Beck ranked in the top five of Rolling Stone and other magazine's list of 100 greatest guitarists. He was often called a "guitarist's guitarist". Rolling Stone describes him as "one of the most influential lead guitarists in rock". Although he recorded two hit albums (in 1975 and 1976) as a solo act, Beck did not establish or maintain the sustained commercial success of many of his contemporaries and bandmates.
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. Beck was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice: as a member of the Yardbirds (1992) and as a solo artist (2009).
Beck was born on 24 June 1944 to Arnold and Ethel Beck at 206 Demesne Road, Wallington, England. As a 10-year-old, Beck sang in a church choir. He attended Sutton Manor Schoo and Sutton East County Secondary Modern School.
Beck cited Les Paul as the first electric guitar player who impressed him. Beck said that he first heard an electric guitar when he was 6 years old and heard Paul playing "How High the Moon" on the radio. He asked his mother what it was. After she replied it was an electric guitar and was all tricks, he said, "That's for me". Cliff Gallup, lead guitarist with Gene Vincent and the Blue Caps, was also an early musical influence, followed by B.B. King and Steve Cropper. Beck considers Lonnie Mack "a rock guitarist [who] was unjustly overlooked [and] a major influence on him and many others."
As a teenager he learned to play on a borrowed guitar and made several attempts to build his own instrument, first by gluing and bolting together cigar boxes for the body and an unsanded fence-post for the neck with model aircraft control-lines and frets simply painted on.
Upon leaving school, he attended Wimbledon College of Art, after which he was briefly employed as a painter and decorator, a groundsman on a golf course and a car paint-sprayer. Beck's sister Annetta introduced him to Jimmy Page when both were teenagers.
Beck stopped regular use of a pick in the 1980s. He produces a wide variety of sounds by using his thumb to pluck the strings, his ring finger on the volume knob and his little finger on the vibrato bar on his signature Fender Stratocaster. By plucking a string and then 'fading in' the sound with the volume knob he creates a unique sound that can resemble a human voice, among other effects. He frequently uses a wah-wah pedal both live and in the studio. Eric Clapton once said, "With Jeff, it's all in his hands".
Along with Stratocasters, Beck occasionally played Fender Telecaster and Gibson Les Paul models as well. His amplifiers were primarily Fender and Marshall. In his earlier days with the Yardbirds, Beck also used a 1954 Fender Esquire guitar (now owned by Seymour W. Duncan, and housed in the Cleveland Rock and Roll Hall of Fame) through Vox AC30s. He also played through a variety of fuzz pedals and echo units along with this set-up and has used the Pro Co RAT distortion pedal. The pickup was based on a Gibson pickup rewound by Duncan and used in a salvaged Telecaster dubbed the "Tele-Gib" which he had constructed as a gift to Beck. Scott Morgan of the Rationals, who at one point shared a dressing room with the Yardbirds, recalls how Beck amplified his lead guitar through a Vox Superbeetle while using banjo strings for the unwound G string on his guitar because "they didn't make sets with an unwound G at that point."
During the ARMS Charity Concerts in 1983 Beck used his battered Fender Esquire along with a 1954 Stratocaster and a Jackson Soloist. On Crazy Legs (1993) he played a Gretsch Duo Jet, his signature Stratocaster and various other guitars. In 2007, Fender created a Custom Shop Tribute series version of his beat-up Fender Esquire as well as his Artist Signature series Stratocaster.
Described by Rolling Stone as "one of the most influential lead guitarists in rock", Beck cited his major influences as Les Paul, the Shadows, Cliff Gallup, Ravi Shankar, Roy Buchanan, Chet Atkins, Django Reinhardt, Steve Cropper and Lonnie Mack. Of John McLaughlin, Beck said: "[he] has given us so many different facets of the guitar and introduced thousands of us to world music, by blending Indian music with jazz and classical. I'd say he was the best guitarist alive."
According to musicologist and historian Bob Gulla, Beck is credited for popularising the use of audio feedback and distortion in rock guitar. Prior to Beck's arrival, guitar playing generally conformed to the "clean, bright, and jangly" sounds of early-1960s British Invasion bands or the bluesy aesthetic of 1950s African-American performers like Muddy Waters and Bo Diddley. During his short time with the Yardbirds, Beck's experimentation with feedback, distortion, and "fuzz" tone "pushed the band into directions that would open the door for psychedelic rock" while "jolt[ing] British rock forward", according to Gulla. While Beck was not the first rock guitarist to experiment with electronic distortion, he nonetheless helped to redefine the sound and role of the electric guitar in rock music. Beck's work with the Yardbirds and the Jeff Beck Group's 1968 album Truth were seminal influences on heavy metal music, which emerged in full force in the early 1970s. Gulla identifies one of Beck's characteristic traits to be his sense of pitch, particularly in exercising the whammy bar to create sounds ranging from "nose-diving bombs to subtle, perfectly pitched harmonic melodies".
According to guitarist and author Jack Wilkins, Beck is regarded alongside Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton as one of his generation's greatest guitarists, receiving praise for his technical skill and versatile playing. Stephen Thomas Erlewine finds him to be "as innovative as Jimmy Page, as tasteful as Eric Clapton, and nearly as visionary as Jimi Hendrix", although unable to achieve their mainstream success, "primarily because of the haphazard way he approached his career" while often lacking a star singer to help make his music more accessible. On his recorded output by 1991, Erlewine remarked that "never has such a gifted musician had such a spotty discography", believing Beck had largely released "remarkably uneven" solo records and only "a few terrific albums". In Christgau's Record Guide (1981), Robert Christgau essentialised Beck as "a technician" and questioned his ability to "improvise long lines, or jazz it up with a modicum of delicacy, or for that matter get funky", although he later observed a "customary focus, loyalty, and consistency of taste".
In 2015, Beck was ranked No. 5 in Rolling Stone' magazine's list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists". In an accompanying essay, guitarist Mike Campbell applauded Beck for his "brilliant technique" and "personality" in his playing, including a sense of humor expressed through the growl of his wah-wah effects. Campbell also credited Beck with expanding the boundaries of the blues, particularly on his two collaborations with Stewart.
Love Is Blue
Jeff Beck Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
A little time to think things over
I better read between the lines
In case I need it when I'm older
This mountain I must climb
Feels like the world's upon my shoulders
Through the clouds I see love shine
In my life there's been heartache and pain
I don't know if I can face it again
I can't stop now, I've traveled so far
To change this lonely life
I want to know what love is
I want you to show me
I want to feel what love is
I know you can show me
I'm gonna take a little time
A little time to look around me
I've got nowhere left to hide
It looks like love has finally found me
In my life there's been heartache and pain
I don't know if I can face it again
Can't stop now, I've traveled so far
To change this lonely life
I want to know what love is
I want you to show me
I want to feel what love is
I know you can show me
Jeff Beck's "Love Is Blue" is a song about wanting to understand love. The lyrics describe the singer's need to take time and analyze their past experiences in order to better understand and appreciate love, which they see as shining through the clouds and keeping them warm during tough times. The singer acknowledges that they've faced heartache and pain before but feels compelled to keep going, driven by the desire to change their lonely life.
Throughout the song, the singer speaks of wanting to know, feel and experience love. They are open to love, having searched for it for so long and realizing that they've finally found it. Overcoming heartache and pain is only possible with the experience of true love. The desire to feel love is so strong that the singer begs the listener to show them the way.
In "Love Is Blue," Jeff Beck has created a beautiful and emotional song that speaks to the universal human experience of wanting to love and be loved.
Line by Line Meaning
I gotta take a little time
I need to step back and reflect on my life
A little time to think things over
I need to assess my thoughts and feelings
I better read between the lines
I need to look for hidden meanings and messages
In case I need it when I'm older
So I can use it as a lesson in the future
This mountain I must climb
The challenges I must face feel enormous and never-ending
Feels like the world's upon my shoulders
I feel weighed down by my responsibilities and burdens
Through the clouds I see love shine
Despite the difficulties, love provides me with hope and comfort
It keeps me warm as life grows colder
Love is a source of warmth in difficult times
In my life there's been heartache and pain
I've experienced difficult times filled with sadness and grief
I don't know if I can face it again
I'm not sure if I have the strength to handle more pain
I can't stop now, I've traveled so far
I've come too far to give up now
To change this lonely life
I want to escape my current state of loneliness
I want to know what love is
I want to understand the meaning of love
I want you to show me
I need someone to help me understand love
I want to feel what love is
I want to experience love for myself
I know you can show me
I have faith that someone can teach me about love
I'm gonna take a little time
I will set aside the time necessary to better myself
A little time to look around me
I will take a moment to appreciate the world around me
I've got nowhere left to hide
I can no longer run away from my problems
It looks like love has finally found me
It seems as though love has come into my life
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group, Warner Chappell Music, Inc.
Written by: Michael Leslie Jones
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
@officialronaldmoger
@Hartholz 701 Blue, blue, my world is blue
Blue is my world, now I'm without you
Grey, grey, my life is grey
Cold is my heart since you went away
Red, red, my eyes are red
Crying for you alone in my bed
Green, green, my jealous heart
I doubted you and now we're apart
When we met, how the bright sun shone
Then love died, now the rainbow is gone
Black, black, the nights I've known
Longing for you, so lost and alone
Gone, gone, the love we knew
Blue is my world, now I'm without you
Red, red, my eyes are red
Crying for you alone in my bed
Green, green, my jealous heart
I doubted you and now we're apart
When we met, how the bright sun shone
Then love died, now the rainbow is gone
Black, black, the nights I've known
Longing for you, so lost and alone
Blue, blue, my world is blue
Blue is my world, now I'm without you
Grey, grey, my life is grey
Cold is my heart since you went away
Blue, blue, my world is blue
Blue is my world, now I'm without you
Blue is my world, now I'm without you
@armbreaker
Almost haunting now to hear this, and I love it. RIP Jeff Beck
@deeg8849
RIP Jeff Beck. Always loved this tune.
@rodrigooyarzun7974
Grande jeff, un genio, todo ese momento y paul muruan bello.. Nunca había escuchado esta versión. Gracias
@sararichmond8476
I remember it playing while I was painting in my room. Not what I expected from the almighty Jeff.
@randycox3522
That's Jeff Beck!
@carolinewoodward1016
@@randycox3522 Yes
@georgemmccormick3368
My favorite instrumental and lyrics of all time.
@GreenerHill
We're not "supposed" to like this, but I love it!
@steinarmogen3166
As a huge fan of both Eurovision and rock music generally, I find it great that he has done this cover version. A beautiful song, both as the original from Eurovision 1972 - and in this cover version
@steinarmogen3166
@@officialronaldmoger Yep, of course you are right - 1967 :) All of us ESC-fans probably know that. I just mixed up with the other year V. Leandros took part