Rolling Stone (9/28/68, p.29) - "...this album is a classic, much the way the Clapton-Mayall album [THE BLUES BREAKERS WITH ERIC CLAPTON] is....The singing is gorgeous and...first-rate throughout the album....As a group they swing like mad..."
Uncut (p.132) - 3 stars out of 5 - "Arriving a year before Led Zep's debut, TRUTH has a strong claim as the original template for what became heavy metal..."
Personnel: Jeff Beck (guitar, bass); Rod Stewart (vocals); Nicky Hopkins (piano); John Paul Jones (Hammond organ); Ron Wood (bass); Mick Waller (drums).
Producer: Mickie Most.
Reissue producer: Bruce Dickinson.
Includes liner notes by Jeff Beck.
U.K. remastered edition contains the bonus cuts "Tallyman," "Love Is Blue," "Hi Ho Silver Lining," and "I've Been Drinking."
The Jeff Beck Group's debut, 1968's TRUTH remains a stunner, probably the best work of the guitarist's long career. Perhaps energized by the bust-up of the Yardbirds, Beck is positively overflowing with ideas throughout the entire album, which pointedly starts with a completely different recasting of the Yardbirds hit "Shapes of Things." TRUTH then continues through an impressively varied set of tunes, ranging from an achingly slow, bluesy version of the Broadway standard "Ol' Man River" to a technically astounding acoustic solo version of "Greensleeves" and a killer pair of Willie Dixon covers including a take on "You Shook Me" that shreds Led Zeppelin's contemporaneous version. Throughout, the then-unknown Rod Stewart sings his heart out; he's as important to the album as Beck himself, and it's unsurprising that when Stewart and bassist Ron Wood left to form the Faces, the Jeff Beck Group never recovered.
