When Aerosmith guitarist Joe Perry talks about his biggest influences, two names are always bound to come up: Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck. And in an interview with Q magazine in the early 2000s, Perry explained exactly why Page and Beck were so inspiring for him.
Perry began by naming a handful of albums that have had a major influence on his own playing. These included The Yardbirds’ Little Games (1967), recorded with Page as the sole guitarist; the first four albums Page created with Led Zeppelin; Beck’s solo debut Truth (1968) and The Jeff Beck Group’s Beck-Ola (1969); and John Mayall’s Blues Breakers With Eric Clapton, aka The Beano Album (1966).
“The first four Led Zeppelin albums, I have to have on me at all times,” Perry said. “The first two Beck albums and the last Yardbirds records are seminal for me – outlandish, experimental stuff. And I must have bought the John Mayall Blues Breakers album twenty times. If you have enough copies, you can never lose it. I listen to all these albums all the time for inspiration.”
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Comparing the three former Yardbirds stars – Clapton, Beck and Page – Perry stated: “Jeff and Eric are so influential, but I guess Jimmy has the greatest influence because of Led Zeppelin – a pure inspiration for this thing called hard rock.
“Jimmy wasn’t just an amazing guitar player. He was an incredible producer and he wrote all these great songs. He had this world vision, and created a whole movement with Led Zeppelin.
“When he was cutting the first Zeppelin album, he knew what he wanted. That’s part of his genius – always knowing what he wanted.
“He’d been out in America with the Yardbirds and he saw this big gap that needed to be filled, and he knew what he needed to fill it. His vision was so much more global than Jeff and Eric’s. Playing guitar was just one part of the puzzle for Jimmy. His production values, the way he put Bonzo [drummer John Bonham] in the spotlight, became a touchstone for rock music.”
Aerosmith’s 1979 album Night In The Ruts featured a version of the Yardbirds song Think About It.
Perry told Q why he considered this a pivotal song for Page.
“We covered Think About It because it was only a b-side,” he said, “and we wanted people to hear this really cool song. It’s the only song that Jimmy did with the Yardbirds that pointed the way to Led Zeppelin. It’s proto-Zeppelin.”
Back in 1974, Aerosmith’s second album Get Your Wings included a version of the seminal rhythm and blues song Train Kept A-Rollin’ – which Jeff Beck recorded with the Yardbirds in 1965, and which Jimmy Page performed live with both the Yardbirds and Led Zeppelin.
In fact this was the first song that the four members of Led Zeppelin ever played together in their first rehearsal in 1968.
Aerosmith’s recording of Train Kept A-Rollin’ actually featured lead guitar from noted session players Dick Wagner and Steve Hunter instead of Perry and his Aerosmith bandmate Brad Whitford.
But as Perry stated, this song was hugely important in his own development as a guitarist.
He explained: “People always say there are certain songs that take you back to a certain time, the first time you heard it. People say that to me about [Aerosmith’s hit ballad] Dream On. And for me, when we play Train Kept A-Rollin’, I still feel the way I felt way back when I heard the Yardbirds’ version. It was like a drug – it set me free.”
Aerosmith ended up performing the song live with both Page and Beck – on separate occasions.
Page guested with them at the Monsters Of Rock festival at Donington Park in 1990, while Beck jammed with them in the US many years earlier.
“It was back in the ’70s that Jeff got up with us and played Train,” Perry recalled. “That was amazing, but of course I was intimidated – he’s a fucking genius! He’s Mozart – he’s that brilliant!”
Perry did his best to describe that level of genius.
“With Jeff, you just knew that he didn’t want to sound like anybody else. He was always pushing the edge, going into jazz.
“I always felt that if Jeff played a lick that sounded like somebody else, he’d throw it away. I’m still astounded that the sound from his amplifier just comes from his hands.
“A lot of guitar players will tell you the same thing – that Jeff is head, hands and feet above the others.
“The first time I saw Jeff play live, he was playing a Les Paul, so I had to have one of those. I bought a ’68 Gold Top. I wish to God I still had it!”
