MAGE MUSIC: On This Day 15 September

Tuesday, September 15, 2015

On This Day 15 September

Jam Sandwich. Yeah.

1981 15 September On This Day Jimmy Page records main title music for Death Wish II
♪ Synth Track (Jimmy Page, Death Wish II soundtrack) Soundcloud

1968 Led Zeppelin - Goteborg, Sweden at Liseberg Amusement Park (billed as The Yardbirds)
1981 Jimmy Page records main title music for Death Wish II
1998 Page & Plant - West Valley, UT at E Center

1968:

Still billed as Yardbirds.

1968 Led Zeppelin - Goteborg, Sweden at Liseberg Amusement Park

1981:
Death Wish II is a soundtrack album by Jimmy Page, released (vinyl) by Swan Song Records on 15 February 1982, to accompany the late Michael Winner's film Death Wish II. Recorded at Sol Studio in Berkshire, UK, it was the first major work Jimmy Page had done since John Bonham's death. Session drummer Dave Mattacks, who had worked with Jimmy before Led Zeppelin and was friends with Bonzo, was the drummer for the soundtrack and worked with Jimmy Page at Page's Sol Studio.

“I set up in the middle of this room. Jimmy set up a little guitar amplifier beside me initially; then at one point told me he was going to place the amp in another room. He told me, ‘I don’t want to ruin your drum sound’. I went, ‘You’re not ruining my sound; we’re working on this together’. I realized later on that he was using ambient room mics to make the drums louder and he didn’t want them to pick up the guitar; he wanted separation. He’d do a guide guitar track with me, sometimes replacing it or overdubbing numerous times…what John Paul Jones termed ‘the army’. Jimmy was using a lot of different amplifiers.
“Jimmy had just gotten the Roland guitar synth and there were occasions he couldn’t reach all the pedals and controls, so he’d be overdubbing another pedal, helping him get all these bizarre sounds, which you can hear on the soundtrack."
~ Dave Mattacks, drummer for Death Wish II, interview by T Bruce Wittet, 2012

The soundtrack was released in CD format in 1999. To mark its 30th anniversary Jimmy Page released a limited remastered vinyl edition on 1 December 2011, of 30 autographed copies and 1000 individually-numbered, non-autographed copies of the soundtrack. This anniversary version included previously unreleased material, updated artwork and new sleeve notes.

Roger Ebert gave the movie a "no star" rating (awarded only to movies that he considered "artistically inept and morally repugnant"). He didn't mention the soundtrack in his review. I've never seen the movie, but the music gets four stars from me.