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The British Invasion, Part III: The Blues Invasion

© Robert Whillans

Last time, we looked at the British Invasion and all the mainstream pop groups that followed it. This week, we take a look at the more blues-related artists that broke into the United States at around the same time. These groups were less known be the general public at the time, but had a strong base of hardcore blues fans that followed them throughout their early careers. Many of them became famous. Many of them became only one hit wonders. Whatever the result of their careers, the impact they had on rock can't be disputed.

Eric Clapton is known to nearly all as one of the greatest blues guitarists ever. Nearly all of his groups and solo albums have been blues-based. Jimmy Page, while not quite as loyal to the blues, became famous for his riffs and solos reminiscent of B.B. King and Muddy Waters. Jeff Beck is yet another guitarist who became famous for the blues. What would you get if you put them all together (at different times, granted)? The Yardbirds. Formed in 1963, The Yardbirds were then named the Metropolitan Blues Quartet. After covering Billy Boy Arnold's "I Wish You Would", the toured with Sonny Boy Williamson the same year in England. Later that year, they charted with "Good Morning Little Schoolgirl". In 1965, Eric Clapton left them because he felt that they were deserting the pure blues. They then added Page and Beck and scored such Top Ten Hits in the US and UK as "For Your Love" and "Heart Full Of Soul", and the next year with "Shapes Of Things" and "Over Under Sideways Down". Eventually they moved on to other things (Cream, Led Zeppelin, The Firm, etc. It's always nice to have a backup plan.)

The longest lasting of the UK blues groups (aside from the Stones) was probably The Kinks, formed in 1963 by Ray and Dave Davies, Peter Quaife and Mike Avory, all blues fans. Their first release, Little Richard's "Long Tall Sally" was a flop, but in 1964, they topped the charts with "You Really Got Me" and, later, "All Day And All Of The Night". Their power-chord driven distorted guitar laid the ground works for the heavy metal of the seventies and eighties. Ray Davies grew as both a songwriter and a vocalist, and the band's sound progessed as well. They went pop wth "Waterloo Sunset" and "sunny Afternoon", and discoverd politicism withThe Village Green Preservation Society and Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire). Most of the seventies were dedicated to concept albums, but they were successful again in the late seventies and early eighties with "A Rock 'n' Roll Fantasy" and "Come Dancing".

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