The songwriter Jimmy Page called “out of this world”
Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page has enjoyed a career of immense gravity. Making his name as one of London’s most sought-after session guitarists, he then had a significant turn in The Yardbirds, which saw the band pioneer psychedelic music and make rock more expansive than ever before. This brief flourish set the scene for him to form Led Zeppelin, a group so influential that they even outsold The Beatles.
Rubbing shoulders with the best of the best from early on, Page’s session career proved vital in readying him for the heights he would later rise to. Demonstrating this point, his training saw Page play on classic records by Donovan, Marianne Faithfull, The Who and The Kinks. Bestowing him with an immense volume of experience and providing an unrivalled networking opportunity, there may have been no Led Zeppelin in the way we all know and love without this period.
One of the most notable projects Jimmy Page worked on as a session musician was Nico’s 1965 cover of Gordon Lightfoot’s ‘I’m Not Sayin”, which also arrived with ‘The Last Mile’. Released on Immediate Records, the single had limited success, but it’s significant as it presents Nico before her influential heights with The Velvet Underground and Jimmy Page before The Yardbirds and Zeppelin. Notably, the song boasts Page on the 12-string guitar, with him also serving as producer. Clearly, at this early stage, he was an already accomplished musician.
Jimmy Page has been asked about this connection to Nico and, by association, The Velvet Underground at various points. When speaking to Classic Rock in 2020, the single with Nico was mentioned before the interviewer reminded Page that he “bumped into her again” when she was with The Velvet Underground. The guitarist was then invited to explain “how profound an influence” it was to hear the New York band for the first time.
Unsurprisingly, it was a monumental occasion for Page. Not only did he describe frontman Lou Reed’s songwriting as “just out of this world”, but he also said that the whole band was “phenomenal”. The Led Zeppelin man recalled: “I went to the Scene Club [in New York], which was decorated by Andy Warhol, and it was decorated with Bacofoil on the walls, because he said that was the colour of speed. And suddenly you hear this band doing this drone stuff, and Lou Reed’s writing was just out of this world. They were just phenomenal, and they sounded just like that first album. I only saw them when I was going through New York with The Yardbirds.”
He concluded: “Everyone talks about The Velvet Underground, but at the time people did not go to see them, and I found that odd. I loved The Velvet Underground, and it was such a thrill to have done that single with Nico, having written something with Andrew Oldham and going in there and just doing ‘The Last Mile’, which was really cool.”
Listen to The Velvet Underground & Nico below.
