Nate smiled. It was a polite smile, but with a trace of mockery around the edges. “Sir, thank you for the feedback.” He said into the mic, “It’s impressive that you know the voicing details of Stairway to Heaven so well.” A few people in the club laughed. Nate turned directly to Jimmy. “We have a nice tradition here.
It’s easy to sit in the critic’s chair, but if you know a piece that well, you’re welcome to come up and show us yourself. The mic and a guitar are right here.” Everyone understood the real message. Jimmy Page said nothing. A faint smile appeared at the corner of his lips, and he raised his hand in a small, “No, thank you” gesture.
It was the silence of a man who didn’t need to fight. Nate shrugged. “All right, then. We love our critics here, too.” A few more people laughed. Just then, the club’s door opened. 69-year-old Ozzy Osbourne was a man who wasn’t supposed to be there at all. Half an hour earlier, he and Sharon were meant to meet at a restaurant on Sunset Boulevard, but Sharon had texted at the last minute.
“Meeting’s running long, another hour. Go to the restaurant, start without me. I’ll be there.” Ozzy hadn’t gone to the restaurant. It had barely been a year since Black Sabbath’s The End tour, and Ozzy was still caught in that strange void. Sitting alone in a restaurant would only have deepened it. Instead, he’d started walking the streets, cap on his head, sunglasses on, looking like any retired Englishman.
Three blocks later, he’d heard a guitar coming through a doorway and stopped. When he stepped inside, he waited a few seconds for his eyes to adjust to the dim light. Then his gaze landed on the man sitting alone at the table in the back corner. One second. Two seconds. Ozzy’s eyebrows rose slightly. Ozzy Osbourne would recognize Jimmy Page anywhere.
Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath were children of the same era, the same stage. But seeing Jimmy here, in this small club, sitting in an unrecognized corner, that was something else entirely. Ozzy walked to the back corner. Jimmy lifted his head and said quietly, “Ozzy.” Ozzy sat down across from him with that familiar mischievous smile.
Jimmy Page in a 50-seat club on a back street in Hollywood, all by himself. Sharon would never believe this. Jimmy laughed quietly. Ozzy shrugged. “Sharon’s in a meeting. I figured I’d walk the streets instead of rotting in the car.” Then he turned his head toward the stage. “Did something happen here just now? Everyone was looking at you when I walked in.
” Jimmy told him briefly, the young guitarist playing Stairway, his own comment, the host’s response. There was neither complaint nor anger in his voice. Ozzy was silent for a moment. “They gave you a hard time about Stairway to Heaven.” He said slowly. “The man who wrote it.” Jimmy waved it off. “Leave it.
The guy doesn’t know who I am.” But an expression had appeared on Ozzy’s face. Sharon had seen this expression countless times in over 40 years of marriage. That calm but irreversible look Ozzy got the moment he’d made up his mind about something. “Jimmy.” Ozzy said. “There’s a guitar on that stage, isn’t there?” Jimmy looked at him.
“Ozzy, what are you thinking?” Ozzy smiled, that familiar half mischievous, half dangerous smile. “Nothing.” He said. “Just thinking.” But he wasn’t thinking. He’d already decided. Ozzy stood up and walked toward the stage. Nobody gave him a second look. Nate was just about to call the next name. Ozzy cleared his throat lightly.
“Excuse me, is it too late to put my name on the list?” Nate saw a tired-looking old man in a cap and sunglasses standing in front of him. “No, there’s still room.” He said. “Your name?” Ozzy thought for a moment. “John.” He said. It was his real name, after all, John Michael Osbourne. “And I have a friend who might want to join, too.
” Nate scribbled something on the list. “Sure, you’ve got 5 minutes. Song choice is yours.” Ozzy nodded and headed back to the corner table. “Jimmy.” He said as he sat down, “I put us on the list, both of us.” Jimmy raised his eyebrows. “What did you do?” Ozzy shrugged with that familiar innocent look.
“We go up, play something, come back down. 5 minutes.” Jimmy shook his head, but a small smile had crept to the corner of his lips. “Ozzy, I came here to sit quietly.” Ozzy leaned forward. “Jimmy, there’s a guitar on that stage, and a man just asked you if you could play it. Doesn’t he deserve to find out the answer?” That sentence touched something deep inside Jimmy.
50 years ago, when he was a young kid nobody had heard of, he’d faced the same question. “Can you play?” Every time, he’d given the answer with his guitar. Jimmy was silent for a moment. Then he stood up. “One song.” He said, “Just one.” Nate called out from the stage, “John and his friend.” A polite round of applause rose from the club, a courteous but indifferent response to two old men taking the stage.
Ozzy walked up first, Jimmy followed. The stage was small, a microphone stand, an amplifier, and a black Fender Stratocaster resting in the corner. Jimmy looked at the guitar. It wasn’t his Gibson Les Paul, of course, but any guitar can speak in the hands of a real guitarist. He picked it up, slung it over his shoulder, and plugged it into the amp.
He touched the strings for a few seconds, adjusted the sound, checked the tuning. Each of these movements looked casual, but every one of them was loaded with 50 years of muscle memory. Nate was standing at the edge of the stage, arms crossed over his chest, a let’s see what they’ve got look on his face.
Most of the people in the club had gone back to their phones. Nobody was expecting anything extraordinary. Jimmy Page closed his eyes. 2 seconds. 3 seconds. Then his fingers touched the strings and the opening arpeggios of Stairway to Heaven filled the air of the club. Nothing happened during the first three notes. On the fourth note, a few people looked up.
By the fifth note, conversations began to die. Because the difference between this sound and what Ryan had played 20 minutes earlier was like the difference between a photocopy and the original painting. The same notes, the same chords, but everything was different. There was a weight behind every note, the touch of someone who knew why each arpeggio was there.
That sus4 transition between the third and fourth arpeggios, the missing piece Jimmy had mentioned 20 minutes ago, was there now. And the moment it completed the melody, everyone in the club heard the difference. Ryan Torres stood frozen at the edge of the stage, his eyes locked on the man’s fingers. A woman in the front row grabbed her friend’s arm.
“Wait a second.” she whispered. She picked up her phone, looked at the screen, then looked at the stage. The color in her face changed. That’s how the wave started. First one phone, then three, then 10. The whispers followed one after another. “Is that Jimmy Page? No way. Look at his face. That’s him.
