Friday, June 29, 2012

The Yardbirds: Jeff's Boogie

I was talking to someone this last week about The Yardbirds, one of the greatest bands from the 1960s – a band that produced the likes of Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, and Jimmy Page. Not a bad stable of guitarists. Add to those notables, the following: Keith Relf on vocals and harmonica, Paul Samwell-Smith on bass, Chris Dreja on rhythm guitar and later bass, and Jim McCarty on drums.



While they never received the notoriety of some of their contemporaries, such as The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Animals, and The Who; The Yardbirds shaped rock ‘n roll in a significant manner. In looking for a “B” side to feature, I thought I might use one of their fantastic flips.

Today’s feature, named for the lead guitarist at the time, is “Jeff’s Boogie.” The instrumental was the flip side to “Over Under Sideways Down” (probably a song that has more prepositions in its title than any other). The “A” side peaked at #13 on the Hot 100 during the summer of 1966. It includes the pre-Page lineup that had Paul Samwell-Smith on bass.  Turn up and enjoy.








3 comments:

  1. Jim - I'm surprised that you didn't note that "Jeff's Boogie" is pretty much a rip-off of Chuck Berry's "Guitar Boogie". Jimmy Page wasn't the only one to take liberties with claiming authorship of other people's songs!

    ReplyDelete
  2. And Chuck's is a rip off of Arnold Smith's "Guitar Boogie". Artists steal ALL THE TIME! Shakespeare stole all the Greek Classics sometimes down to the paragraph. Mike Jagger said the Stones stole ALL of the Chess Records catalog.

    ReplyDelete
  3. What I want to know what Django Reinhardt song is the basis for the chord progression he uses in Jeff's Boogie, I have heard the Django one before but do hot know the name of it.

    ReplyDelete