James Patrick Page was born on 9th January 1944 in the west London suburb of Heston, moving to Feltham in 1952, and then to Miles Road, Epsom in Surrey. It was at this house that Page came across his first guitar, possibly left there by the previous occupant, and by age 12 he was playing it, being mostly self-taught. Page's musical tastes included skiffle and acoustic folk playing, and the blues sounds of Elmore James, B.B. King, and Buddy Guy. At the age of 13, Page appeared on Huw Wheldon's 'All Your Own' talent quest programme in a skiffle quartet, one performance of which aired on BBC1 in 1957 (view it here). By the time he was 14 he was playing in a group called Malcolm Austin and Whirlwinds, and shortly after that he formed The Paramounts, who played gigs around Epsom, once supporting a group who would later become Johnny Kidd & the Pirates. Singer Red E. Lewis had seen him playing with the Paramounts at the Contemporary club in Epsom and told his manager Chris Tidmarsh to ask Page to join his backing band, the Redcaps, after the departure of guitarist Bobby Oats. After playing with them for a while he was asked by singer Neil Christian to join his band, the Crusaders, and he toured with Christian for approximately two years. During his stint with Christian, Page fell seriously ill with infectious mononucleosis so couldn't continue touring, and while recovering he decided to put his musical career on hold and concentrate on his other love, painting, enrolling at Sutton Art College in Surrey.
While still a student, Page often performed on stage at the Marquee Club with bands such as Cyril Davies' All Stars, Alexis Korner's Blues Incorporated, and fellow guitarists Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton, and one night he was spotted by John Gibb of Brian Howard & the Silhouettes, who asked him to help record some singles for Columbia Records. Mike Leander of Decca Records was the first to offer Page regular studio work, and his first session for the label was on 'Diamonds' by Jet Harris and Tony Meehan, which went to Number 1 on the singles chart in early 1963. After a few brief stints with bands, Page committed himself to full-time session work, being known as 'Lil' Jim Pea', to prevent confusion with the other noted session guitarist Big Jim Sullivan. Page's studio gigs in 1964 included Marianne Faithfull's 'As Tears Go By', the Nashville Teens' 'Tobacco Road', the Rolling Stones' 'Heart Of Stone', Van Morrison & Them's 'Baby, Please Don't Go', and Petula Clark's 'Downtown'. However, his best work was undoubtedly on the obscure R'n'B singles from bands like The First Gear, The Untamed, and The Sneekers, where he was given free rein to lay down some great solos, and from 1965 he was also producing a lot of them as well. There have been a number of anthologies of Page's session work released over the years, but they tend to try and include every single recording that he appeared on, whether you can hear him or not, and so for this album I've cherry-picked just the very best examples of his work, where his contribution particularly stands out. He has said in interviews that he was doing so many session at one point, sometimes three sessions a day and fifteen sessions a week, that he couldn't now remember if he appeared on a record or not, but if you do want to investigate further then there are probably a couple of hundred other recordings that he is rumoured to have appeared on that are out there, and you can track them down on this excellent archive site https://jppsessionman.jimdofree.com.
Track listing
01 Somebody Told My Girl (Carter-Lewis And The Southerners 1963)
02 Don't You Dig This Kind Of Beat (Chris Ravel & The Ravers 1963)
03 I Can Tell (The Zephyrs 1963)
04 Bald Headed Woman (The Sneekers 1964)
05 Leave My Kitten Alone (The First Gear 1964)
06 Money Honey (Mickie Most & The Gear 1964)
07 Was She Tall (The Lancastrians 1964)
08 Climbing Through (The Authentics 1964)
09 I'll Go Crazy (The Untamed 1964)
10 Honey Hush (Neil Christian 1964)
11 You Said (The Primitives 1965)
12 The Bells of Rhymney (The Fifth Avenue 1965)
13 Night Comes Down (The Mickey Finn 1965)
14 I've Got Everything You Need, Babe (The Fenmen 1965)
15 Everybody Knows (Sean Buckley & The Breadcrumbs 1965)
16 She Belongs to Me (The Masterminds 1965)
17 Can't Go Home Anymore My Love (The Factotums 1966)
18 Circles (Les Fleur de Lys 1966)
I don't usually bother with bonus tracks, but this one is just too good to omit, although it is slightly outside the timeframe of the rest of the album. In 1968 Scotty McKay contacted Jimmy Page about recording a version of 'The Train Kept A-Rollin'' together, but Page was unable to get to the session so McKay got his band to record the song and then sent Page the master tape, which he took into the studio and laid down his guitar solo. When McKay received the tape he finished mixing it and then found himself without a record label to release it on, so he formed his own and put the A side to the previous single on the B side.
19 The Train Kept A-Rollin' (Scotty McKay Quintet 1968)
