It is not always possible to identify the greatest of all time, in retrospect. Even if a band appears to have potential when performing in a bar, it’s impossible to predict whether there’ll be another flash in the pan. Or if they’ll become this generation’s equivalent to The Rolling Stones. While an actual Rolling Stone did have a landmark musician play on his turntable. Mick Jagger couldn’t care less about Jimmy Page’s latest band.
By the end of the 1960s, The Rolling Stones had moved on from the pursuit of new talent. Because they were still in fierce competition with The Beatles, the band took risks wherever possible. They continuously changed up their sound as Jagger and Keith Richards began to take more daring risks with their music.
After releasing their debut album of all-original songs, Aftermath, the band never looked back, creating records with a unique flair each time they stepped into the studio. While Between the Buttons and Their Satanic Majesties Request demonstrated the band’s ability to wear several sound hats. They consistently returned to the blues.
Returning to their roots with albums like Beggars Banquet and Let It Bleed, Jagger was also putting together The Rolling Stones’ Rock and Roll Circus. It brought together a slew of various rock gods under one roof. The evening would finally feature a historic performance by The Who. Additionally, there was a one-time appearance by the supergroup The Dirty Mac. Jagger recalls producer Glyn Johns floating around a band called Led Zeppelin.
Jimmy Page had been carving out a career for himself onstage and in the studio since The Stones left the blues scene. After grinding it out as the next guitar hero in The Yardbirds after Eric Clapton, Page realized he wanted to try something different. He finally worked alongside session partner John Paul Jones. He brought in John Bonham and Robert Plant to round out Led Zeppelin’s lineup.
Led Zeppelin’s debut had the power to shake the Earth when it was released, after a brief tenure as ‘The New Yardbirds’. Although mostly blues covers, with rare originals like ‘Communication Breakdown,’ Jagger couldn’t have cared less at first.
According to Johns, Jagger was too preoccupied with the minutiae of Rock and Roll Circus to bother listening. He told MusicRadar, “We were putting the Stones’ Rock And Roll Circus together around the same time. I took an acetate of the album into a production meeting.” I warned them, ‘This is going to be tremendous,’ but Mick Jagger didn’t want to hear it.”
The Stones frontman wasn’t the only one dissatisfied with it; Johns showed the same recording to George Harrison before the Beatles dismissed it. Jagger may have had a harsh expression on his face, or he was simply overwhelmed by what was ahead. The Beatles and The Stones may have dominated rock & roll in the 1960s. Led Zeppelin foreshadowed what the 1970s would be like hitting a thousand times harder than anything else in its path.
