John Paul Jones blames the Beatles for killing instrumental music (interview part 6 of 22)

This is the sixth part of the transcript of my interview with John Paul Jones, conducted Dec. 10, 2001.

SPS: You mentioned the Beatles when you were talking about the Tea Party shows in Boston. How much credit do you give the Beatles for today’s music, and I guess I’m saying strictly the Beatles as opposed to any other British groups.

JPJ: The Beatles really opened up with Revolver, I think, they opened up a whole idea of using the studio as an instrument and everybody playing it. My personal beef with the Beatles is that they also killed instrumental music [laughing] forever, from the first song. 'Cause there was lots of instrumental music in England, like … Lots of instrumental bands. Beatles came along. [Claps once] No more instrumental music. It’s all vocals from then on. And so, but yeah, I mean, they just. I suppose at first, we just thought, "Oh, all right, you know, it's a good, tight band, as any band would be." … And we thought, "OK, tight band. They write good songs, but…" And then they started doing that stuff in the studio, and I thought, "Now this is changing the face of music of pop music, it really is." And everybody followed them: the Beach Boys ... Just opening up the potential of the studio and doing stuff that wasn’t considered rock 'n' roll … It was just great, great stuff.

On to part seven: John Paul Jones on the rumor that Phil Carson filled in for him on bass when he was ill.

Hells Angels, helicopter transported John Paul Jones to Bath Festival in 1970 (interview part 5 of 22)

This is the fifth part of the transcript of my interview with John Paul Jones, conducted Dec. 10, 2001.

SPS: Let me take you to the Bath Festival, June 28, 1970. You were almost late because you were out with the Hells Angels and Julie Felix.

JPJ: We couldn't get there! To be honest, we couldn't get there. I think Peter Grant spent nine hours in a car getting down there, and it was looking like … the report would come back with the [place?] … you couldn't get near the festival. So I had an idea. I rented a helicopter. [inaudible] We all lived up in that area in [Hartfordshire?]. And so at Denham Airport, 10 minutes away, I called him up. I looked in the yellow pages. "Can you get a helicopter?" It was like some decently cheap price too – cheaper than a hired car, for some reason. We got in there, and then they said, "The problem will be landing." 'Cause I think for every thousand feet you have to be a thousand feet away. I said something, and they said, "Don't worry, we'll fix you a transport when we get there." So we ended up, we landed in a field [inaudible]. There's nobody about. [inaudible] But suddenly all these bikes just rolled up, just the helicopter just taking around, going, "Oh, wait a minute," you know. And all these Hells Angels appeared in the field on their bikes, and said, "We're your transport." And so it's just like, we got on the back of a bike and just rolled straight through to the stage. It's a great entrance, I have to say. I was carrying a mandolin. I had a cowboy hat on. [laughs] Peter Fonda.

SPS: And they gave you a leather jacket as a souvenir?

JPJ: No, I had this silly... I remember the jacket. It was this silly shiny thing with picks and tapes, real hippie stuff, it was great.

On to part six: John Paul Jones on blaming the Beatles.

John Paul Jones on touring with Led Zeppelin (interview part 4 of 22)

This is the fourth part of the transcript of my interview with John Paul Jones, conducted Dec. 10, 2001.

SPS: Were you ever ... dissatisfied with any [Led Zeppelin] performances?

JPJ: Yeah, there’s a time or two that you could have done better or something breaks down, "Why did that break down there?" There was never a band that had … I guess some bands had some, like, "post mortems" and they’re all sitting down and going, "Well, you know, that note, that lead-in to that…" It was just get on, do it, get off, and just have fun. You know? It was a very enjoyable band to actually make music in. And that was our sole purpose, pretty much. It was just like, do the best job, be very professional about it, and just have fun.

SPS: What’s the most memorable, like one experience or most humorous?

JPJ: Boston Tea Party, where we played four and a quarter hours on an hour-and-a-half act. We really had material for an hour and a half, but we played it twice I think, and then it was just like any Beatles songs anybody knew more than four bars of, or Everly Brothers songs we played, Elvis Presley songs we played. And at the end Peter called all of us out and I think he lifted all four of us off the ground. [Laughing] Some really neat experiences, and they’re all shows. ... Whisky-A-Go-Go we played when everyone was sick. Traveling to the States, we got the flu.

SPS: And you played those shows [Jan. 2-5, 1969] with Alice Cooper.

JPJ: Did we?

SPS: Yeah.

JPJ: All right!

SPS: He was just on the radio a few months back, and he said something to the effect of, "Yeah, I was on the bill with Led Zeppelin." "Well, who was the opening act?" He said, "Well, basically we got there and just said, ‘You be it tonight, I’ll be it tomorrow night.’"

JPJ: Quite likely, that’s how it was done. … I think later [and earlier, December 1968] we opened for the Vanilla Fudge for a while. That was great.

On to part five: John Paul Jones on the Bath Festival 1970.

John Paul Jones on the formation of Led Zeppelin (interview part 3 of 22)

This is the third part of the transcript of my interview with John Paul Jones, conducted Dec. 10, 2001.

SPS: Before the Yardbirds broke up, Page said that he wanted to form a new band with a singer who could double on the mellotron.

JPJ: Page?

SPS: Yeah. That was something published in the Melody Maker. So I was gonna ask if you ever discussed that.

JPJ: A singer doubling on mellotron? No.

SPS: How about Terry Reid?

JPJ: I hear it a lot he was the original choice, and in fact Terry Reid was the one who suggested Robert.

SPS: Were you familiar with Terry Reid’s work before? "Bang Bang"…

JPJ: Oh yeah!

SPS: How do you think that would have turned out?

JPJ: It would have been different. ...

SPS: Were you involved in the selection process of Robert Plant and John Bonham?

JPJ: Well, Terry, as I said, Terry Reid had … What happened was … At around the time that Page was … I think he may have asked Terry Reid and then kind of like, at the same time, I called him up because Mo, my wife, had seen an article in Disc, which said that Jimmy Page was forming a band. Then she said, "Give him a call." And I said, "No, I've got too many sessions, too much work." She could tell I was beginning to burn out on session work. She said, "Give him a call, see what that's all about." So I called him up, and he was that day or the next day going up to Birmingham to see … 'Cause he said, "We've asked Terry Reid." I said, "Who've you got?" He said, "Well, I've asked Terry Reid, and he's declined and that he's recommended a singer, and he thinks the singer might know a drummer. I'm going up to Birmingham tonight and see what they're like, and I'll come back, and I'll tell you what they were like." And so he came back, and he was raving about them. He said, "The singer is fantastic. The drummer is a bit more difficult. He'd been making 40 quid a week touring with Tim Rose, so we'd have to guarantee to pay him more."

SPS: What was Led Zeppelin called before it was called Led Zeppelin?

JPJ: It was going to be Led Zeppelin, but we had to go out as the new Yardbirds because Page had some dates that the Yardbirds had committed to before they'd broken up. So he still had some dates in Scandinavia, I think. So we had to go out as the new Yardbirds because they wouldn’t accept… the promoter ...

SPS: And then, finally, between calling yourselves the Yardbirds or the "new" Yardbirds, what was that like deciding, "We’re gonna be Led Zeppelin"?

JPJ: Well, it's just – the name came originally – well, originally originally, it came originally from [the Who’s John] Entwistle. But the name of the band the first time I heard was at the session for "Beck's Bolero," wherein there was Keith Moon, Jeff [Beck], Jimmy, Nicky Hopkins and myself. And we had a lot of fun in the session, and somebody suggested we should take this on the road. And I think Moon said something like "It would go down like a lead zeppelin" or something like that. But I didn’t think it was such a good name at first. It shows you how wrong I was!

SPS: It could easily be misspelled. Was that Jimmy’s idea to make it L-E-D?

JPJ: No, that was Peter.

SPS: There are people who spell "Zeppelin" wrong. I mean, that's been the airship for years.

JPJ: That's right.

SPS: Somebody ought to know. I just got a letter the other day in my e-mail the other day, saying, "No, it's not Zeppelin, it's Z-E-P-P-L-I-N."

JPJ: No.

SPS: They were so authoritative. They couldn’t even spell anything else right in that e-mail, so I threw that right out.

On to part four: John Paul Jones on touring with Led Zeppelin.

John Paul Jones denies playing on any Yardbirds studio tracks (interview part 2 of 22)

This is the second part of the transcript of my interview with John Paul Jones, conducted Dec. 10, 2001.

SPS: When you were – I was gonna say "with the Yardbirds." Did you consider yourself to be with the Yardbirds?

JPJ: No, I was never with the Yardbirds. I did some arrangements for the Little Games album. That's the only thing I had to do with anything.

SPS: What about playing bass on like all their later A-sides?

JPJ: I never played the bass on their A-sides. Where'd you hear that from?

SPS: A couple books. One a book on the Yardbirds by Greg Russo, a guy from New Jersey.

JPJ: No, I never played the bass for the Yardbirds on record.

SPS: So it was all Chris Dreja then?

JPJ: Yeah.

SPS: Wow. That answers some of my other questions.

JPJ: Page played bass for the Yardbirds.

SPS: When he first started out with them.

JPJ: Yes.

SPS: One of the things I couldn't understand is, he'd always been playing the guitar and stuff like that, doing his session work. And then he gets out of the session work, immediately switches to bass.

JPJ: I think he joined the Yardbirds and -- I don't know what the story was, but he played bass because there was a bass player at the time leaving.

SPS: That's something you can just pick up having played guitar?

JPJ: No, it's sort of similar, but [inaudible].

SPS: I know Chris Dreja had played the rhythm guitar for like three or four years with them, and it took him a while to switch to bass.

JPJ: On a certain level, they're interchangeable, but… [trails off]

On to part three: John Paul Jones on the formation of Led Zeppelin.

John Paul Jones speaks about his early days (interview part 1 of 22)

This is the first part of the transcript of my interview with John Paul Jones, conducted Dec. 10, 2001.

SPS: Your original name, was it John Paul Baldwin?

JPJ: No. Just John Baldwin. No middle name. It’s not common in England, middle names.

SPS: I have a brother, John Paul Sauer.

JPJ: Oh, right? There’s a lot more John Pauls these days, especially in Ireland, after the pope.

SPS: When did you change your name?

JPJ: I'd forgotten, to be honest, until I read the Andrew Oldham book. Andrew Loog Oldham – and he reminded me in there that in fact he thought of the name. [inaudible] movie poster for John Paul Jones the American. So, working that back, it would have been 1964.

SPS: So, after – I guess it started out when you started playing at those American naval bases over in England?

JPJ: No, I had done all that. I was John Baldwin. It was really when I became an arranger for Andrew Oldham. That was its purpose. And also I had a single out at the same time. Oh, that’s right! He produced it. He produced my first single. And that came out under John Paul Jones.

SPS: Now, I know that you were a session musician. Why was it that you put out the "Baja" single?

JPJ: I wasn't a session musician before "Baja." I was just, just breaking into it, which means like maybe a couple of sessions a week as opposed to when I left it about three sessions a day.

SPS: So we're talking about something like 30 years ago you were looking at solo stardom!

JPJ: Yeah. Well, I'd been in a band. I'd had enough of the road.

SPS: The guys from the Tornados?

JPJ: No, it was the guys from the Shadows, Jet Harris and Tony Meehan. ... And we were playing for like 200-500 people a night. ...

SPS: Backtracking a little bit, there was something I wanted to know about your dad and your mom. They toured together on some sort of an act?

JPJ: That's right. They had what you'd call a vaudeville act.

SPS: What was that basically?

JPJ: Musical comedy. It was actually based around -- she was the singer, and she had a really incompetent accompanist or willfully difficult accompanist. He’d start playing, he’d do like long introductions. [Singing:] "Oh, sweet mystery of love…" And then a bell would ring. He goes to the piano, he’d pull out an alarm clock, and the audience gags. So she’d never really get through a song.

SPS: How old do you think you were? I read that you'd toured with them.

JPJ: That's right.

SPS: Was that even before your teens?

JPJ: Oh yeah. That's probably right. ...

SPS: Your dad then played for the Ambrose Orchestra. Were you along with him on there?

JPJ: No, that was before.

SPS: I've always wondered the date that you were married.

JPJ: The date that I was married? I don't know if she'd necessarily want it printed, to be honest.

SPS: There goes out the next question. I was gonna ask when your three daughters were born.

JPJ: Yeah. Information like that…

SPS: And your social security number?

JPJ: [Laughs]

On to part two: John Paul Jones on the Yardbirds.