Tuesday, August 5, 2025

Terry Reid, Storied British Rocker, Dies at 75

Terry Reid, the British rock singer and songwriter, who turned down provides to entrance Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple to embark on a solo profession that earned him the nickname Superlungs, has died. Cleopatra Data shared the information in an e mail, and Reid’s consultant gave affirmation to The Guardian. No reason behind demise was given, however Reid had been elevating funds as he obtained therapy for well being points together with most cancers. He was 75 years previous.

Terrance James “Terry” Reid grew up within the British county of Cambridgeshire, the place he shaped his first band, the Redbeats, as an adolescent. After they supported Peter Jay and the Jaywalkers, Reid was invited to hitch the extra established group. He was 16 after they joined the the Rolling Stones on tour, as a part of a assist invoice alongside Ike & Tina Turner and the Yardbirds.

When the Jaywalkers break up in 1967, Reid went solo, recorded early albums Bang, Bang You’re Terry Reid and 1969’s self-titled, and accepted an invite to hitch the Rolling Stones on two forthcoming excursions. The Yardbirds have been additionally within the midst of a break up, and Jimmy Web page, impressed by Reid’s performances with the Jaywalkers, invited him to entrance a brand new band he was forming—quickly to change into Led Zeppelin. As Reid thought-about the provide, he watched Robert Plant and John Bonham carry out as Band of Pleasure and instructed Web page rent them as a substitute. “It was an ideal mixture,” Reid advised The Impartial in 2007. “Who’s to say what would have occurred if Jim and I had received a band? It may need been a bloody failure.”

Deep Purple repeatedly requested Reid to switch their outgoing lead singer the next 12 months, however, by then, Reid was centered on his solo profession. After a celebrated efficiency on the first Glastonbury competition, in 1970, he believed his time would include the discharge of his new album, River. However when he delivered the completed LP—now a cult traditional—to Atlantic, the label noticed little enchantment in its borderless mixture of rock, blues, soul, funk, and Latin rhythms. Their reluctance to advertise the album helped confine Reid to an underground standing that caught with subsequent albums Seed of Reminiscence and Rogue Waves.

The following a long time entailed scattered work as a session musician, understanding of his adopted residence of Santa Monica. He briefly re-emerged in 1991 with The Driver, a Trevor Horn–produced album that Reid got here to hate and whose title monitor, a collaboration with Hans Zimmer, was rejected because the theme tune of Days of Thunder. He returned to front-of-stage within the 2000s, when he started a residency at Los Angeles the Joint with drop-in appearances from mates equivalent to Robert Plant—who stated on stage that Reid “may have had [his] life”—Keith Richards, and Bobby Womack.

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