Perhaps the greatest living guitar virtuoso, and certainly one of the most mercurial, Jeff Beck stepped back into the spotlight at the start of a brief residency at Ronnie Scott’s. The first of six shows in five nights found him revisiting the most jazz-influenced areas of his back catalogue in an unusually intimate environment. And while he directed the great majority of his efforts towards the audience seated on the left hand side of the stage, even those of us who were required to contemplate the great man’s backside for most of the evening were left in little doubt of his continuing mastery of his instrument.

With his thatch of implausibly dark hair making him look more than ever like Nigel Tufnel of Spinal Tap (for whom Beck was said to have provided the template), the 63-year-old guitarist began with Beck’s Bolero, his calling card from the 1960s, when it was released as the B-side to his evergreen (but long disowned) hit Hi Ho Silver Lining.

From there he navigated his way round the sinuous riffing of Billy Cobham’s Stratus, followed by a deliciously bluesy reading of Stevie Wonder’s Cause We’ve Ended As Lovers from Blow By Blow, the 1975 album that first sent Beck travelling in this jazz-rock direction. Combining astonishing technique with a blissful feel for nuance, he exercised an almost supernatural control of his fretboard and pickup controls. Playing with the fingers and thumb of his right hand, not a plectrum, he was able to vary tone and texture in the twinkling of an eye while turning the most complex of sequences around on the head of a pin.

During the course of an entirely instrumental set but for two numbers featuring the guest vocalist Imogen Heap, Beck was accompanied by Vinnie Colaiuta on drums, Jason Rebello on keyboards and the bassist Tal Wilkenfeld, who looked as if she should have been at home doing her homework for school the next day, but played like a monster. It proved to be one of the best bands even Beck has assembled. The collective pièce de résistance came when Colaiuta set up the super-fast double bass drum rhythm of Space Boogie and they all piled into the number with such supreme skill and exuberance that even the excruciatingly awkward time signature couldn’t prevent it from swinging. There was a standing ovation as the show ended with a version of the Beatles’ A Day in the Life, which rolled the pleasure dial all the way up to 11.

Clapton's new autobiography is getting some interesting reviews. Here's one from New York Newsday



"Clapton: The Autobiography" is a shuffling, apologetic book, the kind you'd expect from a 60-ish rock star now faced with telling the story of how his decades-long drug and alcohol dependency helped wreck numerous personal relationships. The book ends on a cheerful, triumphant note: Clapton has finally found domestic contentment with a young woman, Melia McEnery, who has borne him three daughters; for the first time, he's participating in the raising of his own children. He's clearly enjoying it immensely, and you can't begrudge him that kind of happiness. (With other women, Clapton had previously - and somewhat casually - fathered two children, one of whom, Conor, died tragically at age 4.)

But what if, despite all the confessional self-revelation here - Clapton sobered up some 20 years ago, and also founded the Crossroads Centre, a treatment center for drug and alcohol addiction - Clapton still comes off as a guy who cares more about music than he does about people? That's the sense his book leaves you with.

Clapton skims through his '50s childhood and early teenage years, explaining the pain he felt upon figuring out, around age 7, that the "parents" who were raising him were actually his grandparents. A Canadian airman had fathered him and then disappeared. His mother, Pat, 15 at the time, left baby Eric in the care of her own parents; her reappearance later in his life, after she'd begun a new family, caused him a great deal of resentment and confusion, even though he admits that his grandparents, Rose and Jack, adored him and did everything they could to make his childhood a happy one.

Clapton concedes that he was a loner as a child and a young teenager. He spent a great deal of time listening to the blues and developing a performing style that honored its tradition, going on to play in bands like The Yardbirds, John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers, Cream, Blind Faith, and Derek and the Dominoes. He describes how he felt when, in the mid-1960s, graffiti proclaiming "Clapton Is God" began to spring up around London. He admits he was mystified and a little bit scared by it. But he also admits that the acclaim boosted his ego - he'd just left The Yardbirds after the band recorded "For Your Love," a song whose irresistible pop hooks offended his blues-purist sensibilities. "There's something about word-of-mouth that you cannot undo. ... After all, you can't muck around with graffiti. It comes from the street."

But "Clapton" suggests that Clapton may have taken the god stuff a bit too seriously, at least in terms of his human relationships. His most famous liaison was with Pattie Boyd, at one time the wife of his best friend, George Harrison. He pined for her for years - and wrote what is perhaps his best-known song, "Layla," about her - although when she finally left Harrison for him, he often treated her, he admits, as a "slave cum partner." (Boyd tells her side of the story in her own recent autobiography, the much more enjoyable, and more modest, "Wonderful Tonight: George Harrison, Eric Clapton, and Me.") Clapton will casually introduce a character - generally a woman - on one page and drop her on the next, leaving us to wonder, for long stretches of the book, what might have happened to her. After he'd first started pursuing Boyd and been rejected, he took up with Alice Ormsby-Gore, a young woman from an aristocratic family; he got her hooked on heroin, and the two were together on-and-off for years. But after a few pages of rather indistinct prose about the relationship, Ormsby-Gore disappears from the book. We learn, much later, that she died of a heroin overdose in 1994, and although Clapton made some efforts to help her, there's still something a little callous about the way he assesses his advantages in the situation. Ormsby-Gore's suffering "only emphasized to me how fortunate I was in that, through all my years of drinking and drugging, I still had music." Nice work if you can get it.

That's characteristic of the backpedaling, dissembling and feeble mea culpas Clapton has to offer. He brushes off a remark he made during a 1976 concert in Birmingham, England in support of Enoch Powell, a Conservative MP whose stance on British immigration policy was clearly racist. Clapton was drunk at the time, natch; he was also, apparently, ticked off because a member of the Saudi royal family had recently tried to grope Boyd - a bit of logic that's both feeble and baffling.

Clapton clearly regrets the remark, but he doesn't completely disown it, either. "Clapton: The Autobiography" is filled with similar explanations, excuses and half-hearted apologies. It reveals Clapton as a gifted, dedicated performer and a preternaturally bummed-out guy who, admittedly, has done some real suffering in his life. But that doesn't mean he's not also a self-absorbed jerk. He can't write his way out of that.

Rockin' riffs

The riffs and melodies of "Heart Full of Soul" and "I'm A Man," among all the other hits The Yardbirds played at Monday night's Moe's Alley concert, dwell in perpetuity in my baby boomer head.

I consider myself lucky to have been listening when this musical revolution was going round the world.

The incredibly tight and intense musical dialogue the Brits were kicking back across the pond to the original American blues masters claimed many impressionable young ears and hearts back then.

To hear the music played live, even though there were only two of the original members (rhythm guitarist Chris Dreja and drummer Jim McCarty), was a very cool and fun experience.

John Idan, a very good bassist and lead singer with the group since it reformed in 1995, is young enough and tough enough looking to resemble Jeff Beck as I remember him from the late '60s.

Even though the Detroit-born frontman does not have the same role in the band as Beck did back in the day, his vocals hit the mark for the bluesy rock band's tunes.

Guitarist Ben King, youthful and strong, could play some of the same riffs as Beck, but I still wasn't convinced that he was the next big guitar guy on the block.

He hesitated a bit when it came time to express his own sound in solos. But one must remember it's a tough slot to fill following the legendary guitar holy trinity of Clapton, Beck and Page in The Yardbirds, much like subsequent guitarists in John Mayall's group after Clapton, Peter Green and Mick Taylor left.

Billy Boy Miskimmon wailed appropriately hard on harmonica while the band, with an additional percussionist, held together well through the hit-filled, one-set rave-up it played.

A couple of encore tunes, including a second Led Zeppelin song snippet following a decent sounding "Dazed and Confused" performed just prior, kept the healthy yet not sold-out crowd happy until it was time to file out into the night.

Having a Rave Up with The Yardbirds

The Red Devil Lounge, San Francisco, California

Sunday April 1, 2007

(Concert Review by Beverly Paterson – TLM Staff Writer)


It's a typical cool and breezy night in San Francisco. Those in the know have congregated at the Red Devil Lounge in San Francisco to hear the most blues wailing Yardbirds do their thing. But before the legendary British band takes the stage, a couple of local acts are schedule to play.

First on the bill is Makes Nice, whose caffeine-induced punk pose lifts the best elements of bands like The Ramones and The Parasites and injects them with a dash of pop happy seasonings along the lines of Cheap Trick and Material Issue. Every so often, a shrieking guitar solo surges forth, lending a whole other dimension to the band's rather lean and angular sound. Those jaunty hooks are arguably quite contagious. Bursting at the seams with passion and intent, Makes Nice certainly has a very promising future.

Then came The Bonedrivers, a power trio so electrifying they could light a room of candles. Dripping with self-assurance, they covered all bases, from the blues to funk to standard rock and roll. Try to imagine ZZ Top battling it out with Creedence Clearwater Revival, The Jimi Hendrix Experience and George Thorogood and The Destroyers, and that should clue you in on where The Bonedrivers are at. The band delivered boogie rhythms by the score, the drumming was explosive, the vocals were pleasingly gritty and the guitar and bass work sizzled and slinked with thrilling sensations.

By the time The Yardbirds appeared, the crowd was already dangerously on fire and the mood grew even thicker with excitement once the band began performing. Kicking off their two hour set, which included nary an intermission, to the chugging clutches of "Train Kept A Rollin'," The Yardbirds confirmed to be in flawless form right from the get go. Holding fast to the exact same feel and approach charging their classic records, the band knocked the audience to the floor with brain-bending songs such as "Lost Woman," "Over Under Sideways Down," "The Nazz Are Blue," "Shapes Of Things," "Happenings Ten Years Time Ago" and an extended version of "For Your Love" that revolved around a series of jolting breaks and exotic conga drills. A genuine psychedelic feast it was. Although rhythm guitarist Chris Dreja and drummer Jim McCarty are the only founding members in the band, each musician is absolutely phenomenal as they bring their own talents and identity to the table. They truly duplicate the emotional intensity that originally caused The Yardbirds to be so unique and adventurous.

Not relying solely on the past, the band also played some tunes from their latest and possibly greatest album, "Birdland." Spurred by edgy energy and super taut instrumentation, "Mr. Saboteur" and "Mystery Of Being" are proof in the rice pudding that The Yardbirds are just as brilliant and amazing as they were in the sixties. The vocals were spot on, the guitars swooped, soared and snarled and the frenetic tone of a howling harp was a constant presence as well. From the Box Of Frogs (an early eighties band that starred Yardbirds alumni Chris Dreja, Jim McCarty, Jeff Beck and Paul Samwell-Smith) catalog arrived the eerily bluesy "Back Where I Started," while the paralyzing pounds and stomps of "Drinking Muddy Water" and the dark and terrifying dynamics of "Dazed And Confused" shook the walls and sent chills down the spine. The Yardbirds concluded their spectacular show to the rousing reflexes of "I'm A Man" that simply left us pleading for more. If you think the band's records are remarkable, which they certainly are, seeing them live and in person is a triple revelation. The Yardbirds are a hard and heavy lot that packs a solid punch. An awe-inspiring performance from a band that will be revered for eternity.

A Celebration Of The Life Of Arthur Wood.
2007-04-17 14:23:04 -


There can be no doubt that the spirit of Arthur Wood has been exorcising some unfinished business of late. Born in 1937, he was the first child of Arthur Wood senior, a tugboat skipper who led a 24-piece harmonica band. During his lifetime, Art offered a supportive influence on the career of his youngest brother Rolling Stone Ronnie Wood, forming
Quiet Melon, a pre-cursor line-up to the Faces in 1969. Having spent his youth at the well-acclaimed Ealing Art College, Art's keen interest in graphic design and music led him towards his rightful position as a significant protagonist in the British R&B 1960's ‘invasion'. Art was an early alumni of Blues Incorporated featuring Alexis Korner and Cyril Davies, after which time he evolved his own band The Art Wood Combo into the more simply titled 'Artwoods'. Established in 1964, The Artwoods comprised Arthur Wood-vocals, Derek Griffiths-guitar, Malcolm Pool-bass, Jon Lord-organ and Keef Hartley-drums. In the Artwoods was the corpus of a band that were to make a strong and illustrious contribution to the music industry as both individuals and band mates, gaining swiftly a reliable reputation as the hardest working R&B band on the circuit.

Following his untimely death from prostate cancer at the close of 2006, Art's career was brought to a disappointingly abrupt end. A much-anticipated musical tribute to commemorate Art's life was carefully planned early this year and finally staged on 25th March at York House, Twickenham Town Hall by the Eel Pie Club. The tribute night for Art Wood was a very significant event in the musical calendar and was certainly not an understated affair. During the course of the evening, Eel Pie owners Warren Walters and Gina Way treated us to an unusually rich programme of musical spoils, comprising some five hours of educational entertainment in the talents and traditional heirs of some of the most significant players in the early British popular music scene. Kenney Jones and the ‘Jones gang' were billed next door to the Art Wood 'All-Stars' and original Artwoods, featuring Birds vocalist Ali MacKenzie with special guest Ronnie Wood. The 'house band' included an impressive cast of Eel Pie regulars Pete French (Leafhound/ Atomic Rooster), Mick Avory (The Kinks), John Idan (Yardbirds), Ray Majors (Mott The Hoople/Yardbirds), John O'Leary (Savoy Brown), Micky Waller (Jeff Beck Group), Rollin' Stoned drummer Mark Freeman and Joanne Ruocco. The only absent ingredient was a few magical moments contributed by Art himself and on reflection, we were almost certainly not deprived of just that! Art was often credited as being the life and soul of the modern day Eel Pie Island and god knows, he wasn't about the let a small material matter like his passing over separate him from those he had loved..

Yardbirds-Falls Church, Va. July 28, 2006


It often gets a laugh, news that a 1960s band is touring again. How can geezers still rock?

But with the Yardbirds, you've got to hold the chuckles.





Two of the original members -- rhythm guitarist Chris Dreja and drummer Jim McCarty -- are still with the band, but the three young musicians they've discovered clearly believe the Yardbirds remain relevant. The songs were vintage, but they were as politically current as ever, and they were performed with power and passion.

At Friday's performance at the State Theatre, bassist John Idan more than simply re-created the famous vocals of "Over, Under, Sideways, Down," "For Your Love," "Heart Full of Soul," "Shapes of Things" and "The Train Kept a-Rollin'," and harmonica player Billy Boy Miskimmin added a sonic punch not found in the original recordings.

The Yardbirds are known for discovering lead guitarists who take flight and change music -- Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck among them. They may have done it again with Ben King.

Just 22 and Tiger Beat handsome, King cuts a disquietingly similar figure to the young Beck, but even more frightening is his apparent mastery of the Fender Telecaster. On "My Blind Life," "The Nazz Are Blue" and a screaming set-closing version of "Dazed and Confused" (pinched for Led Zeppelin when Page moved on), King demonstrated an uncanny knack for making exciting blues rock.

Who cares if only two of the original remain? The band is terrific, and the songs are still great.


-- Buzz McClain

Family Tree: Birds of a Feather
(Mooreland Street MSG 1969)

There’s the Yardbirds’ family tree, and then there’s the Yardbirds’ family tree, and in terms of having something fresh to listen to, one is a lot more enjoyable than the other. John Mayall, Cream, the Jeff Beck Group, Led Zeppelin – whatever is left to be said about the monsters that once took flight from the Yardbirds’ nest? But step away from the antics of a few smart guitar slingers, and there’s an underground swirling around the band’s other members that rarely sees the daylight it deserves.

In fairness, this is less a Family Tree collection, than an anthology of Jim McCarty’s more recent, extra-curricular activities. The British Invasion All-Stars, the Yardbirds Experience and, of course, the Jim McCarty Band are the dominant names here, together with a clutch of McCarty-less highlights from the Ambulators’ tribute to ‘birds mentor Sonny Boy Williamson. Likewise, the 19 tracks turn up a mere handful of established Yardbirds classics (“Shapes Of Things,” of course, kicks it all off), preferring to mine the entire British beat repertoire of bluesy classics, R&B stompers and proto-rock howlers.

The line-up across the four acts is phenomenal – Don Craine, Phil May, Dick Taylor, Eddie Phillips, Mick Green, Matthew Fisher, Ray Majors, Mick Avory, Dave Walker … and that’s just the names that your pet goldfish would recognize. Noel Redding leads one aggregation across a dynamic “Jimi Hendrix Trilogy”; Pete French (ex-Cactus) fronts another through an incendiary “Wang Dang Doodle” and a Cream-stopping “Sitting On Top Of The World.” (Both tracks, incidentally, are previously unreleased.)

There’s no weak moments, no awkward segues, no annoying lapses. From start to finish, Birds of a Feather blazes as brightly as the blues should burn, and rocks with all the passion that the Yardbirds themselves made their own. Others among the band’s hatchlings may grab all the headlines, and make all the noise. But when it comes to actually playing the music, and making it matter, this is Year Zero.

The current lineup of The Yardbirds, which consists of only two original members, played the Stearns Square Block Party on Thursday night and no one seemed to mind the absence of the members that made the band famous.

Thousands roamed Worthington Street and squeezed into Stearns Square to witness the 90-minute set of classic rock. It may have been the largest crowd ever at the long-running concert series.




The band that helped create psychedelic rock and launch the careers of guitar legends Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck may be short on star power these days but they make up for it with a relatively fresh approach to the classic catalog.

Riding the searing guitar work of prodigy Ben King and the reverential vocals of bassist John Idan, original members Chris Dreja (rhythm guitar) and Jimmy McCarty (drums) paid homage to an era and its signature sound.

The group opened with "Train Kept A Rollin'" and received an immediate ovation from the throng, with much of the accolades directed toward the work of harmonica player Billy-Boy Miskimmin.

Idan was the focus for much of the night as he plowed through songs like "Please Don't Tell Me 'Bout the News," and "My Blind Life."

The band brought out original Animal's guitarist Hilton Valentine for a run through the Chuck Berry hit "Little Queenie" and drummer McCarty took a turn on vocals as well.

Through the heart of the set, which featured songs like "Shapes of Things, "Heart Full of Soul," and "Mister You're a Better Man Than I," guitarist King was monstrous, showcasing the talent that had Dreja comparing him to a young Eric Clapton.

Dreja pulled the crowd into the mix, leading chant of "hey ... hey" as the band worked into "Over, Under, Sideways, Down."

McCarty introduced the closing medley which included a satisfying romp through "For Your Love," and the pounding, jam-fused "Dazed and Confused."

The group was called back for an encore and Idan paid tribute to McCarty and Dreja for their contributions to psychedelic rock as an introduction to "Happenings Ten Years Time Ago," which earned the distinction as the top psychedelic rock song of all time (beating out the Beatles' "Strawberry Fields") in a U.K. poll.

The Stearns Square Block Party Concerts are held on Thursday nights in Stearns Square (between Worthington and Bridge) in downtown Springfield. The concerts are free and begin at 7:30 p.m. Next week's performance features James Cotton.

When Chris Dreja jumped up on stage with the Jim McCarty Band, at London's 100 Club in 1992, it was just a couple of old bandmates having a blow for Auld Lang Syne. No one, the two musicians least of all, could have imagined that, 14 years later, they would still be playing together, and driving that most sainted of all 60s icons, the Yardbirds, into the hearts of an entire new generation. That decision came later, although listening back to tapes of the show, it's hard to see how they could have arrived at any other conclusion.



Thelion's share of this momentous show was released back in 1999, and quickly sold out. Volume Two, as its title might suggest, wraps up the remainder of the concert, the bits that didnt fit on last time around. But before you groan into your British Invasion teacup, there's not a track on here that didnt deserve inclusion last time around Indeed, with Shapes Of Things and Over Under Sideways Down kicking off the disc, and For Your Love and I'm A Man wrapping it up, Volume Two is arguably the stronger of the two discs.



In between times, the album powers through a frenzied snapshot of all that made the Yardbirds slice of the Sixties so memorable , a pounding 10 minute romp through Gloria, a speeding Route 66, an electrifying Talkin Bout You, and a positively spellbinding Hey Joe, caught somewhere between Jimi Hendrix's blueprint and Roy Buchanan's reinvention, and sounding just as fresh as either.



The spirit of the Yardbirds is one of those elusive beasts that almost every past member of the band has tried, at some point, to capture it primarily because, they tried too hard. McCarty and Dreja were not trying this particular night; they were just having fun. And that turned out to be the missing formula. Reunion Jam Volume Two, like the Reunion Jam that preceded it, is fun. And it sounds so much like the Yardbirds that it became them.
(Available only here at www.yardbirds.us See Music Shoppe to buy or listen to tracks on the Juke Box- R.G.)

Live Yardbirds! Featuring Jimmy Page

Review by Bruce Eder

Arguably the most famous lost live album in history, Live Yardbirds Featuring Jimmy Page, cut at the Anderson Theater in New York on March 30, 1968, has been issued twice on vinyl legitimately (only to be suppressed by legal action) and innumerable times since as a bootleg. In August 2000, Mooreland St. Records put out the first authorized CD edition of the performance, and it is a complete revelation. The original master tape has been improved significantly; the absence of vinyl noise is an obvious plus, but the sheer impact of the instruments is also startling, given that the show was taped by a producer who had never recorded a rock band before, on equipment that was ten years out of date. The producers have expanded this reissue with help from a separate reference tape, an audience recording that preserved the complete unedited show; it's somewhat low-fi, but it captures material edited from the finished master, and it allows for the restoration of little nuances. Page's guitar (which goes out of tune several times) is the dominant instrument, alternately crunchy and lyrical, but always loud and dexterous; the roughness of Keith Relf's singing is also more apparent, but his shortcomings don't really hurt the music. The performance also reveals just how far out in front of the psychedelic pack the Yardbirds were by the spring of 1968; Page had pushed the envelope about as far as he could, in terms of high-velocity guitar pyrotechnics. Ironically, this album isn't quite as strong as the contemporary Truth album by Jeff Beck, mostly because the Yardbirds were still juggling three sounds: the group's progressive pop/rock past, the psychedelia of 1968, and a harder, more advanced blues-based sound. It's clear that they had few places left to go with the first two; "Dazed and Confused," by contrast, represented something new, a slow blues as dark, forbidding, and intense as anything that the band had ever cut — it showed where Page, if not this band, was heading.

Little Games- A Review
(EMI)

If you were a young James Patrick Page, session man, the years 1966-7 were a period of incredible highs and unbelievable lows. You're regarded as swinging London's top guitarist to call on when your fave-rave pop combo couldn't cut it in the studio. But you're tired of the endless jobbing and you welcome the chance to be the Yardbirds' bass player, working next to friend and hero, Jeff Beck. Ah, but Beck is disgruntled, bored and itchy to move on. One classic single ("Happenings Ten Years Time Ago") with both Beck and you on duelling psych-guitars and, woosh! The band are a four-piece and suddenly you're in the spotlight. By early 1967 you're back in the studio but, under the dread hand of grim popmeister, Mickey Most, recording lightweight pop nonsense for the forgettable (US only release) album Little Games. End of story? Not quite...

This album's been rehashed many times already, particularly as it contains some of the seeds of Page's later work with Led Zeppelin. Yet this particular package finally does away with the shoddy production of yesteryear and replaces it with sparkling clarity. This has its good and bad points. Page's sonic trickery and inventiveness (bowed strings, fuzz madness etc.) shine out in digital format, yet Keith Relf's already somewhat weedy vocals aren't helped whatsoever. Whiney is about the only thing to be said of his delivery. Yet beyond mere historic interest there is still plenty to amuse here.

Page's guitar work was pretty well up to scratch by this stage. Endless gigging Stateside had honed his psychedelic muse and the acoustic work on ''White Mountain'' (actually a copy of Davey Graham's ''She Moved Through The Fair'') was never bettered (and often recapped) in his days with the mighty Zep. Song writing, when allowed by the dictatorial Most, was much improved from the earlier blues rave-ups of their last album (Roger The Engineer). Relf's ''Only The Black Rose'' is particularly sweet, and, as extra live tracks (including the original template of ''Dazed And Confused'') and BBC sessions show, the band was as tight as they'd ever been in their Beckian heyday.

So, not the disaster that legend has it. In fact, were it not for the indifference met in the UK by late 1967, these Yardbirds may well have flown on to better things. Their last B-side, ''Think About It'', features playing every bit as explosive as anything that Page was yet to achieve. Unfortunately it came too late to save the band. This reissue goes some way in restoring an unnecessarily tarnished reputation.

Reviewer: Chris Jones

Mostly Sonny- A Tribute To Sonny Boy Williamson



Dave Walker was the voice of the 1970's and '80's British Blues Rock band, Savoy Brown, as well as having short stints as the lead singer for Fleetwood Mac and Black Sabbath. Walker began his professional music career in 1960 at the age of 15 when he played with the Redcaps, a British version of Gene Vincent and the Bluecaps, and shared the stage with the Beatles. After recording dozens of albums and touring for three decades, he dropped out of the entire music scene to lead a Spartan existence as a survivalist, living without electricity or running water. He was accepted into the Pueblo Indian culture and changed his views about life in general. Today he lives in Bozeman, Montana, and two years ago he decided to re-enter civilization by getting electricity and even a telephone, but he doesn't own a TV set and has never used a computer.
The Mostly Sonny album was initially a project of Russ Garrett, who put together the Ambulators as an all-British Blues band, consisting of members from well-known groups: Savoy Brown co-founder John O'Leary plays harp; Peter Green's Splinter Group provides Nigel Watson on lead guitar and Roger Cotton on keyboards/piano/Hammond organ; Ray Majors, who was a member of the Yardbirds and Mott plays lead guitar; from the Downliners sect come Don Craine on rhythm guitar and Keith Grant, who plays bass; Mick Avory, who came from the Kinks along with Alan Brooks and Chris Hunt, handled the drums.

When producer Russ Garrett contacted Arnie Goodman, who was Dave Walker's manager when he was with Savoy Brown, about filling the lead singer position, the choice was obvious. So for the first time in thirteen years Walker consented to participate in a full-blown record album. Dave's gritty vocals were the crowning jewel in an album representing a collaboration of musicians from four decades of British Blues. The album gives recognition to the ultimate source of their inspiration, American Blues, in the persona of Sonny Boy Williamson.

The group was assembled at Roundel Studios in Kent, England, and Walker flew in for a two-day session where he provided the vocals on all eight of the Sonny Boy Williamson songs with lyrics, plus one of his own compositions titled "Floreen." Williamson's compositions include "Nine Below Zero," "Bring It On Home," "Help Me," "Eyesight To The Blind," "Keep It To Yourself," "Don't Start Me Talkin'," "Ninety Nine," and "The Midnight Special." "Talk the Talk" is a short band jam providing interplay between the dominant harp of John O'Leary and the guitar of Nigel Watson. Vocals on the remaining three tunes are sung by their respective authors: "Miss You Too" by Keith Grant, "Soup In A Basket" by Don Craine, and "Driftin'" by Ray Majors.

The album bears the test of repeated listening easily, from the beautiful guitar work reminiscent of early Peter Green period Fleetwood Mac on the first title, "Nine Below Zero," to the familiar finale "The Midnight Special," with its honky-tonk piano. Walker's voice is holding up beautifully as he prepares to enter his sixtieth year.

Outside Woman Blues-Jim McCarty Blues Band



If someone wrote a book about British blues-rock and failed to mention Jim McCarty, the book would have a gaping hole. McCarty was the Yardbirds' original drummer, and failing to mention him would be like not mentioning Cream's Ginger Baker or Led Zeppelin's John Bonham. The Yardbirds weren't strictly a blues-rock band; many of their songs favored a haunting, quasi-Gregorian outlook. But blues-rock was an important part of what they did, and McCarty's blues-rock side dominates Outside Woman Blues. This 2002 release finds the drummer leading a quartet that is billed as the Jim McCarty Blues Band, which also includes guitarist/singer John Idan and ex-members of Mott the Hoople (guitarist/singer Ray Majors) and the Strawbs (bassist Rod Demick). Not everything on this CD is blues-rock; "Lawyers, Guns and Money," for example, is '70s-style arena rock, while the moody "Heart's Not in It" is Police-like reggae-rock. But Outside Woman Blues favors blues-rock more often than not, and all of the material is solid — that is true of the studio recordings that dominate the disc as well as a few hidden live tracks at the end (including performances of "Train Kept a Rollin'" and the Yardbirds' "Heart Full of Soul"). Overall, the sound could be described as London by way of Chicago (as in Chess Records, Muddy Waters, Willie Dixon, and Little Walter) and Detroit (as in John Lee Hooker). Is Outside Woman Blues groundbreaking? Hardly. But then, it isn't supposed to be; this CD is meant to be faithful to McCarty's history. Although not in a class with the best work that the Yardbirds, Cream, or Ten Years After had to offer, it's a solid effort that will appeal to die-hard fans of classic British blues-rock.

The British Invasion All-Stars (a review)



The British Invasion All-Stars are a 21st century band with a '60s sound, which isn't surprising because all of its members are veteran rockers who belonged to various '60s bands (some more prominent than others). In rock circles, the term British Invasion is used to describe the wave of British rock bands that made its presence felt in the '60s. Rock was born in the United States, but when the Beatles and many other British acts hit big in the '60s, it was clear that England had become a major player in the rock & roll field.

Formed in 2001, the British Invasion All-Stars boasts former-Yardbird Jim McCarty on drums and lead vocals, ex-Procol Harum member Matthew Fisher on electric Hammond organ, and Eddie Phillips (formerly of the Creation) on lead guitar. The three other members are Ray Phillips, of the Nashville Teens fame, on lead vocals, and two ex-members of the Downliners Sect: rhythm guitarist Don Craine and bassist Keith Grand (who contributes background vocals and shares the lead vocals with Phillips and McCarty). The British Invasion All-Stars' self-titled debut album, which was released on the independent Mooreland Street label in 2002, shows no awareness of the alternative rock sounds of the early 2000s; the band is totally unaffected by any of the punk, new wave, post-punk, pop-metal, or alternative rock that came after the '60s. From covers of well-known songs by the Yardbirds ("Shapes of Things") and the Who ("Shakin' All Over"), to new material, everything on the British Invasion All-Stars' first album is unapologetically '60s-minded. The CD boasts several guest musicians who have strong '60s credentials, including bassist Noel Redding (who was one-third of the Jimi Hendrix Experience) and two ex-members of the Pretty Things: Dick Taylor and Phil May.

Rockin The Garage: The Pretty Things 'n Mates with Matthew Fisher

Well, the Pretty Things are actually just Phil May and Dick Taylor; the Mates, or more precisely the Inmates, helping to fill the gaps left by missing Pretties Wally Waller, John Povey and Skip Allen. And while at the end of 1998 the Pretty Things are in the news all over again, with a live studio version of S.F.Sorrow, featuring guest Dave Gilmour a new studio album, and a European Rockpalast TV broadcast on the same bill as Van Morrison, this album from 1992 serves as a previous attempt to get back together and do what they do best ... rock.



The Pretty Things do what I wish the Stones were doing now. The musical roots are the same but the Things have loads more clout. Rockin The Garage is an excellent Rock album .

Matthew Fisher has thoroughly discarded his Procol Harum uniform and reverted to his personal favourite style. Anyone touching down on his website will read that he prefers the Stones to the Moody Blues. So this tribute to American Garage Rock was the perfect opportunity to leave the Hammond and the strings at home and stretch out on mid-sixties plastic pianos and organs. And he does it to perfection.

High point for Matthew Fisher is the well-known instrumental Red River Rock. Don't know the title? Just wait till you hear the tune ... it's instant recognition. He plays it with great swinging timing, accenting the notes just before the beat, exactly as it should be, and exactly where all the amateurs get it completely wrong. You don't play like this if you don't adore the music! It's hard to be serious about so lighthearted a ditty but Matthew really does pull this off superbly.

On the remainder of the album, of which even the total playing time is definitely retro (35 minutes!), Matthew Fisher plays far away in the background, sticking to functional piano rhythm backing or sixties-style high-pitched organ chords. His fake-suspense electric piano intro on Strychnine is classic, but it's really hard to hear piano or organ on the rest of the track. Dick Taylor is definitely hogging centre-stage here.

96 Tears has the classic sixties Vox / Farfisa transistor organ sound so reminiscent of the Doors and Iron Butterfly. You can almost hear Matthew Fisher smiling on this track...."At last a chance to play this great silly song! And the chords are easier to remember than Homburg".

So if you're looking for a new Pretty Things Rock Opera, with symphonic colour added by the famous Matthew Fisher, forget it. What you get here is a great sounding punching tribute to simple rock music, performed with lust and vigour, which just happens to have our hero playing backing and a few great leads.

If you find a copy, buy it. There apparently aren't many out there, and the collectability of the Pretty Things is set to increase with their current revival

 

The Yardbirds were doing a show with the Beatles in the mid-'60s when Paul McCartney arrived in their dressing room with a backstage surprise.

"Paul came in with an acoustic guitar and said, 'Hey, lads -- what do you think of this?'" says Chris Dreja, the Yardbirds's bass player at the time. "And he started to play a song called 'Scrambled Eggs.'"

Later, McCartney and producer George Martin would score orchestral parts to the song, a melodic ballad about a man reflecting on his younger years. "Of course, it would become 'Yesterday,'" Dreja says.

While the Yardbirds weren't around long, they made enough of an impression on the Beatles, who invited them to perform a series of shows with them in December of 1964 and January of 1965. "They dug what we were doing," Dreja remembers.

While the Yardbirds were relatively unknown, at the time, the Beatles were already a sensation. so the Yardbirds knew opening for the Liverpool band was a big break. "You couldn't go a day without hearing or seeing something in the press about the Beatles," Dreja says.

While the Yardbirds would eventually become known for having three of the greatest rock guitarists -- Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page -- in the band at one time or another, at the time Clapton was their lone lead guitarist, with Dreja playing rhythm guitar. When the Yardbirds toured with the Beatles that winter, Clapton found a lifelong friend -- George Harrison.

A few years later, Clapton would record a guitar solo for the Harrison-penned 'While My Guitar Gently Weeps.' While that solo is a legendary rock piece, when the Yardbirds opened for the Beatles, Dreja says, Clapton was a blues purist -- one who would dislike the Yardbirds hit 'For Your Love' because it wasn't bluesy enough.

"Eric is a chameleon, both as a character in many ways and as a musician," Dreja says, noting that Clapton would often change his look and musical styles through the years that followed.

Of course, the Beatles famously changed their sound through the years, and during that winter tour, Clapton and Dreja were able to witness the fruits of the Beatles' success. Between performances at the Hamersmith Odeon, Dreja remembers, the Beatles had a local car company drive a small fleet of Rolls Royces to the venue for the Fab Four's inspection.

"They had this line of Rolls Royces to choose from," says Dreja, who reunited with a reformed Yardbirds in the '90s, "and they were test driving them in the lot behind the stage." The Rolls that John Lennon chose -- and later had painted with a psychedelic design -- sold for $2.3 million in 1985.

While Dreja was one of the select few to hear 'Yesterday' in those early stages, it wasn't the only rock 'n' roll classic he'd get a sneak preview of. "I got to hear 'Stairway to Heaven' before it was released as a single -- with a few mistakes in it," he says.

What rock fan wouldn't want to be in those shoes