Truth: Remastered [Original recording remastered, Extra tracks]

The woman in our local corner shop often has her Rod Stewart T-shirts on.
"Have you got the Jeff Beck albums yet?" I ask.
She smiles benignly as if to say; "Idiot! What would my Roddy be doing on a Jeff Beck album, I do wish he'd stop asking me that!"
Jeff Beck's first album after leaving The Yardbirds, and after enjoying (?) 2 or 3 chart singles on which HE took the lead vocals this album was an absolute blessing to hear; this was what we expected from a band fronted by him! And yes, regardless of my disbelieveing corner shop lady, her Roddy sings on all the original album tracks, and makes an especially fine job on every one of them, and would surprise quite a few of those disbeliever's in the process with 'Ol Man River' for starters.
And as if the first 10 tracks were not enough for a more than satisfying first album from The Jeff Beck Group, here we have 8 bonus tracks consisting of B-sides, mono mixes, AND Jeff's 3 chart singles in 'Hi-Ho Silver Lining,' 'Tallyman' and the totally instrumental 'Love Is Blue.'
We must be grateful that we had TWO albums from this band before Rod and Ron Wood split to join up with The Faces, but it was their destiny as much as it was Jeff Beck's to do his jazz-rock thing; though for most of his fans, his blues is far more to our taste and it's where he belongs.

The first version of the Jeff Beck Group existed in a transitional period in time, before bands like The Faces and Led Zeppelin came into being, and after Jeff Beck's ejection from the Yardbirds. It's all in the timing because it also followed the folding of bands like the Shotgun Express and the Birds, from which he recruited Rod Stewart and Ron Wood, then both still relatively unknown. Mick Waller on drums had known Rod Stewart from earlier Steampacket days and came to the band from the Brian Auger Trinity.

Truth was the first album by the group although it was released under the name Jeff Beck, who was simultaneously "enjoying" a solo career, masterminded by producer Mickie Most, and having hits with songs such as Hi Ho Silver Lining, Tallyman and Love Is Blue (shudder).

The truer heart of Jeff Beck was to be found on the B-sides and on this debut album, which was mostly left to Ken Scott, the engineer, to handle, whilst Mickie Most no doubt dreamt of one day discovering elfin girls in black leather cat suits with bass guitars.

After eighteen months of grafting on the road the band were pretty hot. It is a classic album, though the shortage of material does show, with versions of Ol' Man River and a throwaway filler in Greensleeves. This was inspired by Chet Atkins' version, though Mick Waller had previously recorded a rocked-up version of it for Joe Meek with the Flee-Rekkers back in 1960 as Green Jeans. Carrying on that tradition, several of the tracks are thinly disguised rewrites of well-known blues songs. Let Me Love You is essentially Buddy Guy's Let Me Love You Baby; Rock My Plimsoul is clearly BB King's Rock Me Baby (although BB himself nicked it from Lil' Son Jackson) and Blues De Luxe owes more than a little to BB's Gambling Blues.

There's also a reworking of Shapes Of Things, a Yardbirds hit that Jeff played on; a cover of Tim Rose's arrangement of Morning Dew; a version of Muddy Waters' You Shook Me with John Paul Jones (soon to be of Led Zeppelin) guesting on Hammond; and a rip-roaring rendition of Willie Dixon's I Ain't Superstitious, as recorded by the great Howlin' Wolf.

The album set a sort of blueprint for a genre that came to be known as heavy rock, made possible by developments in the technology of electrical musical instruments, amplification and recording equipment, of which Jeff and his sidemen were early adopters and experimenters. In the Yardbirds, of course, he had been a pioneer of feedback. The sound was developed on the second album, Beck-Ola, but with less light and shade than is found on Truth.

Rounding out the album is the instrumental Beck's Bolero, an earlier recording from July 1966. It had previously appeared on the B-side of Hi Ho Silver Lining and has the unique line-up supporting Jeff of Jimmy Page (12-string electric guitar), Nicky Hopkins (keyboards), John Paul Jones (bass) and Keith Moon (drums)! The tune is credited to Jimmy Page, though Maurice Ravel may have had a hand in it. On the album it is shorn of the backwards guitar part at the end but is newly mixed into rudimentary stereo.

This edition of the CD comes with 16 pages of booklet notes including an informative essay by Charles Shaar Murray, and a number of bonus tracks (all stereo except where stated): I've Been Drinking had been the B-side of Love Is Blue, and so was unlikely to have been heard by legions of Jeff Beck fans who would have avoided the single like the plague, and was an adaptation of Dinah Washington's Drinking Again. There are the first takes of All Shook Up and Blues De Luxe, the latter without the fake live effects that were overdubbed to the eventual master; the excellent 1967 single Tallyman (in mono) and its B-side, an earlier recording of Rock My Plimsoul, both from a time when Aynsley Dunbar was the drummer; and Hi Ho Silver Lining, first recorded by the Attack, and its B-side, the original mono, backward guitar mix of Bolero.

Finally, it includes the dreaded Love Is Blue (in mono). Where to begin with this blot in Jeff Beck's discography? It began life as L'Amour Est Bleu by the Paul Mauriat Orchestra, and with words added became Luxembourg's 1967 entry in the Eurovision Song Contest as sung by Vicky Leandros. It came fourth but was popular enough to be recorded by the likes of Andy Williams and Claudine Longet. It falls way outside Jeff Beck's comfort zone and suggests that Mickie Most must have had a very persuasive tongue.

Although everything that has been said in the other reviews is absolutely true, what hasn't been mentioned is the degree of light and shade within the album. Ol' Man River is not an obvious choice for a heavy rock band, yet the performance is surperb, with masterful vocals and some tasty slide playing from Beck. The canned applause on Blues Deluxe is a little irritating, but the execution is excellent once again. Beck's acoustic performance of Greensleaves is a nice change of pace, while Beck's Bolero shows the sheer musicality of the band and their collaborators (Jimmy Page and Keith Moon on this particular track). There's good stuff in the bonus tracks especially I've Been Drinking. It's worth pointing out that this should probably be seen as a band album, with Beck first among equals. Rod Stewart's contribution is just to important to be ignored, and his phenomenal singing throughout just goes to show that he wasn't always naff. An excellent album, with some worthwhile bonus tracks.