Martin Barre once had to ignore a greeting from Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page as he was in the middle of recording his guitar solo for the song ‘Aqualung.’ If he didn’t nail the part, it would have been replaced by a flute solo from frontman Ian Anderson.
“[‘Aqualung’s] solo was all done on the fly. I think it was take two – and if I hadn’t got it in two then it would have been a flute solo,” Barre recalled in a new chat with Guitarist. “But that’s when Jimmy Page, who was recording with Led Zeppelin in the basement of Basing Street Studios, came up to say hello.”
“He was in the control room window, waving madly. I was in the middle of the solo, and I thought, ‘Sorry, but I can’t stop.’ And I didn’t. I just turned my back. Which was a bit rude. But that was the solo on ‘Aqualung.’”
Barre never got the chance to speak with Page about the incident because by the time he finished recording, the Led Zeppelin guitarist had already left the studio.
Still, he shared in a 2021 interview with Guitar Player, “I’m sure he understood that when you’re out there doing something, you need to get on with it.”
“The funny thing about the story is that Zeppelin had been in the studio, in the basement, for over a month working on ‘Led Zeppelin IV,’ and we’d never ever seen any of them,” the ex-Jethro Tull member also said.
“It just happened that the moment he chose to pop in was whilst I was recording that solo. I either had to put my guitar down and say ‘hi’ or carry on with the solo.”
‘Aqualung’ became one of Jethro Tull’s most iconic songs, along with ‘Locomotive Breath,’ and the album of the same name remained their best-selling record through the years.
Barre went on to record 17 more albums with Jethro Tull before leaving the band in 2011. After his departure, the band released ‘The Zealot Gene’ in 2022 and followed it up with ‘RökFlöte’ the next year.
Jethro Tull is currently on a world tour. Their next stop will be in Munich, Germany, on October 19.