'Shapes of Things is the product of pressure and frantic forward motion: pop modernism at its height. Beginning with a warning rumble, it settles into a stiff, martial rhythm. Keith Relf intones the philosophical lyrics - 'Shapes of things before my eyes / Just teach me to despise / Will time make man more wise?' - while Jeff Beck lets off constant feedback drones...
The song is a mixture of idealism, contempt and shame. The lyrics touch on ecology and the nature of perception itself. The message is conveyed through Jeff Beck's Indian-toned guitar, which rumbles, sizzles and soars in the brief instrumental break; the song fades out on sitar-like fizzes that match the Near Eastern harmonies of the final chorus.
A March 1968 live version of the song from the Anderson Theater in New York featuring Jimmy Page.
On the flip side of the British 45 was another groundbreaking song. Written by Manfred Mann drummer Mike Hugg and recorded at Sun Studios, 'You're a Better Man Than I' was a finger pointing classic, tackling racism, militarism and tolerance in three short verses. 'Can you judge a man / by the way he wears his hair?' intoned Relf, before Beck cut the song in half with a raga-like solo.
'Shapes of Things' was an outrageous but highly successful record - it eventually reached # 3 in the Record Retailer chart - that tapped into the new kind of audience that Mick Jagger had already observed. Primed by folk in general and Bob Dylan in particular, a section of the teenage market was now ready for thoughtful, open-ended songs that reflected a new and critical - if not transcendent - perception. Not for nothing did the Yardbirds typify their songs as 'images in sound.'
Jon Savage 1966
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