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Jimmy Page Talking About His Guitars


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Thanks for those John.

It's funny to listen to Jimmy Page through the years and his evolving stories. As much as I idolized him in the past and wanted to believe every word he said. The whole Randy California thing, The Les Paul story was the one that broke the camels back for me. Jimmy Page was a paid endorser for Gibson and Marshall. I can recall several times when he stated that for the recording of Stairway he specifically stated it was a Les Paul fed through a marshall. I tried everything I could to recreate that tone in my early years with a LP standard and various marshal amps. There was even an article in Guitar player where he was called out on the LP thing and he stated "yes I've got a coil tap switch under the pickguard for the nasal single coil tone"

Matchingly bad is this - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stairway_to_Heaven#Composition

Jeff Beck had his 59 esquire stolen and when it was returned he exchanged it with Seymour Duncan for a Telecaster with humbuckers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YB9EX7YpFk

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That Jeff Beck video is great. I saw him play only once. It was in (or near) Nottingham. I was 17 at the time.  

 

I didnt know that about Jimmy Page. Its a shame to hear his misleading stories. Was he insecure do you think?

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With EVH.... he's always been insecure. With Jimmy Page it may have been that he was locked into a contract with Gibson. Gibson was funny that way. They would show up to concerts with free guitars just to make sure the audience saw the brand name. They would do full page advertisements for the guitar and artist when the artist hit the cover of a magazine. If Jimmy Page was on the cover of Guitar Player gibson would sell X more gibsons for that month. So it was important for gibson to have their artist featured prominently with the guitars and dangerous when they weren't. When a guitarist had a big league contract with Gibson it would work for the guitarists career as well. Keep his face in magazines and interest in tours and records alive.

I used to get bent out of shape with that type of stuff. Especially Eddie Van Halen who was really bad about lying and caused quite a number of guitarists to sacrifice amps.

http://ultimateclassicrock.com/eddie-van-halen-reveals-his-biggest-lie/

It's not the only lie he's told in his career. However it was the most damming. People went out and got marshall amps and He told people he cranked the variac up. In truth when you crank a variac up you not only fry the tubes you fry the amp. EVH lied about almost everything. The actual body he used for the guitar he built. The fact that the bridge pickup was the only one that worked. The fact that he bypassed the tone pot. He didn't design the 5150 amp...That was Soldano. He didn't design the EB/Music Man guitar that was all in house at Music Man.

After I wrote this which is famous early keyboard sounds .... http://tappermike.com/?q=node/32

I was going to do a follow up with famous guitar sounds. Guitars, amps effects and settings. The more research I did the harder it was to get to the truth and people who believed things for a long time weren't about to shake off the the belief for truth. Another example.... All the journey songs of the 70's Neal Schon was playing an Aria Pro PE not a Gibson Les Paul.

I've pointed out this video before...

Scott Grove hist many things right on (and some thing s bit off) My contention isn't as much the ghost build but the tonal representation. Let's say you have a bazillion dollars and you buy A Schon signature Les Paul. Goddamit that thing should sound exactly like the guitar he used. Nor sorta or maybe or possibly. I've played a 1980's Eric Clapton strat and ..It does sound exactly like the signature strat he played in the 80's (not quite blackie) I've also played a Peter Frampton Custom signature and it doesn't sound like Peter Framptons during the 70's I had a 78 custom which hit the mark much better.

I ignore the signature status for guitars these days. With maybe the exception of the Jimmie Vaughan signature strat model. I just like the tone for it's own sake. It's reasonably priced.

Edited by TapperMike
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Maybe it was you that put the Ghost Build link up before then. But I have seen it. 

 

That was why I asked a while back about whether Gibson do make all of their guitars in the USA as this (or another similar expose by Scott Grove) calls this into question. 

 

I still find it strange that with Gibson's custom shop they would still pay a 3rd party luthier to build a guitar for a celeb guitarist. 

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This was a great line of post. I never seen the Jeff Beck interview. Just a guy that loves guitar. No ego involved at all. I seen him once here in Philly. He opened for Santana on the Supernatural tour. Great show all around. The only disappointment was they didn't do anything together.

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I used to get bent out of shape with that type of stuff. Especially Eddie Van Halen who was really bad about lying and caused quite a number of guitarists to sacrifice amps.

 

It's not the only lie he's told in his career. 

 

I remember boiling my guitar strings a few times. Not sure what the hell that ever did really. I just wish I would have known where he got that "No Bozos" t-shirt.

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