JIMMY PAGE Working on New Solo Album

Legendary Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page told RollingStone.com that he will be playing guitar “daily for the foreseeable future,” with a view towards “getting to a point where I could play some gigs.” He added: “What those gigs are going to be, I don’t know yet. I have ideas of what I want to do, but they’re pretty complex. I would love to play live again. I love playing live. It’s wonderful.“

Page, who put out Outrider, his one and only solo album, in 1988, revealed to RollingStone.com that he’s “got lots of material I’ve written on acoustic guitar. Lots and lots. And right now I need to get myself up to speed, and that won’t take too long. But I don’t know what musicians I’d play with. I do have material and a passion for it. I need to work towards it, and now I can without all the other side issues going on.“

According to The Pulse Of Radio, Jimmy Page will be the commencement speaker on May 10 at Boston’s Berklee College of Music. The Associated Press reported that Page will address graduating seniors art the Agganis Arena, with the college also presenting honorary doctorates to Motown songwriter Valerie Simpson — best known for her string of classics written with her late husband Nick Ashford, including Let’s Go Get Stoned, Ain’t No Mountain High Enough, You’re All I Need To Get By, Ain’t Nothing Like The Real Thing, Reach Out And Touch (Somebody’s Hand) and Solid (As A Rock).

Page, who’s now 70, has been playing guitar since he was 12. The Pulse Of Radio asked him what originally attracted him to the instrument. “It was just that whole thing of the transmission of ideas through the tactile quality of playing an instrument, y’know, your steel, strings and wood, translating through the electric pickup through the amp, and that’s really what it is for me,” he said. “It’s that, some magical quality, really. Some sort of alchemy, if you like.“

Nikola Savić is a prog enthusiast, blogger and author, in addition to being the founder of Prog Sphere, Progify, ProgLyrics and the ongoing Progstravaganza compilation series.