On This Day 15 August

It appears Mr. Page has very fond memories of Texas.

1969/1979 15 August On This Day Led Zeppelin in Texas/In Through The Out Door released
♪  In The Evening (Led Zeppelin ) Soundcloud

• 1966 The Yardbirds - Wichita, KS at Cotillion Ball - The Mixer Hop
• 1967 The Yardbirds - Mendon, MA at Lakeview Amusement Park
• 1969 Led Zeppelin - San Antonio, TX at HemisFair Arena
• 1970 Led Zeppelin - New Haven, CT at Yale Bowl
• 1979 In Through The Out Door released

1970 Led Zeppelin - New Haven, CT at Yale Bowl

1970:

It's hard to believe Led Zeppelin ever performed at unprepossessing venues like the Yale Bowl, a narrow stage with an awning to cover them. The acoustics must have been interesting. 

1979:

In Through the Out Door, the eighth studio album by the English rock band Led Zeppelin, is the target of illogical criticism. This is not because of where it was recorded or how long it took to be released (recorded at ABBA's Polar Studios in Stockholm, Sweden over three weeks' time in November and December 1978, but not released until 15 August, 1979).  It's not because it didn't reach the top of the charts as did the other albums, because of course it did and it is back there again.

Most of the criticism is that Jimmy Page screwed up on ITTOD. The story is repeated over and over about how John Paul Jones and Robert Plant were forced to take over because Jimmy Page and John Bonham didn't show up "on time" at the recording studio, and because Jimmy Page was strung out on heroin. The story is that Jimmy Page was just along for the ride on this one.

Such closed-minded thinking. Never mind that Jimmy Page co-wrote all but two of the songs on the album and, as usual, did all the production.  Never mind how insulting these stories are to the others.  As if John Paul Jones and Robert Plant were not good enough or entitled to take the lead with Led Zeppelin's music unless it was forced on them. As if John Bonham's drumming was any less than stellar on ITTOD.

As if Jimmy Page had ever let anything get between him and the music. 

In a July 28, 2015 radio.com interview, Jimmy Page provides a different and more realistic explanation: 

"We’re going into rehearsals, and [John Paul Jones] shows up with this massive theater organ, it was called a Dream Machine [note: it's possible as few as seven of that model of the $60,000 instruments were ever built]. It was a Yamaha Dream Machine, Stevie Wonder had one too. John had it at home and had been working on it, and lo and behold, he’s got these songs together. He’d never written complete songs for Led Zeppelin before. But now he had. It was cool. Because the album before, I’d written it all. It was a guitar driven thing. There’s keyboards on the first Led Zeppelin album, and over the years. But it made obvious logical sense that if he had numbers that he’d written on this new state-of-the-art keyboard, let’s do an album which focuses on the keyboard and features it at the forefront, and that’s how it went."

In Through The Out Door

2015 Jimmy Page (Kevin Winter/Getty photo)

♪ South Bound Saurez (Led Zeppelin, In Through the Out Door 2015 remaster) YouTube
♪ Southbound Piano (South Bound Saurez) (Rough Mix) YouTube
♪ I'm Gonna Crawl (Led Zeppelin, In Through The Out Door, 1979) YouTube
♪ Blot (I'm Gonna Crawl) (Rough Mix) YouTube
♪ In The Evening (Led Zeppelin ) Soundcloud
♪ In The Evening (rough mix ITTOD 2015 companion disc)YouTube

On This Day 14 August

Seems to me it's not loud enough yet.

14 August 2000  On This Day published 2020

2000 14 August On This Day Jimmy Page - The Black Crowes - Burbank, CA on the Tonight Show

• 1966 The Yardbirds - Great Falls, MT at State Fairgrounds,4-H Building
• 1969 Led Zeppelin - Austin, TX at Austin Municipal Auditorium
• 1977 Jimmy Page with Ron Wood and local band, Arms and Legs - Plumpton, England at The Half Moon Pub, charity event for underprivileged children
• 2000 Jimmy Page with The Black Crowes - Burbank, CA onTonight Show
• 2009 14 August - It Might Get Loud opens in select theaters in NY, WA, CA

1977:

There were two Jimmy Page/Ron Wood charity jams in 1977.  The first was on this day at the Half Moon Pub, which was very close to Jimmy Page's Plumpton Place home and studio.  The second was 17 September.  Both acoustic jam events were to benefit the Goaldiggers football charity that provides playing fields in under-privileged areas. Elton John released a single for the charity in 1977, The Goaldiggers Song.

2009 14 August - It Might Get Loud opens in select theaters in NY, WA & CA

2009:
The short description of the movie It Might Get Loud might be stated like this: the individual histories of three generations of rock guitarists are shown and then the guitarists come together and jam. But the 2009 documentary directed by Davis Guggenheim is, for those who know, a movie about an elemental - that is, Jimmy Page - and two younger guitarists who practice the art of music.

Just look at the Edge's and Jack White's faces when Jimmy Page hits the first notes of Whole Lotta Love. Those are the looks of people in the presence of one of their gods manifesting his Power. They don't hide how they feel and we know why.

What? You don't know? Well, this is a blog about music AND magic, isn't it? Who else but Jimmy Page embodies both?

2009 June Guitar World cover (Ross Halfin photo)

Jimmy Page, scene from It Might Get Loud

♪ It Might Get Loud (movie trailer 2009)  YouTube
♪ The Wanton Song (Jimmy Page with The Black Crowes, Tonight Show 2000) YouTube
♪ Desire (The Wanton Song, rough mix) YouTube
♪ The Goaldiggers Song (Elton John, for Goaldiggers charity 1977) YouTube

[edited 14 August 2020]

On This Day 13 August

"He's the man who started everything. He's just a genius."
~ Jimmy Page, about Les Paul

"Dazzling"
~ Jimmy Page, about James Brown

Posted 13 August 2020 On This Day James Brown vs Led Zeppelin mashup

2013, 2015 13 August On This Day James Brown vs Led Zeppelin mashup

Note from Mage Music: As we move along through the On This Day year I try to capture the multiple years' different posts on jimmypage.com.  I don't have a bunch of spare time and I do have a slow internet connection, so they won't all be here right away.
 

2011 13 August On This Day 

• 1966 The Yardbirds - Amarillo,TX at Checkmate Young Adult Club
• 2009 Les Paul died

Les Paul (1915-2009)
Born Lester William Polsfuss, Les Paul was a man of many talents.  A guitarist, songwriter, maker of stringed instruments and inventor, Les Paul, was a pioneer of the solid-body electric guitar from which rock and roll rose.  As a guitarist he experimented with overdubbing, tape delay, phasing effects and multi-tracking, not to mention playing the guitar using style techniques that pushed the envelope beyond what others were doing at the time.  Jimmy Page paid attention.

Les Paul wasn't the first to come up with a solid body guitar but Gibson's Les Paul models are considered by many to be the guitar of choice.  Goldtops were the first of the Les Paul line for Gibson, with the Les Paul Custom being next.  These were the Black Beauties, black guitars with gold-plated hardware. After that came the Les Paul Standards (Jimmy Page's Number One and Number Two, among others). There have been countless versions and special editions of Les Paul guitars put out by Gibson over the years.

Les Paul's fertile mind came up with many innovations for the electric guitar and for the recording industry, including the eight-track deck for multi-track recording and a disc-cutter for acetate discs.  He has a permanent exhibit in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and has received dozens of awards, not only for his contributions to the music industry.  Les Paul was also inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame. 

Les Paul: not just guitars

Les Paul's casket gives the date of August 12th for his death, but apparently his website at one point said August 13th.  Whatever. Video mashups aren't my thing. James Brown may be dazzling, and Jimmy Page might appreciate all kinds of music but I'm a mere mortal and I'd rather have Jimmy Page's music as he himself created it.

1993 Jimmy Page with goldtop Les Paul guitar (image from Coverdale/Page Pride and Joy video - )

♪  Lover (When You're Near Me) Les Paul 1988 YouTube
♪  Pride and Joy (Coverdale/Page) YouTube
♪  James Brown vs Led Zeppelin video mashup YouTube

On This Day 12 August

It is the summer of our smiles

12 August On This Day, photo taken at Jimmy Page's Plumpton Place house

• 1966 The Yardbirds - Monticello, IN at Indiana Beach Ballroom -and- Hamilton, IN at Cold Spring Resort
• 1967 The Yardbirds - Holyoke, MA at Mountain Lake Ballroom
• 2000 Jimmy Page with The Black Crowes - Mesa AZ 

Plumpton Place, designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens (designer and builder of a part of New Delhi in India), is an Elizabethan manor house in Plumpton village, East Sussex, England. The original structures on the property were constructed in the mid-16th century. The separate entrance is made of two cottages connected by a porch with a long path leading to the main house.  The manor house has six bedrooms, five en-suite bathrooms, a tennis court and its own moat.  Jimmy Page bought the house in 1972 and sold it ten years later.  His studio was located on the upper floor level.

1973 Jimmy Page in his Plumpton Place house studio

Plumpton Place house is surrounded by a moat

For your laid-back summer acoustical listening pleasure:

♪ Summer's Day (Jimmy Page) YouTube
♪ Only The Black Rose (Jimmy Page) Soundcloud
♪ Black Mountain Side (Jimmy Page, Julie Felix show 1970) YouTube

On This Day 11 August

The more things change...

1979 11 August On This Day Led Zeppelin at Knebworth

• 1967 The Yardbirds - Salem, NH at Canobie Lake Park Ballroom
• 1969 Led Zeppelin - Las Vegas, NV at Ice Palace 
• 1979 Led Zeppelin -  Knebworth  

1969:
While on tour, Jimmy Page flew cross country to New York City for work on Led Zeppelin II at A&R Recording, a studio recording company founded in 1958 by Jack Arnold and Phil Ramone.

1979:
"The sustained roar that greeted Led Zeppelin as they trooped onto the massive Knebworth stage at twenty to ten last Saturday said it all."
~ Hugh Fielder, Sounds

The release of In Through the Out Door was to have occurred at this point but that didn't happen till 15 August 1979, and Robert Plant groused about it during the Knebworth show.

According to Dave Lewis, in Led Zeppelin: Celebration II: The 'Tight But Loose' Files, the album was named to describe its recent struggles amidst the death of Robert Plant's son Karac in 1977, and the taxation exile the band took from the UK. The exile resulted in the band being unable to tour on British soil for over two years, and trying to get back into the public mind was therefore like "trying to get in through the 'out' door."

Recorded at Polar Studios, the album was mixed at Jimmy Page's Plumpton Placestudio.  The album went to No. 1 on Billboard's chart in its second week on the chart and stayed there for seven weeks. The remaster that was released not quite two weeks ago is in the Billboard top ten again.

1979 Jimmy Page/Led Zeppelin Knebworth

1979 Jimmy Page/Led Zeppelin Knebworth

1979 Jimmy Page/Led Zeppelin Knebworth

♪  Audience footage 8mm (Led Zeppelin, Knebworth 11 August 1979) YouTube
♪  Full show (Led Zeppelin, Knebworth 11 August 1979) YouTube

Happy Birthday Leo Fender

The world has changed significantly due to the labors of these men

Leo Fender  (August 10, 1909 – March 21, 1991)

This man carries the revolution forward

Jimmy Page with Fender Telecaster String Bender, taped on location at Les Paul's house in Mahwah, NJ on July 18, 1985 

On This Day 10 August

Ledded, unledded - it's all good

1994 10 August On This Day Page & Plant record in Marrakech

• 1966 The Yardbirds - Manitou Beach, MI at Green's Pavilion Lakeview Park
• 1969 Led Zeppelin - San Diego, CA at San Diego Sports Arena
• 1994 Page & Plant - Unledded Tour – Marrakech Morocco at J'ma el Fna Square

1994:
It started with an invitation to do an MTV Unplugged show and ended being an album and a tour.  It wasn't supposed to be a Led Zeppelin "reunion", and John Paul Jones wasn't invited.  There were lots of Led Zeppelin songs, anyway, reinterpreted with a Middle Eastern/Moroccan flavor, and the album was called No Quarter.

MTV Unplugged was supposed to be "intimate acoustic studio performances by major artists from across the globe". Never mind that Jimmy Page's guitars were still quite plugged in, or that they were backed not only by the usual components of a rock band but also by an orchestra.  The 90 minute MTV special was the highest-rated ‘Unplugged’-era episode in the network’s history.  The DVD includes bonus footage, and was recorded on a London soundstage, in the hills of Wales and in the J'ma el Fna Market Square of Marrakech, Morocco.

In my opinion, a fine effort but not the best showcase for Jimmy Page, who had long ago demonstrated that musical influence didn't have to mean blatantly sounding like the source. Jimmy Page was perfectly capable of the sublime, of internalizing a concept and revealing an entirely new way of hearing what had been heard before. Kashmir - without the orchestra - is a clear example: It does a superb job of evoking desert sands, caravans, and the exotic simply through the use of DADGAD tuning and rhythm.

“I was well aware of a lot of ‘exotic’ music in the late ‘60s,” Jimmy Page told Michael Leonard for Gibson Guitar in 2011. “I had a sitar and got interested in modal tunings, Arabic music. .... I wasn’t just listening to blues, I was trying to find all sorts of new ways for my playing.”

But hey, No Quarter was, after all, Jimmy Page and Robert Plant, together again even if they had forgotten John Paul Jones' phone number. Still good, after all those years.

Unledded promo photo

1994 Jimmy Page MTV rehearsal

♪  Gallows Pole  (Page & Plant, 1994)  YouTube
♪  Battle of Evermore (Page & Plant, 1994)  YouTube
♪  The Truth Explodes/Yallah (Page & Plant, Marrakech 1994) YouTube