Jeff Beck and John Farrar

[StuartD]

HI

I bought the Jeff Beck Tribute to Les Paul on Blu-Ray. Jeff plays an amazing version of Sleepwalk - it sounds like Santo and Johnny- and Apache as well as lots of Rockabilly and Les and Mary stuff with Imelda May.

Looking through the 'Extra Features' there is one showing the setting up of the gig - it was at the Iradium Club in New York - and they were interviewing people going into the show. Who should pop up but John Farrar who described Jeff as his idol!!

I well remember having a discussion with John in the early 1970's and he said that when the saw the Yardbirds on TV, Jeff's solo in Shapes of Things really blew him away. He said it changed how he played and he couldn't really believe what he was seeing!!

So he's still a big fan even after all this time!!

Regards

Stuart

[JimN]

I think Jeff's playing with The Yardbirds was having that effect on a lot of players at the time. That is, early 1965 to very late 1966, with a brief resurgence of interest when the film "Blow Up" was released in the middle of 1967.

In the film, the group played a revamped version of Johnny Burnette's The Train Kept A' Rollin' in a scene which was supposed to be in the Ricky Tick Club, Windsor. The song was renamed Stroll On for copyright (read: composer royalty) purposes and it was played in the the legendary sequence where Jeff attacks a stack of Vox amps with a Hofner Senator and in which urban myth has it that Janet Street-Porter was a dancing extra in the crowd.

Apparently, the guitar smashing thing (never a feature of the Yardbirds' act) came about because the film producers originally wanted The Who, though that group didn't do the movie for one reason or another.

I still remember hearing Shapes Of Things for the first time on the radio (BBC) in about February 1966. Some of what you were hearing - especially the G G G G / F F F F chord sequence - was reminiscent of The Who's I Can't Explain and My Generation, but Jeff's solo took the record to new and uncharted territory. He repeated the feat less than a year later with Happening Ten Years Time Ago. The interim single (Over, Under, Sideways, Down) was a fair bit simpler to play (I've managed it on stage), but Jeff would ham it up in performance. He once mimed to it (on "Ready, Steady, Go!") using a wooden coathanger as though it were a violin bow, pre-dating the use of a (proper) violin bow on guitar by The Creation and by Jimmy Page with Led Zeppelin.

Jeff was also the first prominent guitarist to start using the Gibson Les Paul. Keef had used on in 1965, as had Bobby Goldsboro and John Sebastian, and Eric Clapton was about to play a Les Paul on the "Beano" album, but Jeff was the first famous guitarist to use one for the sort of astounding playing that would become more commonplace over the next few years.

[alewis41]

Thanks for the info, Stuart! Was John identified walking into the club or was he just one of the punters?

Andrew

[bgohara]

Bowie is in the audience for this gig too

[GoldenStreet]

I seem to recall a quote by Jeff Beck, back in the mists of time, to the effect there wasn't an amp on the market that suited his requirements!

Bill

[donna plasky]

I just wanted to say thank you to Stuart for mentioning this concert and for the info about John Farrar. I didn't know about either. I am looking at some videos on YouTube and this one stands out. I'm sure the whole concert was incredible. Thanks again.

Kind regards,
Donna

PS: I've just realised that this might be from a different concert. If so, my apologies.

[ecca]

Jeff Beck doesn't do much for me.......... until he straps a strat on.
By golly he's on a different planet then.

[StuartD]

Hi Donna

That is the concert!!

Regards

Stuart