{"id":320413,"date":"2025-08-05T17:55:11","date_gmt":"2025-08-05T17:55:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/320413\/"},"modified":"2025-08-05T17:55:11","modified_gmt":"2025-08-05T17:55:11","slug":"terry-reid-the-powerhouse-english-vocalist-invited-to-join-led-zeppelin-and-deep-purple-dead-at-75","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/320413\/","title":{"rendered":"Terry Reid, the powerhouse English vocalist invited to join Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple, dead at 75"},"content":{"rendered":"

Terry Reid<\/a> has died at the age of 75. This news was confirmed by his record label Cleopatra Records, a week after a crowdfunder was launched<\/a> to help pay for Reid’s medical expenses as he battled cancer.<\/p>\n

A statement from the Los Angeles label reads: “Cleopatra Records are saddened to learn of the death of Terry Reid, one of the greatest vocalists to emerge from the 1960s, and a great friend to the label as well.<\/p>\n

“While Terry is probably best remembered for the things that he didn\u2019t do – join Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple, for example, despite being invited – the career that he did follow featured highlights aplenty, and we were overjoyed when Terry joined the Cleopatra family, appearing on tributes to Pink Floyd, <\/strong>Badfinger, The Beatles and The Who, and sounding as phenomenal in his later years as he ever did in his youth.”<\/p>\n

The statement goes on to hail Reid as “one of a kind”.<\/p>\n

Terry Reid was born in 1949 in the village of Little Paxton in Cambridgeshire. He came to prominence in the early 1960s when, as a 17-year-old vocal prodigy, his first band, Peter Jay and the Jaywalkers, supported the Rolling Stones<\/a>, Ike & Tina Turner and The Yardbirds on their 1966 tour of the UK. Picked up by producer\/impresario Mickie Most, he released his first solo album, Bang Bang, You’re Terry Reid in 1968,<\/p>\n

Despite touring with Cream<\/a>, Fleetwood Mac<\/a>, Jethro Tull<\/a> and others, Reid’s solo career failed to flourish, and it’s possible he’ll unfairly go down in history as “the man who turned down Led Zeppelin<\/a>“, a description that doesn’t entirely tell the truth of the story.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was very friendly with Keith Richards<\/a> of the Rolling Stones,\u201d Reid told Classic Rock. \u201cKeith asked me to support the Stones in the States, but then shortly afterwards Jimmy [Page] wanted me to join his new band [the New Yardbirds].<\/p>\n

“I was torn. In the end, I put the ball in Jimmy\u2019s court. I said: \u2018You\u2019d better speak to Keith and tell him I\u2019m not going.\u2019 But Jimmy bottled it. He said: \u2018I\u2019m not having him shoot me in the fucking leg.\u2019 Even then, Keith had a reputation. So I ended up going to America with the Stones. I even played with them at Altamont<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Reid did, however, recommend Robert Plant and John Bonham to Page after sharing a stage with their pre-Zeppelin outfit The Band Of Joy on several occasions.<\/p>\n

Reid was offered the singer’s job in Deep Purple<\/a>, but wasn’t entirely clear about the timeline. \u201cI\u2019m not sure what frame I was in when I was asked,\u201d he told Classic Rock. \u201cI think it was when Ritchie was doing it at the beginning. Or maybe afterwards. Or maybe in between. I had gone to California.”<\/p>\n

Although Reid’s solo career never reached the heights of either band, he remained active and produced two bona-fide classic albums in 1973\u2019s River and 1976\u2019s Seed Of Memory, albums that reinforced his “superlungs” reputation, reminded fans why Aretha Franklin rated him so highly (famously, she had been quoted as saying, “There are only three things happening in London: The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and Terry Reid\u201d), and showed why Mick Jagger had flown him to St.Tropez to sing at his wedding.<\/p>\n

Neither album sold in significant numbers, and, after 1978’s Rogue Waves, he semi-retired to the Hollywood Hills, only adventuring to the studio for session work with stars like Don Henley, Bonnie Raitt and Jackson Browne. The follow-up, The Driver \u2013 featuring appearances from Enya, Stewart Copeland, Joe Walsh and Tim B Schmidt \u2013 didn’t appear until 1991.<\/p>\n

Only one more album followed, 2006’s self-released Variations On A Theme. Ten years later, he sang on four tracks on Joe Perry’s album Sweetzerland Manifesto<\/a>, the same year that The Other Side Of The River, an album of outtakes from the River sessions, was released to enormous critical acclaim.<\/p>\n

“Just like most of my albums. I am humbled by the respect it received belatedly,” Reid told us. “But you\u2019ve got to keep your sense of humour about that stuff, mate, or it\u2019ll drive you nuts.”<\/p>\n

Reid continued to tour, and was scheduled to play shows in the UK, Ireland and Norway next month, until illness intervened.<\/p>\n

“I\u2019ve always been working,” he told Classic Rock. “It\u2019s just that often I forget to tell people.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Terry Reid has died at the age of 75. This news was confirmed by his record label Cleopatra…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":320414,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3936],"tags":[77,269,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-320413","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-music","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114977447926663994","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320413","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=320413"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320413\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/320414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=320413"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=320413"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=320413"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}