The most dedicated Beatles or Rolling Stones bands likely remember the hard blues rock outfit The Dirty Mac. However, plenty of people haven’t even heard that name before. And that’s not very surprising. This supergroup was extremely short-lived, as it initially formed in 1968 specifically to perform on The Rolling Stones’ television program, Roll And Roll Circus. That would be the supergroup’s only performance, and the temporary band would come to an end shortly after.
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You won’t believe who was in this group, either. They couldn’t pack bigger musicians into The Dirty Mac if they tried. John Lennon of The Beatles sang and played rhythm guitar, Eric Clapton of Cream played lead guitar, Keith Richards of The Rolling Stones played bass, and Mitch Mitchell of The Jimi Hendrix Experience played the drums. Wow.
The Dirty Mac performed together in December of 1968, and their set was pretty incredible. Shockingly enough, even that almost didn’t happen.
The Dirty Mac Was Only Together for a Very Short Amount of Time, Culminating in an Amazing Performance in 1968
The Dirty Mac performed together for The Rolling Stones Rock And Roll Circus in 1968. Together, they performed Lennon’s contribution to The Beatles, “Yer Blues” from the White Album, as well as “Whole Lotta Yoko”. That latter song was a bit of an improv performance with a bluesier edge, and featured the vocals of Yoko Ono (then Lennon’s girlfriend) and the violin-playing talents of Ivry Gitlis.
The Dirty Mac’s performance was incredible, but surprisingly, the TV special almost didn’t get released at all. The special, which also included several appearances by The Stones, The Who, and Jethro Tull, plus others, did not air as planned. Despite my research, I couldn’t figure out why the show didn’t air as planned. However, fortunately, the video and audio of the performance were officially released decades later in 1996, along with an album and a pretty intimate home video of the event and backstage goings-on.
And by “intimate,” I mean you get to see video clips of Mick Jagger eating noodles and Lennon being Lennon backstage. It’s a cool little piece of music history, I have to say.
While The Dirty Mac didn’t last long, it wouldn’t be the end of Lennon and Clapton’s collaborations. They would work together later on Live Peace In Toronto 1969 by Plastic Ono Band.
Photo by Mark and Colleen Hayward/Redferns
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