On this day 24 January

 UNDER CONSTRUCTION - links might not work properly

Smashed up but not beaten down

2009 24 January On This Day Jimmy Page visiting Myanmar

• 1967 The Yardbirds - Adelaide, Australia at Centennial Hall
• 1969 Led Zeppelin - Boston, MA at Boston Tea Party (day 2 of 4)
• 1970 Led Zeppelin - Leeds, England at University of Leeds, The Refectory
• 1975 Led Zeppelin - Richfield, OH at Richfield Coliseum 

1969 jimmy Page / Led Zeppelin Boston Tea Party

1970 Led Zeppelin Leeds University

1970 Jimmy Page / Led Zeppelin Leeds University

1975:
Jimmy Page was playing with 3 fret fingers, having slammed his ring finger in a train door in England prior to leaving for the US Tour, breaking the tip.  He was getting used to his new technique by this point, although Dazed and Confused had been dropped from the setlist because of the injury.  That song was next performed at MSG on 03 February.

1976: 
Led Zeppelin was scheduled for a show at the Rose Bowl that had been rescheduled from September due to Robert Plant’s car accident.  The recovery took longer than  anticipated, so this and other shows through the middle of March were rescheduled to later dates or, like the Rose Bowl stadium gig, cancelled.

2009 Jimmy Page passport stamp

2019

♪

♪  Rock And Roll (Led Zeppelin, Richfield OH 1975) YouTube
♪  In My Time of Dying (Led Zeppelin, Richfield OH 1975) YouTube
♪  The Song Remains the Same - Led Zeppelin, Richfield OH 1975) YouTube
♪  Trampled Under Foot - Led Zeppelin, Richfield OH 1975) YouTube

♪ Led Zeppelin, Richfield/Cleveland OH at Richfield Coliseum, 24 January 1975)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDwhO8VuOkQ&list=PLf62FjbXtD1JI5oPg0Xe4aZnxtokP5Xl-&index=87&pp=gAQBiAQB8AUB

On this day 04 November

 Cool surprise at last night's Rock & Roll Hall of Fame ceremony!

2010 03 November On This Day, Jimmy Page by Jimmy Page launch party, London

• 1967 The Yardbirds - Pittsburgh, PA at Syria Mosque - Homecoming Weekend Concert
• 1969 Led Zeppelin - Kitchener,Ontario,Canada at Kitchener Memorial Auditorium
• 1976 Led Zeppelin - European premiere of The Song Remains The Same,  London, England at Warner West End Theatre
• 1988 Jimmy Page Outrider Tour - Syracuse, NY at Onondaga War Memorial
• 2014 Jimmy Page, promotion appearances for remasters, New York City
• 2023  Jimmy Page plays Link Wray's Rumble at Rock & Roll Hall of Fame (03 November)

1976 04 November, The Song Remains The Same movie premiere, London

1976 Led Zeppelin at London premiere of TSRTS

2010 Jimmy Page, launch party for autobiography

2014 Jimmy Page photographed at Bowery Hotel, NY (Jesse Ditmar/Redux Photo)

2023

Last night Jimmy Page stole the show at the 2023 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame ceremony! JP inducted Link Wray via video and got a nice applause from an audience that mostly weren't sure who Link Wray was and that also didn't know JP was standing in the dark on the stage holding his doubleneck.

When Jimmy Page began to play, a guy in the audience "Doubleneck!! Doubleneck!!"  The audience came to its feet at the first notes and stood through the whole song. 

As they should.

Elton John blew Jimmy a kiss. 

Jimmy Page covers Link Wray's Rumble, 03 November 2023

♪

♪  Jimmy Page Outrider Tour (Syracuse NY at Onondaga War Memorial, 04 November 1988) 
♪  Rumble (Jimmy Page at Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, 03 November 2023)

On this day 22 October

Whole lotta lotta.

1969 22 October On This Day Led Zeppelin II released
♪ Whole Lotta Love (SoundCloud)

• 1966 The Yardbirds - Westport, CT at Staples High School Auditorium
• 1967 The Yardbirds - Wichita, KS at Cotillion Club
• 1969 Led Zeppelin II released
• 1976 Led Zeppelin - Los Angeles at Fox Wilshire, premier of The Song Remains The Same 
• 1988 Jimmy Page - Outrider Tour - Detroit, MI at Joe Louis Arena
• 1997 Led Zeppelin releases Whole Lotta Love as a single in the UK 
• 2014 Jimmy Page - London at Paul Smith Led Zeppelin Limited Edition Scarves launch 

1976:

There is conflicting information about the exact dates of the Led Zeppelin premieres in New York and Los Angeles. Some say October 19 and 21, respectively, and others - including Dave Lewis - say October 20 and 22. I'm going with Dave.

1976 The Song Remains The Same movie premiere, LA

1976 LA premiere of The Song Remains The Same

1988:
Jimmy Page just got better and better at interpreting Chopin's Prelude. It's the first song on the full set video for the Detroit show (playlist below).

1988 Jimmy Page, Outrider Tour, Detroit (Ben Roberts photo)

1997:

Whole Lotta Love was released as a single in the UK on this day - the first ever single released there. The occasion was the 30th anniversary of the band. The video is hot, hot, hot. 

If you'd never heard one Led Zeppelin song and this was your first, it would knock your socks off. For those of us who've been listening since day one, it was a reminder that every single Led Zeppelin song is a masterpiece in its own right.

2014:
Having met with fashion designer Paul Smith in Tokyo earlier this month in 2014, on this day Jimmy Page attended the launch of the Paul Smith Led Zeppelin scarf line in London.

2014 Paul Smith & Jimmy Page in London

2015:
Lots of movies are licensing Led Zeppelin songs in their trailers and as part of their soundtracks.
Mostly it's Kashmir or Immigrant Song, but the trailer for The Big Short (2015) uses When The Levee Breaks. I've got a blog entry with the start of a list of songs and the movies, trailers, and other uses that you can check out.

♪

♪  Whole Lotta Love / promo (Led Zeppelin, 1969/1997) 
♪  Jimmy Page Outrider Tour (Detroit MI at Joe Lewis Arena, 22 October 1988) 

♪  The Big Short (movie trailer 2015) 

Labels: 

On this day 20 October

 "It’s a pity we hadn’t done a commercial for Mercedes."  Or Gibson.

• 1966 The Yardbirds - London at IBC Studios to record for Great Shakes
• 1967 The Yardbirds - San Antonio, TX at Pusi-Kat Club
• 1969 Led Zeppelin - Seattle, WA at Seattle Paramount Theatre (unconfirmed)
• 1976 Led Zeppelin - New York City at Cinema 1, premier of The Song Remains The Same 
• 2020 Jimmy Page: The Anthology released worldwide

1966:

Great Shakes was a General Foods product used to make milkshakes at home.  It included a shaker cup with lid, and a flavored powder to mix with milk.  The marketing was advanced for its time, and included one-minute radio spots recorded by the most popular bands of the day, generally reworks of existing songs. The commercials were released by Columbia Special Products on two volumes with four tracks each, as Great Shakes Shake-Out and Great Shakes Shake-Out 2.  A 1990s edition, Great Shaken' was also released (Mo-Donna EP), with the The Yardbirds' contribution, Over Under Sideways Down.  That EP also included a Pepsi song (by Stone Poneys) and a H.I.S. song (The Troggs).

The Who, The Byrds, Dusty Springfield and other musicians and bands from that era also did spots for Great Shakes.

1969:

JP's website says Led Zeppelin performed at the Seattle Paramount Theater on this day, but I can find no confirmation of this - no setlist, no recordings, no photos, no promo, no ticket stubs.

1976: 

The $25,000 proceeds from the world premiere of The Song Remains The Same (TSRTS) that went to the Save the Children Foundation would be $135,000 in today's dollars. The party thrown by Swan Song after the premiere was attended by Ahmet Ertegun (in a neck brace), Mick Jagger, Ron Wood and Linda Ronstadt, among others. 

1976 Jimmy Page at The Song Remains The Same movie premiere, New York City

1976 Jimmy Page at The Song Remains The Same movie premiere, New York City

The Song Remains the Same

In The Song Remains The Same movie Jimmy Page's fantasy sequence opens with him sitting on the lawn overlooking the moat that surrounds his Plumpton Place manor. He climbs up a mountain near his Boleskine House on Loch Ness in Scotland during the nights of a full moon. He seeks the Hermit, which turns out to be himself. The music that accompanies this is a monumental and powerful bow sequence of Dazed and Confused.

The Hermit, according to most tarot traditions, represents the turning away from the outer world and tuning in to the inner life, in order to search for a deeper, higher reality. The tarot card stands not just for seeking, but for maintaining independence as well as guiding others to the higher knowledge.

The image of the hermit with the lantern is based on Diogenes, the Greek ascetic, who was searching for an honest man - a metaphor for searching for higher truth. That depiction of Diogenes, in turn, could well be based on the Greco-Roman understanding of the Celtic Druid, described by Julius Caesar as highly educated and powerful priests who believed in the immortality of the soul and the transmigration of it into other lives (reincarnation). In modern-day illustrations Druids are often depicted as carrying a staff and a light.

According to the Thoth deck, designed by Aleister Crowley, the Hermit is also the Lord of Time whose lantern shines the light of his wisdom and who leans on the staff of his experience.

Lucifer, bringer of light.

Had Jimmy Page been exposed to a different culture, he might have portrayed himself as a shaman, who uses altered states of consciousness to access and interact with the energies of other planes of reality, and to channel those energies into this world.

Give the man a guitar, after all, and that's what he does.

Jimmy Page, The Song Remains The Same

2020

From JP's website: "Jimmy Page: The Anthology*. Both reflective and revealing, it is quite simply the legendary musician’s most comprehensive and fascinating account of his life to date."

*As an Amazon Associate, I earn a teeny tiny commission from qualifying purchases.

♪

♪  Great Shakes Commercial (the Yardbirds, 1966) 
♪  TSRTS movie trailer (Led Zeppelin 1976) 
♪  Dazed and Confused (Led Zeppelin, The Song Remains the Same 1976) 

On this day 28 July

 Fenders.  It's what was happening.

1958 28 July On This Day Gene Vincent and the Blue Caps release Hot Rod Gang EP 

1984 28 July On This Day Jimmy Page with Roy Harper - Cambridge Folk Festival
♪  Short and Sweet (Jimmy Page with Roy Harper)

• 1967 The Yardbirds - Sacramento, CA at Governor's Hall
• 1973 Led Zeppelin - New York, NY at Madison Square Garden (day 2 of 3)
• 1984 Jimmy Page with Roy Harper - Cherry Hinton Hall, Cambridge Folk Festival

1973:

Day two of the Madison Square Garden show. More firecrackers. The band was asked to wear the same outfits for the sake of the filming that was being done. Mr. Jones was the only one of the four who didn't comply.

1984:

We don't think of Jimmy Page as a folk guitarist, but of course he has demonstrated he can play any musical genre he wants to, and do it well.

The Cambridge Folk Festival's first show was in 1965. Back then Paul Simon and about a dozen others were on the bill, and 1400 tickets were sold. Simon earned £15 for his performance. Since then the festival has expanded and now includes non-folk performers as well. In 2014 there were more than a hundred acts featured over four days, including Van Morrison, Sinéad O’Connor and Rosanne Cash.

1984 Jimmy Page with Tony Franklin, Roy Harper - Cambridge Folk Festival

1984 Jimmy Page with Roy Harper - Cambridge Folk Festival

1984 Jimmy Page with Roy Harper - Cambridge Folk Festival

1984 Jimmy Page - Cambridge Folk Festival

1984 Jimmy Page with Roy Harper - Cambridge Folk Festival

Jimmy Page with his Fender Telecaster

♪  8mm film (Led Zeppelin, MSG 28 July 1973) 
♪ Led Zeppelin (New York NY at Madison Square Garden day 2/3), 28 July 1973)
♪  Hangman (Jimmy Page with Roy Harper, Cambridge Folk Festival 1984) 

On this day 27 July

 And it's whispered that soon, if we all call the tune, then the piper will lead us to reason. 

~ Stairway to Heaven

1973 27 July On This Day Led Zeppelin at Madison Square Garden, NYC (show 1 of 3)

• 1967 The Yardbirds - San Francisco, CA at Fillmore Auditorium
• 1969 Led Zeppelin - Woodinville, WA at Seattle Pop Festival
• 1973 Led Zeppelin - New York, NY at Madison Square Garden

1973:
"Originally, we saw the whole essence of our live performance as something that the audience listened to very carefully, picking up on what was going on, the spontaneity and musicianship. And you can’t do that if you’re running around the stage all night, or at least we couldn’t back then.” By 1973, however, “we were much more ambitious, in that respect. We really wanted to take the live performances as far as they could go".
~Jimmy Page, Mick Wall interview, Times Online 1 Nov 2008

"The kind of speed we were moving at, the creative juices in the air, the whole thing was just an absolute mixture of adrenaline, chemical, euphoria ... and there were no brakes. We couldn't stop what was happening. We had no idea what it even was. But we just kept trying, pushing forward, every show."
~Robert Plant, from liner notes by Cameron Crowe for The Song Remains the Same, 2007.

1973 Jimmy Page/Led Zeppelin at MSG

1973 Eddie Kramer & Jimmy Page at MSG

Jimmy Page from 'The Song Remains The Same' movie footage (Stairway to Heaven)

Jimmy Page from 'The Song Remains The Same' movie footage (Stairway to Heaven)

♪  Glimpses (Yardbirds, Fillmore West 1967) YouTube
♪ Led Zeppelin (New York NY at Madison Square Garden day 1/3, 27 July 1973)
Note: First half of the show is missing from currently available recordings

On this day 25 July

 "He was such a stylist.  I don't think anybody ever managed to play the same way as Scotty."

~ Jimmy Page, at Gibson guitar party for Scotty Moore, 1999

1999 25 July On This Day Jimmy Page presents Gibson Signature guitar to Scotty Moore
♪  Mystery Train (Jimmy Page) Soundcloud

• 1966 The Yardbirds - Bath, England at Bath Pavilion
• 1967 The Yardbirds - San Francisco, CA at Fillmore Auditorium
• 1969 Led Zeppelin - West Allis/Milwaukee WI at Midwest Rock Festival 
• 1995 Page & Plant  Unledded Tour - London at Wembley Arena 

Winfield Scott "Scotty" Moore III (1931-) is an American guitarist and recording engineer who backed Elvis Presley between 1954 and the beginning of the Hollywood years. Many of his performances are considered precedent-setting.  He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000.

Scotty Moore used a thumbpick (a flat pick with a loop to slip your thumb into) to create his own unique finger-picking style. He also used an EchoSonic guitar amplifier with built-in tape echo.  He started out with a Gibson ES-295. Gibson created a Scotty Moore Signature guitar that was presented to Moore at a private party at North London's Air Studios.  (At about 3:19 on the video hear Jeff Beck tell Jimmy Page to shut up!)

Associated Independent Recording (AIR) was founded in 1965 by Beatles producer Sir George Martin and his partner John Burgess.  The  studio has operated in three locations: Oxford Street, London (1970-1991), Montserrat Island, West Indies (mid 1970s-1989) and AIR Lyndhurst Hall, London (1991-present).  

1995 Page & Plant Unledded Tour - London at Wembley Arena

♪  White Summer/Black Mountain Side (Led Zeppelin, Midwest Rock Festival Milwaukee 1969) YouTube
♪  Communication Breakdown (Led Zeppelin, Midwest Rock Festival Milwaukee 1969) YouTube

♪  Orchestra soundcheck (Page & Plant, Wembley 1995) YouTube
♪  Wanton Song (Page & Plant, Wembley 1995) YouTube
♪  The Song Remains the Same  (Page & Plant, Wembley 1995) YouTube
♪  Full show  (Page & Plant, Wembley 1995) YouTube