Best known now, sadly, for being responsible for Led Zeppelin, The Yardbirds were arguably the first real rock band, as they went from speedy, authenticity-obsessed blues with Eric Clapton, then into gorgeous beat music, then astonishing psychedelic guitar pop with Jeff Beck, and finally, after a Mickie Most-directed flirtation with the kind of kiddie-pop that even a young David Bowie might have baulked at, into the riff-powered post-blues overdriven sound that would comprise most rock bands’ output in the 1970s.
While their 60s colleagues all experimented with sound, none of them were so guitar-fixated as this group and, though they lacked a great songwriter like the Stones, The Who and The Kinks had, The Yardbirds were unfazed, mostly using songs as launch pads for extraordinary guitar workouts in the way modern jazz artists took pop standards into new dimensions.
