THE YARDBIRDS IN SWITZERLAND

We were also to beginning to venture overseas, with a couple of the earliest shows taking place on a strange trip to Ascona, Switzerland - Giorgio grew up in that country, and his son Sergio still lived there, so Giorgio had a lot of contacts there. With Bill Relf (Sam’s note: father of Yardbirds singer Keith Relf, and driver of the Yardbirds in their early days), as always, at the wheel, we made the trip in the same old van that had dragged us around the UK, and Bill didn’t adapt his driving style, either. Hairpin bends held no fear to him; nor those endless stretches of road that -  shades of my long-ago railway journey - seemed to be suspended in mid-air with a deathly drop awaiting careless drivers.

How we huddled together in the back of the van, white faced and praying, and barely daring to breathe, all convinced that,  any moment, we would be soaring into oblivion. If only Keith had been with us - he’d spent his entire life driving with his father, and he was totally inured to it. But he was in the West Middlesex Hospital, having a lung removed, so we’d brought Mick O’Neill to stand in for him.

We received a fine welcome, when we got there, though. Giorgio had arranged for a busload of fans from the Crawdaddy, every one of them female, to be at the show to greet us.

From Jim’s autobiographical Book „Nobody Told Me“, released in May 2018.