The story of The Yardbirds getting held at gunpoint in Rhode Island
Corruption is everywhere, and the music industry is no exception; if anything, the world of show business is the one filled with the most criminal activity. This means that there are some people high up in the industry with ties to criminal activity, so many artists have to rub shoulders with gangsters to climb to the top of the tree. This is what The Yardbirds did, and it resulted in their tour bus getting pulled over and them having a gun in their face.
The Yardbirds are arguably one of the most influential bands in rock music. While a lot of their music might fly under the radar, the fact that so many monumental musicians developed their style from them and the fact the foundation that the new wave of the British invasion would be built on was set by them means their stance in musical history can’t be overlooked.
Jimmy Page, Eric Clapton and Jeff Beck were all monumental names in the world of rock music, and it was vital for them to be in The Yardbirds to work out the kind of musicians they wanted to be. Cream wouldn’t exist without The Yardbirds. Jeff Beck wouldn’t have become the guitar-wielding inspiration he did without them. And Led Zeppelin wouldn’t be a thing without The Yardbirds. With so much of what we now know as being the pinnacle of rock resting on the band, it would have been a nightmare if the mafia backed up their murder threats when they encountered them.
Jimmy Page first worked with the manager Peter Grant, who went on to represent Led Zeppelin, in The Yardbirds. Peter Grant was able to turn the band around, get them gigs across the country and start making them some money. A lot of the antics they all got up to were fun. For instance, they met the Plaster Casters, a bunch of groupies who made casts of the erect penises of bands passing through town. However, Grant’s connections also got them in trouble.
Grant had ties with the mafia, which was good for getting the band in front of different people and getting them gigs; however, it also came with problems, namely, that the band were in ties with the mafia. For the most part, there weren’t any issues, but one day in Rhode Island, they found themselves having their lives threatened.
The one rule about working with the mafia is that you don’t keep them waiting, but that’s precisely what the band did. They turned up an hour late for a gig and were met by two Italian promoters who came onto their tour bus waving guns around and telling the musicians that they were going to die. Luckily, Grant, as someone who had dealt with the mafia in the past, knew not to back down from the threats; he stood up and faced the gunmen, saying, “You’re gonna do what?!” Things eventually cooled down, but it could have been a lot worse.
If you work as a professional musician, you’ll bump into a lot of people, and not all of those people will be nice. The Yardbirds found this out the hard way, and if things had gone differently, music today might have looked very different.
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