Zeppelin Mysteries Hosted by Steve A. Jones

[Otto Masson]

Great story and pics. Thanks for posting!

[Cecil.]

Did Jimmy attend Art School? I saw the interview with the biological research bit, I am

sure I have also read he studied fine art.....Steve any light you shine on this?

[glicine]

Did Jimmy attend Art School? I saw the interview with the biological research bit, I am

sure I have also read he studied fine art.....Steve any light you shine on this?

It was the Sutton Art College in Surrey, he studied painting there.

[Otto Masson]

Did Jimmy attend Art School? I saw the interview with the biological research bit, I am

sure I have also read he studied fine art.....Steve any light you shine on this?

He sure did attend Art school, and has mentioned it countless times in interviews, but as it turns out, the details are still not at all clear, so I often wonder about this too. Steve, have you been able to find any actual confirmation of the basic facts - where exactly was he enrolled and precisely when?

[Otto Masson]

It was the Sutton Art College in Surrey, he studied painting there.

Where do you know this from?

[Cecil.]

He sure did attend Art school, and has mentioned it countless times in interviews, but as it turns out, the details are still not at all clear, so I often wonder about this too. Steve, have you been able to find any actual confirmation of the basic facts - where exactly was he enrolled and precisely when?

Otto, if I can add to that, Jimmy & Jeff (Beck) at the same Art school?

[Otto Masson]

Otto, if I can add to that, Jimmy & Jeff (Beck) at the same Art school?

There you go - I can't really answer that question!

I should add that I tried to research this to the best of my ability a couple of years ago, and all I could come up with was a guess that it was indeed Sutton Art, as Glicine said, from about mid-1962 - the end of 1963. I asked George Case about it, and he made the same guess. Seemingly insignificant details like that can indeed often be quite important when you start taking a closer look at things, and knowing this for sure might actually be of real help in various contexts. And after all, these are just verifiable facts. Now if I remember correctly, Swandown then made an educated guess that Jimmy in fact attended Art school quite a bit earlier, beginning in 1960-1961!

We do know he was enrolled for about a year and a half.

Edited August 7, 2009 by Otto Masson

[glicine]

I don't know how reliable Mick Wall's book is, but he states clearly on page 112-113 that Jimmy was at the Art College in Sutton.

If it was true, then he and Jeff Beck were not at the same school, since Jeff attended the Wimbledon College of Art.

Edited August 8, 2009 by glicine

[Otto Masson]

I don't know how reliable Mick Wall's book is, but he states clearly on page 112-113 that Jimmy was at the Art College in Sutton.

If it was true, then he and Jeff Beck were not at the same school, since Jeff attended the Wimbledon College of Art.

I see, I must admit I still haven't read that one. Does he give any indication on what he is basing the claim?

[MJC455]

New York Blogger post a encounter with Jimmy Page interesting since it was mention before about Jimmy only close Jimi is clarifed by JP himself

An Accidental Encounter With Jimmy Page

Jimmy’s thoughts shifted to another, more short-lived Manhattan venue, the heavily Mobbed-up West Village rock club Salvation. (Although I can’t vouch for the accuracy of his account, author Jerry Hopkins wrote at length about Salvation’s troubled history in Chapter 13 of his 1996 biography The Jimi Hendrix Experience.) Salvation only lasted about a year as a live music venue but during that time, it was a favorite hangout for Jimi Hendrix.

Page: “I may have been there only once but I remember that Jimi came in, or rather was led in by some people” — and here he assumed the heavy-lidded, open-mouthed expression of a very loaded Hendrix. “He was at another table and someone came over and asked if I wanted to join him, as we’d never met before.

“But I said no, because Jimi seemed really out of it and I just didn’t want to meet him under those circumstances. Unfortunately, I never got another chance — really too bad.”

Seem consistent to what i read about it this before.

[glicine]

I see, I must admit I still haven't read that one. Does he give any indication on what he is basing the claim?

No he doesn't, that's why I said I don't know if it is reliable. He is doing the "second person" writing(you blablabla) and talking from the angle of Jimmy about how he and Jeff got to know each other.

[Otto Masson]

No he doesn't, that's why I said I don't know if it is reliable. He is doing the "second person" writing(you blablabla) and talking from the angle of Jimmy about how he and Jeff got to know each other.

OK, thanks.

[Otto Masson]

New York Blogger post a encounter with Jimmy Page interesting since it was mention before about Jimmy only close Jimi is clarifed by JP himself

An Accidental Encounter With Jimmy Page

Seem consistent to what i read about it this before.

Hey, thanks for posting that link, interesting to read, even if there's basically nothing new there. We were actually discussing this very recently in THIS THREAD

[Hotplant]

Great story, love those roadies white legs in shorts too...

[swandown]

Now if I remember correctly, Swandown then made an educated guess that Jimmy in fact attended Art school quite a bit earlier, beginning in 1960-1961!

Actually, I have 2 theories on Jimmy's tenure at art school:

1. based on recent evidence that Jimmy joined Neil Christian's band as early as March 1959 (and stayed with him for 18 months), then Jimmy could have enrolled in art college as soon as September 1960.

2. on the other hand, Jimmy wrote to a pen pal in 1963 that he planned on going to art school in September 1963. But perhaps Jimmy only meant that he was returning to art school?

Either way, most of Jimmy's life prior to 1966 is a total unknown.

[Aquamarine]

The 1960 school year is pretty much the earliest he could have enrolled, as he'd have been 16 then, and he'd have needed O Levels or CSEs (which he'd have taken at the end of the previous school year) to be admitted. He couldn't have gone to art school any younger than that, basically.

[SteveAJones]

New York Blogger post a encounter with Jimmy Page interesting since it was mention before about Jimmy only close Jimi is clarifed by JP himself

An Accidental Encounter With Jimmy Page

Seem consistent to what i read about it this before.

Yes! Those are Jimmy's most definitive comments on the matter.

[SteveAJones]

Actually, I have 2 theories on Jimmy's tenure at art school:

1. based on recent evidence that Jimmy joined Neil Christian's band as early as March 1959 (and stayed with him for 18 months), then Jimmy could have enrolled in art college as soon as September 1960.

2. on the other hand, Jimmy wrote to a pen pal in 1963 that he planned on going to art school in September 1963. But perhaps Jimmy only meant that he was returning to art school?

Either way, most of Jimmy's life prior to 1966 is a total unknown.

This is consistent with what I believe to be the facts too. Enrolled in Sutton Art College circa Sept '60 after having left Neil Christian and the Crusaders following a bad bout of glandular fever. Tenure at art college also lasted about 18 months, but he continued to

be involved in music during this time, for example rehearsing with Cyril Davies and Nicky Hopkins for Davies band (Jimmy declined to join), accompanying beat poet Royston Ellis on accoustic guitar, and listening to records at home with Albert Lee. Jimmy developed

an affinity for Lee's sound (Gibson Les Paul Custom with Supro Amp) and bought a Supro of his own in 1961. Jeff and Jimmy were friends in art college, but attended different schools.

[Cecil.]

Thank you all for the the help on that, Does anyone know what Jimmy Page was influenced by in

terms of artists, and did reflect on the album designs?

[SteveAJones]

John Paul Jones Triple-Neck Instrumental on www.johnpauljones.com

http://johnpauljones.com/video_tripleneck2000.html

Is this multi-camera footage from the 3/14/00 House of Blues concert in New Orleans?

I know three songs from this gig were sanctioned for simulcast on the internet at the now defunct www.rockuniverse.com website, but it's my understanding each of those

songs were incomplete.

Is there any confirmation or further details available concerning how many of the JPJ solo gigs were professionally audio/video recorded? I distinctly recall seeing a single

boom mike and camera mounted atop the soundboard in Frankfurt on 11/8/99.

[SteveAJones]

Thank you all for the the help on that. Does anyone know what Jimmy Page was influenced by in terms of artists, and did it reflect on the album designs?

Jimmy himself was always quite fond of the pre-Raphaelites:

http://persephone.cps.unizar.es/General/Ge...aphaelites.html

Jimmy also collected quite a few M.C. Escher works during the first few American tours.

However, as you'll see in a moment, regardless of his interests in art he had the good fortune of close association with a number of talented graphic artists.

George Hardie was commissioned by Jimmy to produce the first album cover, the details of which have been covered previously in this thread. Chris Dreja, whom had been the bassist in The Yardbirds, took the photographs on the back. Interesing to note it was his pursuit of photography which influenced him to opt out music for some time.

The album sleeve design for Led Zeppelin II was from a poster by David Juniper, who was simply told by the band to come up with an idea that was "interesting". His design was based on an old photograph of the Jasta 11 Division of the German Air Force during World War I, the famed Flying Circus led by Manfred von Richthofen, the Red Baron. After the picture was tinted, the faces of the four members of the band were airbrushed on from a 1969 publicity photograph, as well as the faces of band manager Peter Grant and tour manager Richard Cole. The woman in the picture is Glynis Johns, the mother from Mary Poppins. Her presence in the photo is an obvious play on the name of recording engineer Glyn Johns. The other face added was that of bluesman Blind Willie Johnson. The cover also pictured the outline of a Zeppelin on a brown background, which gave the album its nickname "Brown Bomber".

Led Zeppelin III was designed by Zacron, a multi-media artist whom Jimmy had met in 1963 whilst Zacron was a student at Kingston College of Art.

Jimmy's long-standing friendship with Barrington Colby culminated in the album cover for Led Zeppelin IV, for which Jimmy contributed the typeface for the lyrics to "Stairway to Heaven", printed on the inside sleeve of the album. He found it in Studio Magazine, an old arts and publication which dated from the late 1800s. Jimmy thought the lettering was interesting and arranged for someone to work up a whole alphabet.

The cover art for Houses of the Holy was inspired by the ending of Arthur C. Clarke's novel Childhood's End. (The ending involves several hundred million naked children, only slightly and physically resembling the human race in basic forms). It is a collage of several photographs which were taken at the Giant's Causeway, Northrn Ireland, by Aubrey Powell of Hipgnosis. This location was chosen ahead of an alternative one in Peru which was being considered

The album sleeve design for Physical Graffiti features a photograph of a New York City tenement block, with interchanging window illustrations. The album designer, Peter Corriston, was looking for a building that was symmetrical with interesting details, that was not obstructed by other objects and would fit the square album cover. He said:

We walked around the city for a few weeks looking for the right building. I had come up a concept for the band based on the tenement, people living there and moving in and out. The original album featured the building with the windows cut out on the cover and various sleeves that could be placed under the cover, filling the windows with the album title, track information or liner notes.

The two five-story buildings photographed for the album cover are located at 96 and 98 St. Mark's Place in New York City. But to enable it to fit, the fifth floor had to be cropped out. So for the album cover it became a four-story building instead. The front cover is a daytime image, while the back cover is the same image but at nighttime. As a by the way, this is the same building The Rolling Stones used in their 1981 promo video for 'Waiting on A Friend'.

The cover and inside sleeve of Presence, created by Hisgnosis, features various images of people interacting with a black obelisk-shaped object. Inside the album sleeve, the item is referred to simply as "The Object". It was intended to represent the "force and presence" of Led Zeppelin. In the liner notes of the first Led Zeppelin boxed set, Jimmy explained:

There was no working title for the album. The record-jacket designer said `When I think of the group, I always think of power and force. There's a definite presence there.' That was it. He wanted to call it `Obelisk'. To me, it was more important what was behind the obelisk. The cover is very tongue-in-cheek, to be quite honest. Sort of a joke on [the film]. I think it's quite amusing.

The background used in the cover photograph is of an artificial marina that was installed inside London's Earls Court Arena for the annual Earl's Court Boat Show that was held in the winter of 1974–1975. This was the same venue where the band played five dates in May 1975.

In 1977 this album was nominated for a Grammy Award in the category of best album package.

In Thru The Out Door featured an unusual gimmick: the album had an outer sleeve which was made to look like a plain brown paper bag, and the inner sleeve featured black and white line artwork which, if washed with a wet brush, would become permanently fully colored. There were also six different sleeves featuring a different pair of photos (one on each side; see images at right), and the external brown paper sleeve meant that it was impossible for record buyers to tell which sleeve they were getting. (There is actually a code on the spine of the album jacket, which indicated which sleeve it was—this could sometimes be seen while the record was still sealed.) The pictures all depicted the same scene in a bar (in which a man burns a Dear John Letter), and each photo was taken from the separate point of view of someone who appeared in the other photos.

The album artwork was designed by Hipgnosis. Storm Thorgerson recalls the design in his book Eye of the Storm:

The sepia quality was meant to evoke a non-specific past and to allow the brushstroke across the middle to be better rendered in colour and so make a contrast. This self same brushstroke was like the swish of a wiper across a wet windscreen, like a lick of fresh paint across a faded surface, a new look to an old scene, which was what Led Zeppelin told us about their album. A lick of fresh paint, as per Led Zeppelin, and the music on this album... It somehow grew in proportion and became six viewpoints of the same man in the bar, seen by the six other characters. Six different versions of the same image and six different covers.

In 1980, Hipgnosis was nominated for a Grammy Award in the category of best album package for In Through the Out Door.

Coda was also designed by Hipgnosis, and the ten circular irrigation fields on the back cover are thought to correlate to the ten albums released by the band. The inner liner features a collage of photographs. The main photo on the right side—showing the band members clapping—was taken the day before their Knebworth concerts in 1979 on the concert grounds. However, the band were dissatisfied with the image, and their image—and the ground where they stand—are all that remain from that photo. Superimposed behind the band is a photo of a green field in Chaddesley Corbett, Worcestershire, England, near Bonham's home. It is thought John Paul Jones suggested the album title.

Edited August 8, 2009 by SteveAJones

[SteveAJones]

Jimmy Page & Screaming Lord Sutch - 'Flashing Lights' - set to Poe's The Fall of the House of Usher. 3:06 of sheer bliss:

Lord Sutch - Lord Sutch and Heavy Friends

May 19, 2009

What’s not to love about Sundazed Music? Their re-release of recordings considered essential by collectors, yet out of print for decades, never ceases to astound. Their High Definition Vinyl output is especially impressive. Let’s give a listen to an infamous record that has been slagged by some critics and ignored by Atlantic Records nearly since its first release back in 1970 – Lord Sutch and Heavy Friends. Sundazed knows the importance of this record and so should you.

Lord, or Screaming Lord, Sutch as he was alternately known had been gigging around the U.K. since the early ’60s. He was actually rather innovative in his stage show, having stolen the horror- show gimmickry from his namesake, Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, and taken it to another level. He had a bit of a reputation leading up to the recording of his debut full-length album as a political oddball and proponent of cutting-edge swinging London fashion (especially with his long hair and historical costuming). Sutch had no trouble attracting quality musicians to his camp despite his acknowledged limited vocal abilities; even a young Ritchie Blackmore slung axe for Sutch before forming Deep Purple. Enter Jimmy Page, ever the studio rat even into his early success with Led Zeppelin, and an unholy partnership was formed. Page co-wrote several songs with Sutch and agreed to produce an album for him. With his own formidable musical connections, Page attracted Experience bassist Noel Redding, fellow guitar phenom Jeff Beck, piano wizard Nicky Hopkins and Page’s own regular drummer John Bonham to the studio for some fun. What came of the sessions was originally thought by the musicians to be demo recordings that would undergo more polishing before being unleashed on the public. Silly musicians! Cotillion released Lord Sutch and Heavy Friends following what Page considered to be the record’s completion and it faced an immediate denunciation from the musicians involved. Many music fans also disliked the result. The record, and Sutch to some degree, began a rapid descent into obscurity. I feel, however, that history has done wrong by Sutch, Page and the Heavy Friends. It’s an extremely listenable record with several quality performances. It deserves, and Sundazed was right on this of course, a closer listen some decades on.

As each song does not have individual credits, we are left to pick out unmistakable performances based on the style of the musicians involved. And it ain’t hard. Side one begins with “Wailing Sounds” and it may as well have been an unused Zeppelin track with Sutch instead of Plant on vocals. Page recycles riffs found on the first two Zeppelin albums and uses many of the guitar effects that he was known for early on. The opening riff sounds as if it’s stolen from “Helter Skelter,” but it’s all Page and Bonham after that. “’Cause I Love You” follows and is again featuring solos made famous by Page in Led Zeppelin, but has different studio musicians behind him. The song is a little sloppy, but the so were the first two Zeppelin records. Sutch has no ability to emote, but rather adds a bit of grit to a delivery that’s one step up from monotone. We’ve heard a zillion tracks like this on Nuggets and Pebbles collections by garage bands throughout the world, and we love the stuff. This is at least that good; one step below what Page had done elsewhere, but still quite good. Side two’s “Union Jack Car” tells the true tale of Lord Sutch touring around in his Rolls Royce decked out in Britain’s emblem. It’s a 4-bar blues, not unlike “Sweet Little Sixteen,” but hints at punk music as do several other songs on the album. We learned to appreciate the vocal shortcomings of many punk singers over the years and I think we can easily do the same for Lord Sutch. “Brightest Light” is one of the few songs not co-written by Page, but it brings new elements in background vocals and an organ. Page, the producer is showing the innovation that he has been known for on this song. If we had heard this track 20 years later as recorded by Pavement, we wouldn’t have flinched. The record closes out with “Baby, Come Back,” which is sort of a maxed-out “You Really Got Me” kind of song. Remember, Page played guitar on a lot of old Kinks’ singles, and he’s dredging it all up once more on this tune. The proto-punk feel of the song and basic, guttural vocal delivery had been extremely influential on garage-psych punks and also, much later, heavy metal bands. The listener gets to thinking that Page may actually have contributed to a style of music (punk) that eschews everything he’s known for (Zeppelin). Wild!

Check this record out; it’s an absolute hoot. Whether you’re curious about the character Sutch, interested in the various projects Jimmy Page has been involved in over the years, or as a document of what sorts of attempts were being made at popular British rock music back in 1970, you won’t be disappointed. And don’t forget to thank Sundazed for reproducing that spectacular album cover featuring Sutch and his Rolls. We no longer have squint to see Sutch’s sneer like we do when looking at the CD booklet.

- Mark Polzin www.classicrockmusicblog.com

[sam_webmaster]

John Paul Jones Triple-Neck Instrumental on www.johnpauljones.com

http://johnpauljones.com/video_tripleneck2000.html

Is this multi-camera footage from the 3/14/00 House of Blues concert in New Orleans?

I know three songs from this gig were sanctioned for simulcast on the internet at the now defunct www.rockuniverse.com website, but it's my understanding each of those

songs were incomplete.

Is there any confirmation or further details available concerning how many of the JPJ solo gigs were professionally audio/video recorded? I distinctly recall seeing a single

boom mike and camera mounted atop the soundboard in Frankfurt on 11/8/99.

Correct, that video is from New Orleans 3/14/00. The entire show was filmed. Not sure exactly how many gigs were professionally filmed (multi-camera) in their entirety, but the New Orleans video is the best one overall that I've seen.

[BonzoLikeDrumer]

John Paul Jones Triple-Neck Instrumental on www.johnpauljones.com

http://johnpauljones.com/video_tripleneck2000.html

Is this multi-camera footage from the 3/14/00 House of Blues concert in New Orleans?

I know three songs from this gig were sanctioned for simulcast on the internet at the now defunct www.rockuniverse.com website, but it's my understanding each of those

songs were incomplete.

Is there any confirmation or further details available concerning how many of the JPJ solo gigs were professionally audio/video recorded? I distinctly recall seeing a single

boom mike and camera mounted atop the soundboard in Frankfurt on 11/8/99.

Even if only one camera sound's boring, I assure you that one correctly placed stereo microphone can make all the difference between a professional and not so professional a sound recording.

Microphone placement is the first rule in a live recording! But, if your going to take it back to the studio and re-record a lot of it, it will matter not how many or what kind of microphone's you have.

Just depends on what was in the work's at that time.

[SteveAJones]

Correct, that video is from New Orleans 3/14/00. The entire show was filmed. Not sure exactly how many gigs were professionally filmed (multi-camera) in their entirety, but the New Orleans video is the best one overall that I've seen.

Thank you, Sam. It's unfortunate that there were so few complete pro-shot multi-cam performances recorded during the Led Zeppelin era, let alone the post-Zeppelin era.