I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: The Yardbirds are one of the most important bands in the history of rock.
Three of the most important guitarists whose influences you continue to hear in modern music are Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page. All three of these guitarists earned their stripes and established their sound in The Yardbirds.
Eric Clapton was able to find his feet in the band. He developed an intricate sound that put The Yardbirds on the map, giving him the courage and ability to further enhance his style of guitar playing in a bid to create Cream. Cream is considered by many as one of the most pivotal bands in the prog rock movement, and it was Clapton’s guitar work that helped them develop this sound.
Meanwhile, Beck was responsible for not only his excellent guitar playing style but also his endearing stage presence. Before Beck, the guitarist stood at the back of the band, providing rhythm and structure to the sound. Beck brought the guitarist to the front of the stage and showed people what kind of performance style a guitarist would have that made them more of an integral part of the performance. Before Hendrix, there was Beck.
Finally, the Yardbirds were one of the first touring bands that Jimmy Page had ever performed in. A lot of the ideas he had for Led Zeppelin were initially thought of when he was playing in The Yardbirds. For instance, when discussing the first jam he had with the band, Page said he knew the kind of tone he wanted Led Zeppelin to have because of what he had tried doing with The Yardbirds.
“I had a lot of ideas from my days with The Yardbirds. The Yardbirds allowed me to improvise a lot in live performance, and I started building a textbook of ideas that I eventually used in Zeppelin,” he said. “I wanted Zeppelin to be a marriage of blues, hard rock and acoustic music topped with heavy choruses – a combination that had never been done before. Lots of light and shade in the music.”
Essentially, if not for Yardbirds, we may not have Led Zeppelin. Who would have thought that we owe all of our rock ‘n’ roll love to one explosive argument, which caused The Yardbirds to split up one night? Jeff Beck had already tried to get Page to join the band on a few different occasions, but Page was hesitant. It wasn’t until he became an absolute necessity that Page gave in and joined; however, he wasn’t playing the instrument you would expect.
“There was an explosion one night and the producer and the bass player – the same person – called [Paul] Samwell Smith, decided to leave the band,” recalled Page. “There was a big row between him and Keith Relf, and he went off, that was the end of it, he wasn’t gunna come back in the band. They were stuck and they had The Marquee coming up.”
Page concluded, “Chris […] who was the rhythm guitarist didn’t feel confident to do the bass, so I said, ‘I’ll do it then’, and that’s sort of how it worked.” That argument marked the beginning of it all. Jimmy Page joined The Yardbirds, and the rest is rock ‘n’ roll history.
