Led Zeppelin engineer Stuart Epps recently shed light on his experience working with guitarist Jimmy Page following the tragic passing of drummer John Bonham. Epps revealed to Rock History Music that Page appeared emotionally detached during their collaboration on the first compilation album ‘Coda.’
The sudden and unexpected passing of Bohnam due to suffocation from vomit, an accidental death, was not easy for Page to accept. It was a few years before Jimmy was ready to work on anything new for the band, and ‘Coda,’ where Epps worked with the singer, was more of him doing his own thing and Page having the last say at the end.
Stuart Epps’ words about Jimmy Page after John Bonham’s death read:
“I suppose what we did think was that they’re bound to replace him with someone, I thought Simon Kirke. I think few people thought Simon Kirke from Bad Company, who had actually worked [with]… That wasn’t going to happen.
The first thing that happened was Jimmy said, or I don’t know, someone said, that there are some tapes arriving; some Zeppelin tapes are going to arrive. So, these multi-tracks started arriving, and I was putting them in the tapes store. Then, at some point, he came in and said, ‘We’re doing a tribute album; we’re doing a tribute to John Bonham.'”
He added:
“I don’t suppose that they had the title of the album. So, he brings in this tape that I put on the multi-track – talk about being chucked in at the deep end – and it’s all drums. It’s this ‘Bonzo’s Montreux,’ which is a crazy track by any stretch of the imagination.
I thought, ‘It would’ve been nice if we had something simple while I’m working with Jimmy Page for the first time.’ I did the best I could. Also, Jimmy is still with us, but maybe he’s not listening. He was out of his tree most of the time.
It’s difficult sometimes with Jimmy to know whether his eccentricity is the fact that he was out of it or on something. Somehow the two went together, and he was quite difficult to understand. Because I thought this was Jimmy Page, Led Zeppelin’s producer, he would tell me what to do; he would tell me how to get John Bonham’s drum sound.
But he didn’t tell me anything. I just sort of went for what I sort of thought, and I figured, ‘Well if he didn’t like it, he would say something.’ That’s actually how I always worked with Jimmy.”
You can watch the interview below.
