singemonkey wrote:
X-rated Bob wrote:
Jack Flash Jr wrote:
Page also allegedly approached Rod Stewart before being threatened away by the Faces manager... THANK GOD that vocal didn't happen!!
Unlikely it happened like that because at the time Page was putting The New Yardbirds/Led Zeppelin together Stewart would have been singing for Jeff Beck.
Isn't the story that he did an initial round of looking for people? Then there was a gap before he hired Bonham and Plant. I'm not sure if I'm remembering that right. Or that Rod Stewart joined Jeff Beck just as Jimmy Page came sniffing around.
Page had to fulfill obligations that the Yardbirds had. He proposed to put together "The New Yardbirds" with Chris Dreja who had been playing bass for the Yardbirds. The story I know is that they approached Terry Reid. Reid turned the offer down and recommended Plant. Plant, in turn, recommended Bonham. Then Dreja decided he wanted to be a photographer and so Jones applied for the vacancy. Jones and Page knew each other from the "Beck's Bolero" sessions.
I still haven't heard those records. Only "I ain't superstitious." Jeff Beck's an odd one for me. His stuff is so much more musical, imo, than the shredders, but I've still often been put off by technique overwhelming the actual music.
Yep. I feel pretty much the same about the Beckster. However, I'd recommend the
Blow By Blow album as one that all electric guitarists and fans of electric guitar playing should have. There he's playing within the context of the songs, with a killer band, and the technique serves the music. Marvellous album. It may be that George Martin, who produced, was able to supply some direction. It may also be that Martin and engineer Geoff Emerick decided at a certain point that enough was enough and who cares what Beck thinks. The story goes that Beck phoned up Emerick one day saying that he wanted to redo his solos uh-gain only to be told that the album had been mastered and was now being pressed.
I've been half-heartedly working on playing "The Lemon Song," among other things that I'm working on more seriously to develop my technique. That's one zany blues arrangement. You might like, Bob, that the most distinctive part of the main riff is hybrid picked. Page was just insanely creative, there's no doubt. Far more so than Clapton or Beck. More even than Peter Green.
Like I said, he had great ideas, and great focus. He had the discpipline and the internal critic that IMO Beck lacks. More than Peter Green? Ultimately, yes, I think I must forgive you the blasphemy because Green's mental problems and drug intake resulted in him being inconsistent.
The only thing that spoils Zeppelin for me, is that they should have got an external lyricist - since most of Plant's lyrics are pretty infantile. I went through a phase where I couldn't stand to listen to Zeppelin because the lyrics were so annoying. But I got over it. Their awsomeness meter's needle hovers at 10 - so who cares about the lyrics to "Out on the tiles?"
I think most of their lyrics were derived from old blues songs or from Tolkien. Plant was to blame for a lot of they lyrics. Interestingly his more recent lyrics have been less cringe-inducing.
