Before lending his bass and keyboard chops to arena behemoth Led Zeppelin, John Paul Jones was already a seasoned professional musician. Prior to joining the band in 1968, Jones had hundreds of session credits as an in-demand arranger and studio director for a myriad of the era’s biggest names, including Dusty Springfield, Tom Jones, The Walker Brothers, Shirley Bassey, and the strings on The Rolling Stones’ psychedelic ‘She’s a Rainbow’.
Working at a fantastic pace, often two or three sessions a day over as much as six or even seven days a week, Jones crossed paths with fellow jobbing guitarist Jimmy Page, and the seeds of the Zeppelin monster were sown.
Having worked with all manner of big characters, there was still one singer who struck him with her striking presence and unique vocal style. Having been modelling in New York and Paris and cast in various European films in minor roles, German artist and future Velvet Underground collaborator Christa Päffgen—better known as Nico—had a knack for immersing herself in the right cultural circles, which resulted in a romantic fling with The Rolling Stones’ Brian Jones.
Bringing her to London, Jones convinced manager Andrew Loog Oldham to cut some material in the hopes of matching the success of their recent blonde protégé, Marianne Faithfull, and Page and Jones were handed their next job.
While the exact duties between Page and Jones are lost to time, the sessions were generally viewed as a misfire. Oldham decided to rope in a big orchestra and presented Gordon Lightfoot’s ‘I’m Not Sayin’, dropped a few months earlier, as the suitable track to cover. Yet, Nico’s Teutonic vocal delivery and the lush arrangements clashed awkwardly and didn’t complement her mystique, which would realise itself later with Lou Reed and company. “Decca rejected it and I hated it,” Oldham candidly confessed to The Times in 2008. “It was in the wrong key, her voice sounded like a horse on steroids”.
Nonetheless, Oldham issued ‘I’m Not Sayin’, backed with ‘The Last Mile’ as a B-side, on his fledgling Immediate Records label and gifted Nico her first recording. While making little splash upon release, Nico’s time with London’s hottest gang of musicians and producers would serve as an essential stepping stone and prove to be one of the sessions Jones would remember vividly.
“She sang ‘Blowin’ in the Wind’ in the most unusual manner,” Jones recalled to Classic Rock in 2010, highlighting a Bob Dylan take that never saw the light of day. “I wasn’t quite sure what to make of it, to be honest, but she was certainly something unusual. Very imposing too, about a head taller than me. When I heard her later stuff, it sort of made sense, though the music was so austere. I remember the session well, because Ari, her son, was with her and spent the whole time just tearing the studio apart. He was wild, running around and causing havoc.”
Nico’s career would only rise, making history with The Velvet Underground and dropping a string of solo neoclassical avant-garde gems that would presage post-punk’s unorthodox spirit, and Jones would conquer the world as hard rock royalty with his Led Zeppelin day job.
While pursuing disparate creative paths, the two shared a taste and penchant for the exotic: Nico’s records were gothic wanders into dark psych, and Jones was wielding synth washes and string arrangements to push Zeppelin to weirder sonic realms.
