Page On Led Zeppelin Roots

Guitarist recalls BBC session

Jimmy Page has spoken about an early Led Zeppelin BBC session that causes him to ‘wince’.

Led Zeppelin emerged from the ashes of legendary British group The Yardbirds. Guitarist Jimmy Page was the last man standing, recruiting session musicians and renegades from the R&B circuit to fill out the group.

Completing a tour as The New Yardbirds before changing their name to Led Zeppelin the group then auditioned for an all important session on BBC Radio 1.

However in a new program Jimmy Page has revealed that the audition did not go to plan. A notice by the 1969 Audition Panel of BBC producers explains that the band simply did not impress.

“English blues group longing to sound like Muddy Waters, but failing necessarily through being derivative…for me it’s unconvincing and I’d rather hear the genuine article”.

Reported by the BBC, the corporation then asked Jimmy Page his thoughts on those early sessions. Playing a long lost medley on ‘Whole Lotta Love’ alongside early material, the guitarist laughed at the recording.

“For those who were hearing it for the first time, there was a certain guitarist who was really wincing at the out of tune part, because the string had dropped and it was out of tune,” he told BBC 6Music. “I was gyrating on the chair here wishing I could tune it up.”

Led Zeppelin were paid a total of six pounds for the session, however soon after the group discovered that the cheque had bounced. It just so happened that quite a number of years ago I was going through some old papers and things in a tea chest, and I found this cheque that said, ‘Ordered not to pay’,” he explained. “It’s from the Zeppelin era, so one of these sessions.

“I’ve actually got it on the wall at home and I should have looked at the date before I came here. It was probably for that out of tune guitar on that medley, and that’s fair do’s.”

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