“Beck's Bolero” by Jeff Beck

"Beck's Bolero" is where Jeff Beck's solo story begins: an instrumental the English guitarist cut in 1966, his first recording under his own name, with stacked guitar parts riding a rhythm modelled on Ravel's Boléro. Jimmy Page plays the other electric guitar, with John Paul Jones on bass, Nicky Hopkins on piano and Keith Moon on drums, a lineup the players later agreed was a first run at what became Led Zeppelin.

The credits are still in dispute. Page is listed as sole writer, though Beck says he did plenty of the composing, and Mickie Most got the production credit that Page and Simon Napier-Bell each claim. It surfaced ten months late as the B-side of Beck's first single, then got its real hearing on Truth in 1968, still sounding ahead of its time and pointing the way to hard rock and heavy metal.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.