Used with permission
Interview by Xavier Blanc and Benoit Pascal - Translation by Xavier Blanc
Jorgen Angel: You mean, the show by the guys who became Led Zeppelin later (laughs). This small club outside of Copenhagen, the Gladsaxe Teen Club, had booked The Yardbirds a few months before but the Yardbirds broke up and Peter Grant and Jimmy Page came with other musicians to fulfil those commitments. They signed a contract for a small tour in Scandinavia. Jimmy recruited 3 other guys and they played all the clubs where The Yardbirds were supposed to play. The first of these clubs was the Gladsaxe Teen Club. It's only a short while before the concert that we realized it wouldn't the "real" Yardbirds that were going to play. A guy who was preparing the hall before the show told me that they had arrived in the afternoon and had asked if they could rehearse. I suppose they had rehearsed in England before but, as it was apparently a new group, they needed to rehearse a little more.
JA: It was the gymnasium of a school located in the area of Gladsaxe and that was named Egegaard Skole. This school was built in the 60's and run by people who were modern and progressive. The pupils were between 7 and 17 years old. This big hall was used for their exercises but also for the band's school that played for the parents during a celebration every year. They also played Shakespeare etc … A small stage was there. The changing room was in the basement. There were concerts from September to March almost every Saturday. It was a club that was run by volunteers. They didn't make profits and nobody was paid for its work. Even myself : I was working as a photographer for the club's magazine absolutely for free !
K: How did the Danish promoters manage to book a band like the Yardbirds for a date in such a small club?
JA: The Yardbirds were famous indeed but when I saw them in April 1967, they also played in a gymnasium that was used for handball, tennis, etc … So, they were not so big and they played this kind of places. In fact, the musicians who were to become Led Zeppelin had to play twice that evening to earn some money. After the show at the Gladsaxe Teen Club, they went to another part of Copenhagen, 20-30 km away, in another school where there was a similar club, the Brondby Pop Club, where people worked as volunteers too.
JA: I was indeed because I liked the Yardbirds. I had seen them twice before, including once before Page joined the band, but I didn't bring a camera at the time. I think it was a great band, I like their records. Indeed, I was a bit disappointed when I realized that they were not the real Yardbirds but this feeling quickly disappeared when I saw how this new band was playing.
K: What was your first reaction?
JA: I can't recall details but I know that when they came onstage and started to play, it was very different from the Yardbirds and whatever we had seen before ! The overall feeling was that they were even more extrovert than the Yardbirds. Keith Relf was extrovert but Robert Plant was even more. There was a lot of energy in the band. Bonham was what you could call "aggressive" on drums…
JA: I think they played 45 minutes or 1 hour but I'm not completely sure. There must have been around 1.000 people in the audience. Sometimes, when a big name was on the bill, there were a few hundred more but 1.000 people was usual for a good evening.
K: What was the audience's reaction?
JA: I can't remember. I think that people were asking themselves what was going on …
K: Did people in the audience stay till the end of the show?
JA: Oh yes, definitively. There was another band coming after the new Yardbirds because they were second on the bill, in fact. The two other bands were Danish ones (Four Ways and Bodies).
K: Do you know how much they were paid for this first show?
JA: The price the club paid to the Danish promoter was $250. It was not the Yardbirds' fee but the price that the club paid to have the Yardbirds on the bill. In the other school, the Brondby also paid $250.
K: Do you think it is possible that someone taped the show?
JA: Apparently, someone taped the show when they came back 6 months later but I didn't know that some people used to tape concerts at that time. It's something I realized later. I never saw a tape recorder.
JA: Because they could find jobs here, I guess (laughs) ! The Gladsaxe Teen Club was a small club but we had many bands that had made records who came and played here. We had Deep Purple in the original line-up (before Gillan et Glover joined the band), Ten Years After several times, Spooky Tooth, John Mayall, The Pretty Things, Alexis Korner, Colosseum, Nice…
K: At the time, was it easy to work as a photographer?
JA: Oh yes. It was what they call now "access all areas". As the resident photographer, I could go anywhere. That's the reason why I could even take photos of the artists in the dressing room.
JA: I don't think the first album was out yet, at least in Denmark. I checked in the club's magazine and they announced Led Zeppelin but the Yardbirds' name was still mentioned in brackets because the guys who run the club were not sure that the people would know who Led Zeppelin was. So, to get people to come, they mentioned the Yardbirds too. I met the band backstage and I took some pictures. Robert Plant was nice and communicative while the others were more withdrawn. They didn't seem too keen having me among them taking pictures. I have just done some new prints of that and it's easy to see. But it was great to relive the beginnings. Honestly, I don't recall the details, but looking back at the shots of this show, I can tell how much power and energy there was in this show. They were happy to play together. When I see the photos today, I can see there's a lot of interaction between them. What is funny is that you can even see some people in the audience. There was no fence at that time : if they wanted, they could go right to the front of the stage but there was plenty of room between them. Nobody was rushing to the stage.
K: You took photos of Led Zeppelin a lot of times. Have you ever had a bad experience with them?
JA: Only once. In March 1973, the Danish promoter who had heard that Led Zeppelin was interested in art had organized a press reception in a famous art gallery in Copenhagen. The atmosphere was tense and I think the band was not really interested in that reception. Robert Plant was nice as usual. John Paul Jones was quite drunk. Some journalists continued to ask Page the same old questions on his interest for black magic plus the usual stupid questions ("How much money do you make ?" etc…). The band was annoyed, which was understandable. Suddenly, two journalists were thrown out into the street by some Zep roadies. Also, in the gallery, some paintings were hanging on the walls. The opening of the exhibition for the public was due one or two days later and some of these paintings were so new that they were not dry yet. Those were abstract paintings and John Bonham, who was wearing knitted gloves, started to smear out some of the paint on the canvas. Of course, it created a very bad atmosphere because these paintings were very expensive. The band and its body guards or roadies thought that I took a photo of the incident. Actually, I had seen John doing that but I hadn't taken any photo. But they didn't want me to leave the gallery before I handed over the film. They were afraid that the photos could be used for lawsuits for the damages they had done to the paintings. They stood in front of me. I went to see the Danish promoter, I told him that I had a problem and that I couldn't give them the film because it was my job. Finally, we made an arrangement whereby if I could take some exclusive photos backstage the day after the show, then it would make up for the film that I had to hand them over. They said OK and they told me : "Come backstage at the show, bring the film and you will be allowed to take new photos". Then they let me out. Of course, the day after, I put in a new roll in the camera to be able to give them something if they asked me to, but they never did. On the other hand, I was not allowed to take photos backstage. Later, I checked and asked the daughter of the man who owned the gallery if there had been some lawsuits. She answered me that her father had never started legal proceedings against anybody. Apparently, they got away with it. Anyway, they were abstract images and it was impossible to know what they had done on them.
JA: No, it was absolutely not the reason. I'm not sure but maybe I was abroad. If I had been here, I would have been to the show …
K: At last, why did you stop this work?
JA: As you can understand, when I started to take photos (even as a schoolboy), there was a completely different atmosphere. Photographers and rock stars respected each other for their work. But slowly, it became much more 'business' and the working conditions for photographers became more and more difficult. You had to sign contracts that required you to sell photos only to the magazine that had sent you. As I was free lance, if this magazine bought one or two photos, it only covered for my expenses. I had an agent in London and another one in Monaco who sold my photos and if I couldn't work this way anymore, I couldn't make a living. All the more, when you attended a show, you were only allowed to take photos for the first 3 songs. Consequently, everybody around the world took the same pictures ! So I had nothing more to offer than the others and it became very hard. I was used to work in an environment where you had fun and enjoyed the music; suddenly, everything was run by managers and lawyers. There was no reason to stay any longer : no more pleasure, no more money.
JA: Everyone who bought it wrote me to tell me how much they enjoyed this lithograph and it gave me much pleasure but it hasn't been as successful as I had expected. I'm quite reluctant to publish more. If it had been very successful, no doubt I would have made a lithograph of the second show because I've got excellent photos of that concert. But you must realize one thing : some fans seem to prefer paying a fortune for and old used ticket instead of such an item …
K: Don't you think that the next step would be to put out a book with your best shots?
JA: I've talked with quite a lot of publishers and all of them told me that photo books on musicians did not sell well. Moreover, it is expensive to do it if you want to do it properly. In fact, I thought about doing it by myself because I receive at least one e-mail per week asking me why I don't publish a book. It is one of the reasons I made this lithograph aimed at the ones who really wanted a collector's item.
JA: There was a gallery in New York that really liked my work and asked me if I had more photos of the early shows of Led Zeppelin. So I checked again and found some more negatives. Why I had never made prints from these negatives, I'm not sure to know, but I realized that some photos were not bad at all. I spent the last two days to make prints. Honestly, it has been a surprise for me to see how many good photos I had of this second show of March 1969. I had never seen them before ! It was the first time I made prints of them yesterday. When it is finished, I will make them available on my site. Also, I've got 50.000 negatives and there are lots of other bands I have well known, too. I have to check more carefully !
K: Personally, were you a fan of Led Zeppelin ? Did you like their music?
JA: Yes, no doubt about it ! I think the first two albums are among the best all time rock albums. Maybe the two best albums. When the first album came out, I immediately became a fan. When the second one was released, I went to the record shop's, listened to the first 30 seconds and bought it.
JA: Yes, no doubt about it ! I think the first two albums are among the best all time rock albums. Maybe the two best albums. When the first album came out, I immediately became a fan. When the second one was released, I went to the record shop's, listened to the first 30 seconds and bought it.
Jorgen is pleased that his archives make the collectors around the world so happy. He hopes that a photo exhibition displaying his prints could see the light soon.
JA: I'm very flattered and honoured by the positive reactions that my photos have received. What is funny is that I received more compliments during the first 20 weeks following the opening of my web site than during the 20 years I've made those shots! Had it not been for the Internet, today all my negatives would be deteriorating in the attic.
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