Chris Dreja passed away at age 79 in London, after battling several strokes and lung disease, as his daughter Jacqueline shared with The New York Times.
Growing up in Kingston Upon Thames, Dreja was hooked on rock music as a teen, and his friendship with Anthony “Top” Topham started in an art class, which led to their first band. Soon, Keith Relf, Paul Samwell-Smith, and Jim McCarty joined in, and the group quickly became the Yardbirds after a short stint as the Metropolitan Blues Quartet. When Topham stepped out, Eric Clapton filled the gap, and the band soon snagged the Crawdaddy residency from the Rolling Stones—talk about a wild start.
Even though most people talk about the Yardbirds’ famous guitarists—Clapton, Jimmy Page, and Jeff Beck—Dreja was the steady force on rhythm guitar, making space for those epic solos and jams that shaped classic rock forever. In 1966, when Samwell-Smith left, Dreja switched to bass and kept the groove going until the band wrapped up in 1968.
Fans think it’s cool how Dreja turned down Page’s offer to join Led Zeppelin, just so he could focus on photography instead.
After the Yardbirds, Dreja grabbed his camera and shot some seriously iconic photos, including the picture of Led Zeppelin on their first album’s back cover. He snapped everyone from Bob Dylan to Ike and Tina Turner, and even did a shoot with Andy Warhol while working in New York. Sometimes life takes you in unexpected directions, right?
