Jimmy Page is as wary of discussing his formidable past as he is talking to the press in the first place. The latter state of affairs has been alleviated somewhat but exists as a reminder of the consciously anti-Zeppelin bias that prevailed in several notewrothy periodicals for so long, and Page’s own awareness that facts and statements can so easily be twisted and perverted into something else again when splashed across the printed page.

Still, looking almost obscenely calm and healthy in the wake of the last (and exceptionally grueling) Led Zeppelin assault on the United States, the dapper Mr. Page genially acquiesed to being plugged with questions about his pre-

Zeppelin work.

“God knows what the others must think when I start talking about my old days. They must say ‘Oh Christ, he’s off again on his Yardbird stories’.” Similarly, he prefaces a recounting of his session work experiences — which stretch from working in the studio with P.J. Proby and Dave Berry to playing on the Who’s “Can’t Explain” and Them’s immortal “Gloria” — thus: