While fellow Led Zeppelin member Robert Plant continues to create new music with his solo band, guitarist Jimmy Page has mostly been working on re-releases from the Led Zeppelin catalog in the last few years. With the recent release of Zeppelin’s The Complete BBC Sessions, it seems Page can finally turn his sights on the new.
In past interviews, Jimmy Page has talked about putting a band together to record new music and tour. However, those plans were unfortunately sidetracked with work on the new release. As Page explains, he’s still very much interested in getting back out there in 2017.
Speaking to Planet Rock, Page said, “It took a lot of time and I must say that I hoped by this time (September 2016) that I would be sort of playing with other musicians. I’ve said that to you before but I still hope to do that. Clearly now it’s not going to materialise until next year. That’s not that far away now!”
On the other hand, Page also said that he might work on more re-releases as well. “I’m sure there will be some (restored) releases over the next few years… but it’s the sort of thing where we need to have a good old chat with the band y’know. A few band meetings to discuss the ideas. So, I hope so!”
He’s also in touch with the members of his other band, The Yardbirds, about potentially producing re-releases for them as well.
“I’m in touch with the members of the Yardbirds and I hope to be seeing them relatively soon and then the material I’ve got we’ll see how much of it comes out. Hopefully all of it will come out but they haven’t heard all of the things, they’ve just heard certain samples of things and they were really thrilled with what they heard, which is cool.”
He continues, “It’s all stuff that was done right in the last stages of The Yardbirds, it’s more or less almost in that last year that we had together. It’s got things that were really sort of crossover… I’m just really keen to do that and do it with them… so we’re all involved, bits of memorabilia and all of that. I’m very very hopeful that it will come together. I’m confident that it will.”
Let’s hope this doesn’t impede Page’s ability to create new music and get back out there. We’ll be sure to keep you updated as we know more.