WANTED: HOT POTATO GUITARIST

It's hard to pinpoint exactly were, in the chronology of British music, the blues turned into blues rock. The Yardbirds? John Mayall's Blues Breakers? Alumni, just between the two of them, account for huge chunk of the British 70s rock icons. Eric Clapton, the first guitarist for the Yardbirds, left to join the Blues Breakers, recommending Jimmy Page as his replacement. Page declined and recommend Jeff Beck. Those movements were just part of a tangled web. When you include the next level, say the members of early Jeff Beck Group, and the early Fleetwood Mac, it expands even further. Besides those three guitarists, you can add Mick Taylor, Ron Wood, John McVie, Peter Green, Rod Stewart, and more. The personnel on the Jeff Beck Group's 1968 debut "Truth" alone included two future Faces, two future Led Zepplin members, Keith Moon and studio session icons-to-be Nicky Hopkins and Mick Waller. Yeesh!

This is just a smattering of stuff. The first two mp3s are from the 1966 archetypal John Mayall Blues Breakers with Eric Clapton LP ("Hideaway" has some mean Mayall Hammond on it). The Jeff Beck Group's "I Ain't Superstitious" (from '68) has the first line up, with Ron Wood and Rod Stewart, and is right about where Beck is starting to get a little crazy. By the eponymously named fourth album (in '72, with Bobby Tench on vocals), he'd be fully aware of how to go off (listen to the guitar on that one). I threw a couple videos down there too. The one directly below is the 1983 ARMS concert, and the first time Page, Clapton and Beck all appeared together on the same stage. It's "Layla," and I hate that song, but this one is a little beefier and a little faster. The rhythm section is Kenny Jones (the Faces, and later the Who), Charlie Watts and Bill Wyman; and Steve Winwood's in there somewhere too. The bald-ish percussion guy, banging the shit out of just about anything that isn't tied down, is Ray Cooper, who worked with Rod Stewart and Elton John, among others. (He reminds me of the Oktobefest drummer at the wrong gig at 1:25 in this video). For curiosity sake, there's a link way down there to a 1957 clip of a very young Jimmy Page playing in a skiffle band.

~ NOTE: ALL MEDIA IS HOSTED BY THE BLOGS & SITES NAMED BELOW ~

John Mayall & the Blues Breakers - Hideaway mp3 at BPFastball.com
John Mayall & the Blues Breakers All Your Love mp3 at Giant Panther
The Jeff Beck Group - I Ain't Superstitious mp3 at Snuhthing Anything
The Jeff Beck Group - Going Down mp3 at Centurytel.net
Jimmy Page in skiffle band (1957), The Huw Wheldon Show, BBC at YouTube
John Mayall & the Blues Breakers with Eric Clapton at Wikipedia
Jeff Beck Group at Wikipedia