(Credits: Far Out / Dana Wullenwaber)
Wed 8 April 2026 18:15, UK
It was going to be a cold day in hell before Jimmy Page ever willingly left Led Zeppelin.
The band was his baby before anyone was even in the group, and while The Yardbirds were definitely fun while they lasted, the moment that Page decided to leave the band behind would be the day when pigs start flying. But even though Page would have done anything to keep the band afloat at any cost, he did at least have a handful of artists that he would rather hang out with in his spare time than worry about whatever the next Zeppelin record was going to sound like.
After all, some of the greatest moments of Page’s career before then were as a session musician, and he wasn’t about to give up all of those chops that he learned to play blues rock for the rest of his life. But even if Zeppelin went in a bunch of different directions, there were more than a few times when Roy Harper started making music that wasn’t cut out for Robert Plant’s style of singing.
In the grand story of rock and roll, though, Harper always seemed like someone just on the fringes of superstardom but never quite reaching it. He was friends with a lot of legends and even managed to have a lead vocal on one of the best Pink Floyd albums of all time, but even after Zeppelin named a tune after him, he wasn’t exactly the same artist who was going to be rubbing elbows with the true legends of the genre or anything.
But that never stopped Page from working with someone new. Hell, before Zeppelin was even a major band, half of the members of the group were already backing Screaming Lord Sutch, and since that guy was a horrible singer from the jump, it wasn’t out of the question for Page to spend some time working with his friends who could actually manage to carry a tune together. And when you look at the timeline, Page was already white hot when he got the call to work with Harper.
‘Whole Lotta Love’ had just become the biggest rock and roll song the world had ever heard, but Page felt that if there was anyone who could shift his focus, it was Harper, saying, “The only deviation from that was my playing with Roy Harper on Stormcock. He and I were playing the two acoustics, and that was really cool. I really admired Roy’s work and still do. But that was the only area really where I stepped out of Led Zeppelin, because if I wasn’t on the road, I was writing for the next album.”
So this is where I tell you that Stormcock is one of the greatest albums in rock and roll history, right? Well, not exactly. The album isn’t bad by any stretch, but when compared to the rest of what the rock and roll world was doing, this is the only time that Page was ever on a record that could be considered more faceless than anything else.
Which is a shame because Harper isn’t one lacking in personality, either. He did a great job playing the sleazy businessman-type on ‘Have a Cigar’, but when you listen to him in context, you can tell that he doesn’t have the same kind of range that everyone else does. That said, kudos for making a record that was a lot more daring than anything else at the time, especially when done all on acoustic instruments for the most part.
Page was still more comfortable going back to Zeppelin after his work here, but it’s not like Harper was ever going to encroach on what they were doing. He was his own unique animal, and if Page could manage to give him a little bit more leverage in between making his own acoustic ditties on ‘Friends’ and ‘Tangerine’, he was going to do whatever he could to push him over the line.
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