Pageia Obscura: Jimmy and Sonny Boy

"Don't Send Me No Flowers"

Of the many obscure projects Jimmy Page was associated with prior to Led Zeppelin, one of the most notable was a studio session he recorded live alongside noted keyboardist Brian Auger, and famed bluesman, Sonny Boy Williamson. The session took place at IBC Studios on January 28, 1965. Those present at the session included, Jimmy Page on guitar, Brian Auger on organ, Ricky Brown on bass Mickey Waller on drums along with Joe Harriot & Alan Skidmore on saxophone, and Sonny Boy taking up vocal and harmonica.

In an interview conducted by Mick Wall for the book "Blues: The British Connection" Drummer Mickey Waller recalled the session itself "We started at 10.00 am and it was all done by 1.00 pm. Also it was done completely live: there were no overdubs. We all sat in a circle and played.' Sonny Boy got drunk, and his erratic sense of timing gave them some trouble." 

While doing press for the documentary film "It Might Get Loud" Jimmy Page also recalled the session with Sonny Boy Williamson: "The one that was done live with The Yardbirds hadn’t come out. It was our manager who called me. I was a studio musician, at the time, and Sonny Boy was living in his flat. Somebody told me once that they went to the house and they heard Sonny Boy plucking a live chicken. I don’t know how true that was. That didn’t happen when I was there. Sonny Boy and myself rehearsed these neighbors in the manager’s flat and, by the time we got into the studio a couple days later, Sonny Boy had forgotten all of the arrangements of what we were going to do. It was cool. Good music comes out of that."

Sonny Boy Williamson

This session with Jimmy was not the first time Sonny Boy recorded with English players. He had been touring Europe since the early 1960's and had done some studio work with The Animals, as well as Jimmy's future band, The Yardbirds, which Jimmy alluded to in his comments above. "God" himself Eric Clapton was still the guitarist at that point. Despite using both band's a studio musicians, when asked what he thought of The Yardbirds, Sonny Boy reportedly replied, "those British boys want to play the blues real bad, and they do."

The Yardbirds turn with Williamson took place at the Crawdaddy Club in Surrey on December 8th, 1963. Eric Clapton later spoke of his time as Sonny Boy's backing band, "I had met Sonny Boy Williamson earlier. He was quite a mean boss. A character. The difficult part about that was that I wasn't a huge fan of his. We really didn't hit it off. I was in the Yardbirds, and he was coming out on a blues tour, and they decided to put us together. And we really didn't get on well. He didn't think we played well, and I thought he was a strange guy and unnecessarily harsh."

Funnily enough, years later, Jimmy's future band-mate, Robert Plant would have his own run-in with Sonny Boy Williamson as recounted in a story by Rolling Stone Magazine just last year, "Plant played in the original Band of Joy with [John] Bonham in 1967 and 1968. The group never caught on, and Bonham and Plant both found new gigs. Back then, Plant's influences were primarily Mississippi Delta blues. He grew up going to blues festivals, introducing himself at 14 to legendary harmonica player Sonny Boy Williamson at a urinal. Williamson responded with a curt "fuck off." Plant's answer? He snuck backstage and stole Williamson's harmonica."