Читать книгу The Mojo Collection - Various Mojo Magazine - Страница 170

Record label: Columbia

Produced: Mickie Most

Recorded: De Lane Lea; November 1, 1968–April 19, 1969; Kingsway Recorders, London; May 1969

Released: June 1969

Chart peaks: 39 (UK) 15 (US)

Personnel: Jeff Beck (g, b); Rod Stewart (v); Ron Wood (b, g); Tony Newman (d); Nicky Hopkins (k, p); Martin Birch (e)

Track listing: All Shook Up; Spanish Boots; Girl From Mill Valley; Jailhouse Rock; Plynth (Water Down The Drain) (S/withdrawn); Hangman’s Knee; Rice Pudding

Running time: 30.29

Current CD: EMI 5787502 adds: Sweet Little Angel; Thow Down A Line; All Shook Up (Early Version); Jailhouse Rock (Early Version)

Further listening: Truth (1968), the band’s sparkling debut; Blow By Blow (1975), an all-instrumental effort where Beck teamed up with Beatles producer George Martin; Beckology 3-CD boxed set

Further reading: www.jeffbeck.com

Download: iTunes; HMV Digital

In retrospect, Beck-Ola is clearly the soundtrack of a band in the midst of disintegration. By 1969, The Jeff Beck Group was barely intact. The seeds of discontent had been sown after the release of Truth, when other band members complained that their credits were too small. To ensure his visibility this time, vocalist Rod Stewart insisted that the credits for Beck-Ola read: ‘Rod Stewart, vocalist extraordinaire’.

On Beck-Ola, Beck’s guitar is more combative and flinty than the sinuous sounds of Truth, but that is perhaps because the band members were constantly at odds. Prior to the band’s second tour of America in February 1969, Beck had fired and rehired Ron Wood twice and, having shown drummer Mickey Waller the door, replaced him with Sounds Incorporated stickman Tony Newman. Only Rod Stewart seemed beyond Beck’s compulsive changes. During the band’s second US tour, Beck collapsed after a concert in Minneapolis and cancelled the rest of the dates, hastening home to make another record.

‘The world was ready for The Jeff Beck Group in a way much bigger than I had imagined,’ he says. ‘I suddenly realised I had to go home and do something about it. So in four days, we nailed together Beck-Ola. The whole damn album was pretty much dreamt up on the spot. It was made in desperation to get a product out. We just got vicious on it, because we were all in bad moods, and it came out quite wild.’

In the brief liner notes, Beck became an apologist for the material: ‘Today, with all the hard competition in the music business, it’s almost impossible to come up with anything totally original. So we haven’t. However, this album was made with the accent on heavy music.’

To drive the point home, the former art student chose a Magritte print of an oversized green apple for the album cover. ‘The painting had something heavy and weighty about it. Ron Wood and I were looking through this book of Magritte, and I said, “Let’s just open the book at random and see what happens”.’

Beck sees Beck-Ola today as ‘a good reference point for where serious metal started. It may not be up to scratch sound-wise, but the riffs, the notes, the whole attitude was vicious.’