Thoughts On Jimmy Page Being A 'Sloppy' Player

Jimmy Page is frequently accused of 'sloppy' guitar playing, and is often dismissed entirely as a guitarist and a musician as a result. As a huge Zeppelin fan, I cannot let this stand. After lots of discussions and debates about this on forums and elsewhere, I figured I should write up my thoughts long-form. I (and now you!) can then point people here when the subject comes up and save a lot of typing :)

Much of this post is based on the ideas I developed on this TGP thread.

Lots of people accuse Jimmy Page of being sloppy. The more accurate thing to say is that, like most all of us, if Jimmy is highly intoxicated, his playing suffers mightily and sounds sloppy. We're basically all this way, and I don't think that's a controversial opinion.

However, I don't think most people only mean Jimmy is sloppy when impaired, as this is rather self-evident, applies to us all, and isn't really worth saying. I think they mean that even when he is not physically or chemically impaired, Jimmy plays in a sloppy way. This is where I disagree.

I think it's pretty hard, and I've never seen anyone really try, to say that Jimmy Page is sloppy in the studio/on record. The dude played on numerous professional sessions, starting when he was still a teenager. He's a pro.

He still often has a very “loose” feel when playing solos, which to me is completely intentional. He said himself, he deals in emotion, not technique. The sound of his crazy, fast-as-he-can-possibly-move-his-fingers, hair-breadth away from it all falling apart kind of playing was, I argue, an intentional stylistic choice. This is the point I don't think many realize. It was not a technique issue or skill deficit, it was something he did on purpose.

I major contributing factor to the perception of sloppiness is his unusual timing. Most anyone who has spent some time trying to learn his licks or style will tell you that that is one of the hardest aspects of his playing to emulate. But that's because his timing is unusual, which makes it interesting, not sloppy!

Live Jimmy appears when he's not injured (he dealt with broken/sprained fret-hand fingers on multiple US tours) or excessively intoxicated. Here he is at his best. He can sometimes sound “sloppy”, but again, I believe it's an intentional stylistic thing. He makes mistakes, as we all do, and he has off-nights, like all us mere mortals, but generally speaking, he's clearly a maestro of the electric guitar, and a hell of a showman to boot.

One very important point to understand about his live playing is that he routinely plays at the very limit of his technique. It's a brave thing to pick literally as fast you are capable of, in front of tens of thousand of fans, all in pursuit of creating an emotional effect and connection with the audience. It would be hard for me to attempt that at a coffee shop open mic night, let alone at at Madison Square Garden or Carnegie Hall. That takes real musical bravery and honesty. But he did that sort of thing nightly, and I think it's because he understood that the audience present would understand and respond to it. It was real and authentic. And risky too; it risked making him look sloppy or inept or incapable. But he did it anyway, to my eternal gratitude.

This brings me to another important point: I think he performed for the present audience and not for future listeners when he played live. He wasn't planning for hardly any of their shows to be recorded for public listening, and certainly not to be constantly analyzed decades later on internet guitar forums. When he was playing for posterity, he was usually Studio Jimmy (see above).

Finally there's Wasted Jimmy. He sucks, as we all do when messed up. Also I wish I was as good as him on his worst night. There's no doubt by '77 onward he is too ensnared by drugs and booze to play the level of difficult music and improvisation they were trying to play. There were still moments of sheer improvised genius, but those seem to be more luck, and willingness to fail, at this point. Combine his intoxication with his attempts to play at the very limit of his technique like he's used to, and you get all the “Jimmy is sloppy, he sucks, so and so is better” chatter.

Sadly I think Wasted Jimmy gets more attention than the other 2, and that's a shame, because there is literally a lifetime of enjoyment to be had listening and learning the playing of the other 2. Plus if you screw up a gig by getting too drunk beforehand, you can just say you're doing a very accurate Wasted Jimmy impression!

TLDR: 2 out of 3 Jimmys ain't sloppy!