Of the three lead guitarists spun off of the Yardbirds, Jeff Beck had the most varied and difficult journey. While Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page worked within band contexts in their post-Yardbirds careers, Beck, who logged the most time in the band, went straight into his solo career with this, his first album.
Although the album enjoys generally high reviews, I've always seen it as a bit of a mess. This probably has its roots in the singles between the last Yardbirds recordings with Beck and this album, which has generally sweet A-sides backed with gritty B-sides. Generally the latter sound is in charge here, though it doesn't always work so well. Case in point with the opening track, a re-working of "Shapes of Things". I'm not a huge Rod Stewart fan, but it feels like a plodding clunky version of the original. From there it bounces around blues numbers and odd cover choices. None of the songs are bad, but the order can be jarring at times. Especially near the end, with the crescendo of "Beck's Bolero" everything else feels tame.
The Rod Stewart-Jeff Beck era ended the following year after the brief Beck-Ola and half of the old Jeff Beck Group would be mainstays in the Faces in the new decade before storming off into solo careers and, in Ronnie Wood's case, the Rolling Stones. For such a blues-driven debut that gave very little thought to the weakening psych rock scene of 1968, Beck himself would wander into more jazzy territory in the 1970's. Although he lent his services to many other musicians, he never fully immersed himself into any band identity (I think Deep Purple tried twice with no such luck - not sure that would have been good for anyone's health in hindsight).
I don't know why I don't have more Jeff Beck stuff. There's a lot of good albums out there and many are closely linked to other albums I have and enjoy.
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