Credit: Alamy
Tue 13 October 2026 8:16, UK
Sometimes, all it takes is one live show to convince you that a band is capable of taking on the world. While more often than not, these things don’t work out that way, Mick Jagger was spot on with one prediction that he made in 1968.
At this time, The Rolling Stones were no longer the new kids on the block, and every other new band was coming for their crown. It would have been easy for them to take their eye off the ball, lose sight of reality on a yacht in St-Tropez. However, while that future did await The Rolling Stones, they were still firmly focused on any potential rivals that could arise out of nowhere.
The best way for Jagger to keep his ear to the ground was to remain a regular at the clubs his group once played on their way up, checking out the latest wave of bands coming through the system.
Jagger made a point to acquaint himself with emerging bands before they gained record deals and fame. One notable example is Led Zeppelin, who, like The Rolling Stones before them, played the same iconic venues across the English capital during their early days.
From the beginning, it was clear to Jagger that Led Zeppelin had all the ingredients to become arena-dwelling rock giants. Prior to the band forming, Jagger was already in awe of Jimmy Page, as well as John Paul Jones, the latter of whom worked with The Rolling Stones in 1967 as a session musician. Therefore, he was intrigued to see how their new venture would pan out.
Credit: julio zeppelin
Back in 2020, The Rolling Stones finally released ‘Scarlet’, which was originally recorded with Jimmy Page in 1974, once Led Zeppelin had established themselves as one of the biggest forces in rock history. This gave Jagger an opportunity to cast his mind back to his first impressions of Page, and how Led Zeppelin were in a league of their own as a live outfit.
During a conversation with BBC Radio 2, he described Page as “one of the best session guitarists at the time,” before recalling, “He was very young. They used to play chess in between takes; that was their thing.”
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He added of the days before Page had even joined The Yardbirds, let alone formed Led Zeppelin, “And that’s how I met Jimmy, and that’s how I met John Paul Jones – because he was the bass player. So I knew Jimmy from then, and I knew John Paul Jones from then, and then ten years later – or a bit less than ten years later – they made this very successful band.”
After learning the inner workings of the recording process through their experience as session musicians, Jones and Page flew the nest to form their own band, Led Zeppelin. Of course, this was no guaranteed recipe for success, but John Bonham and Robert Plant, unknowns compared to Page and Jones, were wise recruits who made Led Zeppelin turn heads everywhere they went.
Due to his relationship with the two musicians, Jagger was immediately intrigued by this development and was a regular at their earliest shows. Looking back fondly on their earliest concerts, Jagger warmly reminisced: “I used to go watch them live; I remember watching their concerts live; it was a great, thunderous racket“.
Within a year, Led Zeppelin would be playing on the biggest stages, and Jagger’s assertion that they were cut from a different cloth than the rest was proved correct.
Since then, his love of the band has only continued to grow, and Jagger was fortunate enough to witness history in 2007, when Led Zeppelin reunited for one night only at London’s O2 Arena. It was a night that he’ll never forget, and in fact, his only criticism is that he hasn’t been able to relive the experience, adding, “And I saw their last concert as well. And they were absolutely incredible. And I was so disappointed they didn’t actually go on [a reunion] tour and do it. But that’s their business, not mine”.
Jagger was one of the few people among the 20,000-strong crowd that night at the O2 Arena, apart from the band itself, who could genuinely say they’d been there with Led Zeppelin from the start. It was a true full-circle moment that allowed Led Zeppelin to bow out with dignity and grace while still making a thunderous racket, almost 40 years after their story began.
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