Guitar great Jeff Beck was impressed with the Wick Assembly Rooms when he played there with The Yardbirds
JEFF Beck was widely regarded as one of the most influential guitarists in rock music, was critically acclaimed and received numerous awards during a long and very successful career.
Beck, who died last month at the age of 78, played all over the world in various groups and as a solo performer but in 1965 he was a member of The Yardbirds and was in Wick with the band to perform at the town’s Assembly Rooms.
Before they went on stage Beck and other members of the group went to the local music shop to sign copies of their latest single, For Your Love.
In the evening they played before delighted fans and Beck was much impressed by the venue, saying it was one of the best he had experienced because of the excellent acoustics. The remark did not go unnoticed and helped attract other well-known names to the far north at that time with chart-topping acts like The Troggs playing at the Caithness venue.
The Yardbirds were one of the most innovative of British groups in the 1960s and had three of the UK’s best guitarists at one time or another with Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page all featuring in the band.
On the night they played in Wick, they were backed by local band The Aktual Fakts. According to Steven Cashmore in his Northlands Rock articles, the usual format back then was for the star act to play for about 45 minutes with local support group opening and closing the show.
The Aktual Fakts played the first set, described as “a good warm up session of hard driving beat and rhythm and blues. Then the Yardbirds came on to perform all their well known numbers.
But when it was time for The Aktual Fakts to return their singer Dennis Thompson was unable to return for the second half so band member Johnny Sutherland took over. Even without their regular frontman, the band were complimented on their performance by Yardbirds rhythm guitarist Chris Dreja.
However, according to Cashmore, “Jeff Beck’s performance, his dazzling technique, his creative use of feedback, his improvisational skills had both inspired and demoralised Johnny. Faced with the stark choice of giving up or totally changing his technique, Johnny opted for the latter. “
Later that year the Aktual Fakts split up. Johnny Sutherland and Sonny Flaws, drummer Graham Walker and vocalist Ronnie Barnett became The Fragments, “abandoning hit parade pop for a more savoury diet of blues, R&B and proto-heavy rock,” playing The Yardbirds, The Who, The Byrds, and similar groups.
Jeff Beck came to national prominence when he replaced Eric Clapton in The Yardbirds and afterwards founded and fronted the Jeff Beck Group and Beck, Bogert & Appice. In 1975, he switched to an instrumental style with focus on an innovative sound, and his releases ranged from blues rock, hard rock and jazz fusion. Over the years he recorded with many artistes.
He was described as “one of the most influential lead guitarists in rock” by the Rolling Stone magazine and was often called “a guitarist’s guitarist.”
Beck earned wide critical praise and received the Grammy Award for Best Rock Instrumental Performance six times and Best Pop Instrumental Performance once. In 2014, he received the British Academy’s Ivor Novello Award for Outstanding Contribution to British Music. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice: first as a member of The Yardbirds (1992) and secondly as a solo artist (2009).
He died on 10 January 2023, at the age of 78 and received glowing tributes from throughout the music world, including Jimmy Page, Mick Jagger and Ronnie Wood. Page said Beck’s guitar technique was “unique” while Jagger described him as “one of the greatest guitar players in the world.” Wood, a former bandmate of Beck’s, said: “ I feel like one of my band of brothers has left this world, and I’m going to dearly miss him.”