"Guitarist Jimmy Page is rocking again, but no nostalgia, please"

[Cat]

Guitarist Jimmy Page is rocking again, but no nostalgia, please

Montgomery (AL) County Record, May 19. 1985

Associated Press

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Guitar master Jimmy Page, late of Led Zeppelin, and now a senior partner in the Firm, likes what he doesn't hear from concert audiences.

"We don't get any shouts for the old stuff, so we must have something going," said Page during

a recent appearance here by the group which includes former Bad Company lead singer Paul

Rodgers. Though the 41-year-old Page and Rodgers, 35, wrote most of the group's music, there's barely enough original material for a two-hour concert. Still, Page's determined not to trot out any Led

Zeppelin or Bad Company chestnuts.

"We want to do whatever's good, and whatever's new," said Page in an interview, adding that

he was not trying to aim the group in any musical direction.

"When we started writing songs for the LP, a lot of them came from thin air." The Firm, which also includes young bassist Tony Franklin and drummer Chris Slade, breaks no new ground with its first album, but harvests its popularity from some well-tilled rock 'n' roll fields. It is music that is not likely

to attract the spiky-haired or the studded leather wristband set. The solid musicianship of Page

and Rodgers' distinctive vocals are the group's chief assets, and their presence alone may have

generated their debut album's success on the charts. But it may take a second LP to judge where

the Firm actually fits in the rock 'n' roll scene. Released by Atlantic Records, the LP titled after the group's name was No. 21 on Billboard Magazine's top pop album chart for the week of April 27. It had

reached a high of No. 17 and was certified gold — 500,000 records and cassettes sold — on April 15.

"Radioactive," a single released from the album along with a video clip, was listed No. 46 on Billboard's "Hot 100" singles, down from two weeks at the No. 28 spot.

The Firm's members are masters of their trade, know how to produce good sounds and put on a

show for concert crowds. The presence of Rodgers and Page could provoke plenty of requests from those who remember Led Zeppelin, formed in 1968 and dissolved in 1980 when

drummer John Bonham died of a heart attack.

Page and other Led Zeppelin members — vocalist Robert Plant and bass-keyboard player

John Paul Jones — have said over the years that the group would never come together again

because the spirit of the original band could not be recreated without Bonham.

The group produced such hits as "Whole Lotta Love" and "Immigrant Song." And "Stairway

to Heaven" was the big hit on FM rock radio stations during the 1970s.

Page did studio sessions 20 years ago for The Who and Van Morrison's old group, Them, including

guitar work on "Gloria," which was to 1960s radio play what "Stairway to Heaven""was to the'70s.

Rodgers' association with Page goes back at least to the early '70s, when Bad Company's

albums were released in the United States on Led Zeppelin's Swan Song label. His first U.S hit was

"All Right Now" recorded in 1970 when he was with the short-lived British group, Free.

Bad Company's biggest hits include "Can't Get Enough" in 1974 and "Feel Like Makin' Love" in

1975.

Led Zeppelin, with its strong sexual messages derived from early American blues songs and

Page's interest in the occult and mysticism, was the first rock group termed "heavy metal" by

critics. "I know that we were labeled 'heavy metal,' and we certainly fit that category in some areas,"

Page said. "But in some of our sounds, you could hear a pin drop between notes. That's not how I

see heavy metal music now. But I guess we were embryonic of that whole thing."

Page said he likes current heavy metal groups "because it's not polite music."

[SteveAJones]

Some nice quotes in there; thanks Cat.