Yardbirds (Roger The Engineer) (studio album) by The Yardbirds

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From teague 02/05/2021 02:32

Bit of an odd sound compared to my expectations, but I found myself enjoying it. Jeff Beck's near unhinged guitar playing on this LP is definitely a highlight.

From llibnanoon 08/19/2020 15:37

Nutz! Did not expect that. Rating (72.91)

From mdbaxter 12/12/2019 19:01

I really like this album. The guitars are the clear driving force of the album and it's sometimes hard to focus on anything else because of how good Jeff Beck is. The vocals are good and the songwriting has a whimsical element to it that gained more popularity in years to come. They were clearly trying a lot of different things when making this record as is evidenced by the litany of different sounds throughout the album. It's chaotic and fun. I find that some of the inadequacies of the recording come off as quirky. I like the poorly recorded electric guitar on "I Can't Make Your Way" for example. "He's Always There" (which would be sampled by the Pussycat Dolls some 40 years later) on the other hand suffers at the hands of poor production in my opinion. Beck's guitar could be higher in the mix on some songs. Thought neither mix is particularly great, I prefer the stereo to the mono. "Eccentric" would be good word to describe this album.

From AndrewJFisher 04/14/2019 23:16

I was a bit partial to The Yardbirds e.g "Heart Full of Soul", but didn't expect this album would be anything special, despite it being ranked in Rolling Stone mag's top 500, thought it would be standard British, '60s pop/rock, a little alien to me. I found it to be a great listen, better than much of the British pop before it and the psychedelia after it. Just better riffs, melodies, lyrics, concepts, everything. Of course it's notable that before this album, The Yardbirds' albums did not contain many of their own compositions at all. Suddenly they were releasing all originals and some very interesting ones at that, especially for the time.

A bit inconsistent but a good guitar based blues rock.

From planetneutral 01/20/2018 15:25

Not as straightforward as I expected, but not as good either.

The best Yardbirds album. Consistently good tunes and playing (Jeff Beck on lead for this edition of the group)with effective period psychedelic overtones. The standout tune is "Over, Under, Sideways, Down."

Best Track: Over, Under, Sideways, Down

From swhaze 12/24/2014 19:11

For all the praise heaped on the Yardbirds by those lucky enough to have seen them live, the band always seemed vexed by the studio.