Yes, Jimmy is with Jones hewing closer to the riff, and we hear Bonham shuffle a bit into the hippie-Latino cha-cha-cha that Spirit begins with. Spirit's song departs from the riff into the chorus and then swings into a Coltrane-type middle section. It's very latino jazz rock fusion. They abandon a great riff. Zeppelin agrees with none of that, and sticks to the riff, piecing out an improv over that great bass line. It doesn't sound like Jimmy has much familiarity with Spirit's song. I am entirely biased, of course, and I do not want to believe that Jones is lying when he says he doesn't remember who brought it in. Based on who's doing what (Plant again doesn't reference the Spirit lyric) it's either Jones or Page, possibly Bonham. I'm leaning toward the rhythm section because it doesn't sound to me that Jimmy and Robert have much familiarity with how Spirit handles the riff, or are purposefully avoiding it because they don't like how Spirit marooned such a cool riff. Bonham may have been drawn to "Fresh Garbage" because of the Latino percussion sounds. It's Bonham, I say. Maybe Jimmy will remember better than Jonesy. I agree, Strider, there is no need to pull a Jake Holmes trip r.e. "Fresh Garbage", as it doesn't have much to do with "Taurus" despite both being on Side One of Spirit's debut album. Maybe I am being naive. Alright, interesting note: the author of "Fresh Garbage" is Jay Ferguson, Spirit's lead singer, also in charge of percussive flourishes like the Latin drums we hear in "Fresh Garbage." In fact, Ferguson wrote most of Spirit's first album. "Taurus" is the only song with Randy Wolfe's name on it, and Mark Andes the bass player contributes on two of the 11 tracks. LINK album notes here. So where oh where is Ferguson in all this? Why have we not heard from him? He's alive and well, scoring the music for "NCIS: Los Angeles", according to wikipedia. Like Jimmy, he's friends with Joe Walsh or was at one point. I'd be very interested to hear what the singer who wrote 90% of Spirit's debut album has to say about this lawsuit.

Great comments. Do take some time and listen to Spirit's "Fresh Garbage" and the LEd Zep "As Long As I have you" medley. You'll have to listen to it a couple of times because on the first run you'll wonder why Spirit's "Fresh Garbage" is relevant to what Page and Plant may have heard consciously or subconsciously. What Page and Plant are doing in the Medley has nothing to do with Spirit's song. It really is like they never heard it. The Bootleggers may have mis-labelled what was happening there. The 12-note bass line Jones plays might be from somewhere else (sounds spy movie soundtrack stuff, maybe jones picked it up in the studio. Spirit AND jones may have lifted it from the same source.) Based on what Page and Plant and Bonham are doing, there is no evidence that Led Zep heard even "Fresh Garbage", much less "Taurus". I knew the suit was frivolous all along, I didn't realize until today how unrooted in reality it is. I don't think the judge did either. Judge Klausner thought there was proximity and some familiarity reflected in "Fresh Garbage" but we know now that there was neither.

Malofiy's antics seem to be prejudicing the jury against the plaintiff's. Mal's clients. The judge wants to limit the drama as well as his own liability because he would prefer that what happens here not add another case to the Appellate Court docket. If Malofiy becomes the issue, then ineffective counsel to the point of jury prejudice would be grounds for an appeal (not that it would necessarily be accepted as grounds for an appeal). Klausner would want a clean verdict here -- no appeals by anyone ... To your other question - yes - judges have miles of discretion -- they can rule what they want, do what they want, and if you were to ask a judge the question of whether limiting a lawyer's cross-exam is typical, they would tell you that nothing is typical and everything occurs on a case by case basis. Of course that's BS, especially when it comes to sentencing, but that's another topic. Judges are the purist minds in the land, they admit no trends in decision-making.

I figured as much r.e. the more hardcore fans from way back. I wasn't old enough to buy my first Led Zep record (the fourth album) until 1979. From there, you had to dig in the bins of used magazine shops to find anything, then have Hammer of the Gods, which isn't much to go on, and so on. Every once in a while the Spirit-Stairway thing would come up and you didn't have much ammo until the last decade or so. Is it far fetched? I just did a side by side listen twice, and all I hear is the bass line. Page is obviously not referencing anything Randy California played and Plant is making up lyrics of his own, not singing the melody, never refers to any of the Spirit Lyrics. I think they're just jamming to this bass line Jones started playing. Here's Spirit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7MQ5rxUZsc Here's Zep. I think the bootleggers are the guys who labelled it "Fresh Garbage." Zep may very well have just been jamming.

The most interesting and, ultimately most satisfying, revelation from this past week is that Led Zeppelin and Spirit never toured together, upending the long-held assumption that they were on the road together in 1968-69 during the very beginnings of Led Zeppelin. Secondary to that is the brand new information offered into the record Friday by John Paul Jones that he probably didn't realize he was playing Spirit's "Fresh Garbage" when he added the riff to the "As Long As I Have You Medley." Down through the years, these two notions have been the linchpins that suggest that the intro to "Stairway" was "Taurus" embellished and that Page probably swiped it because he does that ever so often (a la "The Rain Song" - the opening chords are an intentional tribute to George Harrison's "Something"). The first assumption -- the shared proximity on those early tours - is one of the key points that the judge cited bringing this case before the jury, and it's the causal connection behind the lawsuit. The second notion implies that someone in Led Zeppelin had listened to Spirit's first album, which had both "Fresh Garbage" and "Taurus" on it. Last week we learned that they never toured together at all -- far from it, in fact. They played on the same stage on the same day twice, once in 1968 in Denver, and once in 1970 at a festival in Texas. On those two days, they never met; they never spoke; they passed like two ships in different lanes on the ocean of middle America. Hardcore Zep fans have known this for a few years at least since the internet exploded, but the "touring together" assumption was accepted reality in the 70s, 80s and 90s; it was the glue that held the Taurus-Stairway idea together. That glue of proximity dissolved last week in court, and as far as the jury knows, there is no causal connection between the two bands. There is none, and it really hurts the Wolfe Trust case. That Jones was just jamming and probably didn't know about "Fresh Garbage" means that the bootleggers were the ones who identified the riff in the first place, combined with a line or two that Plant might have been howling (which does seem to indicate that Plant probably had listened to Spirit's first album). We'll find out next week. However -- and this is key because Page's work is on trial here - it clearly removes Jimmy Page from any creative connection to Spirit's first record. Without a physical or creative connection -- and Page and Plant certainly didn't take the record with them to Bron-yr-aur -- there is no case, something that Randy Wolfe knew all along. We know now that the reason Wolfe never sued was not that he was such a cool guy (another long-held belief) but that he of course knew he had never met Led Zeppelin, and had scarcely been in the same building with any of them. The task of proving that Jimmy Page had ever heard "Taurus" 1968-1971 would have been extremely difficult, if not impossible. It's beginning to look like Page had truly never heard the song until his son-in-law played it for him a few years ago. Knowing this as part of the court record they've seen and heard, I don't see how this jury rules against Jimmy Page.

It seems the combativeness was between plaintiff atty Malofiy and defense musicologist Dr. Lawrence Ferrara, according to Pamela Chelin, who tweeted up-to-the-minute updates from the trial all week. Pamela Chelin ‏@PamelaChelin 22h22 hours ago Malofiy is currently arguing with defense music expert Dr. Lawrence Ferrara. And I don't mean the kind of argument that uses legalese. Ms. Chelin is a real journalist, having been published in LA Weekly and LA Times, along with the music papers like Rolling stone and Spin, so it's great to have such qualified eyes and ears in the courtroom. She's got a better grasp of what's happening than the writer from Rolling Stone, Matt Diehl, who seems to cracking under the strain of having to file copy every day. Come Friday, day five of the proceedings, it became clear that Mr. Diehl needed a day off. He makes his third "Game of Thrones" reference of the week, comparing a statement by Led Zeppelin lead lawyer related to Randy Wolfe's heirs to something that would be said on the TV show. He was clearly frustrated by the technical approach of Ferrara, Led Zeppelin's academic expert, and began his article with confusing passages about JPJ's confirmation of the Bron-yr-Aur origins of "Stairway" being "a surprising assertion Page had also made under oath Thursday." Zep fans who've read the many books know the history of the song, and that information is on the wikipedia pages about the band (written by those same expert fans). By and large, Diehl's Friday article is mush. I've never thought Rolling Stone was a great publication, and back in the day they were far more giving to band's like Kiss than to people like Lou Reed and Iggy Pop and early Zep, those who were really driving rock forward into the ditch where it belonged. They ignored the VU and the Yardbirds on the avant garde in the 1960s, didn't like the MC5, didn't do much for Iggy, didn't support punk in the beginning, didn't like scronk, ignored hard rock in the 70s but celebrated "hair metal" in the 1980s, didn't support noise, and sure hated Led Zeppelin. I wouldn't trust Jan Wenner to cover a cub scout wood car competition much less this trial. All that said ... I hope Meade feels better on Tuesday when Led Zeppelin proceeds with its defense.

It would go to a different court altogether, this one . The appellate judge (s) would in part be ruling on decisions Judge Klausner may have made, so no Klausner on the 2nd District Court of Appeals. Who knows what grounds Led Zep might appeal on if they should happen to lose. It would have to be something more than "we don't like the jury's decision."

Wow, that's impressive, thank you for posting that. They've submitted every track on Love Forever Changes, a sad but incredibly beautiful record -- lots of cool finger picking by Bryan MacLean. And "Can't Find My Way Home" by Blind Faith - was wondering if that would come up at all. Beatles, Stones, yardbirds, Donovan -- They're going to give the jury a music lesson!

It was just a fracture, most likely, not a clean break. Train doors don't close like a slamming car door. Had it been a full break, they would have had to cancel some things - he'd be in a splint for weeks, with a mini-cast for his finger. It's quite possible the broken finger story was exaggerated for effect - he had already messed up his hand 18 months prior (May 29-30, 1973 at LA Airport), and rust never sleeps. Meanwhile, Page was being drawn into his heroin affair. The shows are quite a bit different from how they sounded in 1973, and a lot of it was the change in Page's playing, and are maybe a little more interesting for reasons stated previously.

The best source for the timing of the injury was Cameron Crowe's Rolling Stone cover story published March 13, 1975. Based on that story, the timing of the injury is Jan. 13-15, most likely the 14th as they had played in Brussells on the 12th, take a day, then he's commuting around by train for final pre-tour business on the 14th, and flying out on the 15th. They have one rehearsal the 17th in Minneapolis at the venue, then the show on the 18th. Here's Crowe: It has been a long time since Zeppelin last rock & rolled. After 18 months spent laboring over their new double album, Physical Graffiti, the band has some warming up to do. "It's unfortunate there's got to be anybody there," Plant said. "But we've got to feel our way. There's a lot of energy here this tour. Much more than the last one." The tour's official opening night, January 18th at the Minneapolis Sports Center, went surprisingly well considering the circumstances. Only a week before, Jimmy Page broke the tip of his left ring finger when it was caught in a slamming train door. With only one rehearsal to perfect what Page calls his "three-and-a-half-finger technique," the classic Zeppelin live pieces, "Dazed and Confused" and "Since I've Been Loving You," were indefinitely retired. Codeine tablets and Jack Daniel's deadened the pain enough for Page to struggle through the band's demanding three-hour set. Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/the-durable-led-zeppelin-19750313#ixzz4BgL1vSGR However it now seems possible that they jived Crowe with the exact timing of the hand injury or that he simply got it wrong. The set list from Rotterdam on the 11th of Jan. does not include "Since I've Been Loving You" or "Dazed", according to LedZeppelin.com. Those bootleg recordings, then, didn't miss a beat. They didn't play either song in Brussels the next night. Another possibility is that Crowe did get it right, yet Zep (and Page) were so rusty after 18-months of not playing live that it was decided they should skip those songs until they got warmed up. It doesn't take long -- Page on Feb. 3 at Madison Square Garden is feeling good enough to forget "How Many More Times" and go for "Dazed" (one of their best shows ever, according to Crowe). In that scenario, the Rotterdam and Brussels shows are just warm-ups best left forgotten and the finger injury in London on the 14th compounds the rust problem, and provides some fodder for the press as a much-needed pr "rustoleum" so to speak. A heavily medicated Page decides the show must go on, and that some interesting things might happen as he experiments his way through the mists. The finger, though, is definitely injured. The photos from the rehearsal Jan. 17 clearly show Page managing to keep the ring finger out of a few chord clusters where one would normally use it. There are a bunch of those posted in another thread on this forum.

Ha - beat me to it!

It sure is, and those are two of my favorite Page solos, so similar and both great examples of what one might call "playing backwards" against the rhythm. I think with Page's "mutation" as a player you have a combination of three things: 1) the injuries to his fret fingers that forced him to rethink his approach. 2) A change in style to a more expressive, sometimes "backward" playing that relied on nasty string bends instead of fast playing. If you hear the live recordings from 1970-72, he's just blowing through that extended jam on "Thank You", for exampe, and it's (to me) not that interesting, more like the kind of thing Ritchie Blackmore was doing, and Blackmore was actively competing with Page in those days, despite the fact that Page wasn't competing with anyone. Page -- and this is amazing, really, considering that this is occurring at the height of Led Zep in the mid-1970s-- actively sought a more expressive style and phrasing. The new style can be heard all over Presence, which he has often cited as his favorite Zep album. 3) The heroin. On the bootlegs that are now so available we can hear him searching for those phrases mentioned in #2, sometimes not finding them, relying on tones and bends and noise to get where he wants to go. Sometimes getting lost, then triumphantly finding his way, or not. The element of experimentation and creation is there all the time, very jazz-like in the truest sense of be-bop and Miles and Coltrane, who were also hooked on the junk. Beautiful statements, sometimes failing, but always courageous.

If it's public domain, it's public domain and the issue becomes whether Randy Wolfe has any claim to it, which he doesn't. Page has always been consistent in talking about Bach in relation to Stairway's roots, and he began playing a snatch of Bach's "Bourree" in the "Heartbreaker" solo in 1970. He cited Bach many times in the 1980s when was speaking more to the press than he had been in the 1970s, though in Jimmy Page: Tangents Within a Framework (1984, Omnibus Press) author Howard Mylett cites a much earlier interview by Page in which he talks about transposing Bach from Dm to Am. None of this is cited on the Wikipedia page, which seems really weird to me. The Bach connection was such common knowledge that music teachers used to do side-by-side Stairway-Bach demonstrations to show their students how cool and relevant classical music is. But that was in the 1970s. Information isn't what it used to be. It does seem like a bit of a stretch, especially considering that Led Zep was jamming Spirit's "Fresh Garbage" into the Garnett Mimms "As Long As I Have You" medley leading to "Killing Floor/Lemon Song". "Fresh Garbage" is on Spirit's first album, along with Taurus, so somebody in Zep probably listened to it in 1969, though they were never touring together as has been suggested. What an LA County jury will make of all this probably depends on what random movie some of them think they're in that week.

This is an awful thing to say for some people, perhaps, but the broken finger served to make Jimmy Page an even more interesting guitar player than he was before. He became more of a noise artist, and that, to me, was a beautiful thing. The fact that he then seemed to stick with those alterations well after his hand was repaired cements him as the most interesting guitar player I've ever heard. He's Miles Davis in my book.

That fits. Hemispheres was recorded at Rockfield Studios in SE Wales during summer of 1978, and released in October, so Page would have likely owned a copy by winter 1978-79 and heard "La Villa Strangiato" - just "fucking brilliant" but not a radio-friendly piece like "Closer to the Heart." To add more to the likelihood that Bonham was aware of Rush is that Rush played 7 UK dates in 1977 (their first British shows), sold out London, Birmingham and Manchester and then went off to Rockfied to record Farewell to Kings. (Source: 2112.net) The major British music press gave Rush a very positive reception, and they then returned on a broader European in early 1978 -- including more UK dates -- and back to Rockfield in the summer for Hemispheres. The possibility that Bonham was NOT aware of Rush and Neil Peart does seem pretty remote.

La Villa Strangiato is on Hemispheres (as I'm sure you know) so that shows Page at least was aware of Rush beyond Fly By Night, the first record Peart plays on. Wonder what he thought when he and Halfin got to "Rivendell" on side two?

That is your personal understanding, which you should definitely stick with -- it's really just an old alchemic signature that points to certain astrology. Mercury is very heavy as is a Capricorn arrangement of stars and planets. there's nothing Satanic about the symbol, so disregard every 666 mention about the oso part that may have been mentioned in the thread. There's nothing demonic about the thing at all. There is a "Saturnalia" at work there too, but the completed picture points to Mercury, which is the swift runner, the messenger, so it's really just a representation of the search for spiritual wisdom and truth and all that. It's very specific and artful, but it's only Satanic in it's purposeful ignorance of Christian affects, which are irrelevant in the Led Zeppelin universe.

Yeah, that's the elephant in the room isn't it? All this legal wrangling about venue, whether Randy Wolfe even had publishing rights at the time, whether the Randy Wolfe Foundation is a legit charity (it's shambolic at best ), is really just encouragement for Mike the Spirit bass player and publicity-seeking Malifoy to drop it. The elephant in the room is that the jury will eventually get to hear Davey Graham and Bach and Giovanni Granata and the Beatles and some of Page's own work preceding Stairway, and realize how frivolous this suit was. And millennials everywhere in the social media universe, and even grouchy Ritchie Blackmore fans will know once and for all that the descending chord pattern of Stairway belongs to no one in particular and humanity in general, and that the No. 1 influences on Page specifically at the time were Davey Graham (no doubt about this), Johann Sebastian Bach (the Bourree in E minor, which Page was playing live in the Heartbreaker solo).

Diamanda Galas and John Paul Jones "The Devil's Rodeo" from The Sporting Life album.

Jonesy's in Brooklyn now, probably sleeping. There are still tix available for this weekend's shows at BAM with Sonic Youth & Merce Cunningham. Tisn't that far from Ohio, for one who had a table for the Rock Hall induction two weeks ago, no?

And it's a great version, one of the better tracks on the that record, along with Girl from the North Country. But of all Bob, Visions of Johanna still takes the cake for me.

Are those places in England? I'm in the most German city in America, Milwaukee. I can tell you that the motor bikes the German army rode during WW II were made here (by Harley Davidson). I can also say that the Iron Cross, which Jimmy is wearing, has nothing to do with Nazis or the abominations that they visited upon the world. That's the symbol of the German regular army, not of the SS. If Scottish people were upset, it's perhaps because the Iron Cross was the symbol on the bombing planes that were over the British isles during WW II? Not that I'm opposed to holding a grudge. The other thing that looks like the Loch Ness monster, it looks to me like Siva dancing or perhaps the letter K - which was Crowley's favorite letter. But I wondered why Jimmy doesn't wear Crowley's rose cross. Have you seen Yeats' rose cross? Those Golden Dawn members all designed their own crosses, and the ones I've seen are some of the most beautiful pieces of art I've ever seen. Maybe Jimmy doesn't want it out of the house? I can't help but say that the woman holding the belt buckle is a treasure that the piece of metal she is holding could never equate.

Why, your belt buckle is gorgeous, as I have no doubt you are. I can only see through your computer on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Other days, such as today, which (good god, it's Sunday already), things get a little cloudy. It's quite foggy on your end as I write this ...

Seeing as the Damned were perhaps in elementary school when Love broke up, sure. But you shouldn't discount those Damned fans in the '80s who went out and acquired Love records because they loved The Damned's cover of Alone Again Or. What a beautiful belt buckle.