Page breaks finger

[pledm]

Led Zeppelin concert postponed, Page breaks finger

LONDON (Reuters) - Led Zeppelin have postponed a one-off comeback concert in London because guitarist Jimmy Page has broken his finger, the promoters said on Thursday.

The concert will now take place on December 10 and all tickets for the original concert on November 26 will be valid, a statement said.

The injury happened last weekend and Page will not be able to play guitar for three weeks, a statement quoted a specialist as saying.

"I am disappointed that we are forced to postpone the concert by two weeks," said Page, 63.

"We feel that this postponement will enable my injury to properly heal and permit us to perform at the level that both the band and our fans have always been accustomed to."

Led Zeppelin split in 1980 after the death of drummer John Bonham and last took the stage 12 years ago at their induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

The concert venue takes up to 20,000 fans and many die-hard Zeppelin fans had organized trips from around the world to attend the concert this month.

Tickets were allocated by ballot and more than 1 million fans registered for a chance to see the legendary rock group.

Page will be joined by singer Robert Plant and bassist John Paul Jones, and Bonham's son Jason will be the drummer.

The show will be a tribute to the late founder of Atlantic Records, Ahmet Ertegun, who signed the group in 1968.

[Bob]

He probably had it up some 13 year old girls snatch and it accidentally broke off... Oh well... Bless the old pervert. I hope he will be well enough to play in December then. Gotta love the guy!

[pledm]

LOL,ha ha that just may be true.I`ve been reading the rumours about the broken finger in other web sites and they still don`t know which finger,he`s supposed to get some award on monday so I guess we`ll find out.

Here`s one;

Zeppelin Injury Raises Questions
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By BEN SISARIO
Published: November 3, 2007
The press agent in London was getting the same question all day: Which finger was it?

Audio from "Good Times Bad Times" by Led Zeppelin (mp3)The digit in question belonged to Jimmy Page, guitar magus of Led Zeppelin. And according to a statement issued Thursday afternoon, it had been fractured last weekend, forcing the group to delay its megaticket reunion concert in London by two weeks, to Dec. 10.

“Led Zeppelin have always set very high standards for ourselves,” Mr. Page said in the statement, “and we feel that this postponement will enable my injury to properly heal, and permit us to perform at the level that both the band and our fans have always been accustomed to.”

But the announcement did not say which finger, on which hand, was affected. Nor did it explain the circumstances of the injury.

Right on cue, blogs and message boards caught fire with speculation, parsing the language of the release and debating whether the injury was real. Was it a sign that rehearsals were not going well? Was Robert Plant, the singer, spending too much time promoting his new album with Alison Krauss? “I can just sense the conspiracy theories already spreading,” read one entry on the ledzeppelin.com forum.

Despite the efforts of the international press corps, neither the band nor the organizers of the concert — a benefit tribute to Ahmet Ertegun, a founder of Led Zeppelin’s label, Atlantic — were offering any further details.

“Everyone wants to know about Jimmy’s finger,” said the concert’s publicist, Chris Goodman, with a chuckle. “I’ve never had so much interest in fingers.”

On Monday, Mr. Page is to make a public appearance at the Classic Rock Roll of Honor in London, where he is to receive a Living Legend award. The telephoto lenses, presumably, will be focused on his hands.

Yesterday it was not just Mr. Page’s finger fans worried about. More than a million people around the world had entered a lottery for a chance to buy one of the 20,000 tickets (£125 each, or $260, plus fees) for the Nov. 26 concert at the O2 Arena, and fans commiserated over airline ticket-exchange fees, tricky hotel reservations or worse.

Andrew Welder, a 28-year-old sommelier in Manhattan, had bought a $600 airline ticket on Thursday morning, just hours before the announcement of the date change. He won’t be able to get the time off to go to the rescheduled show, he said.

“Last night after I got out of work,” Mr. Welder said, “I stopped at my local pub for a beer and a hamburger, and they were blasting Zeppelin when I walked in. My heart almost broke.”

Online, fans analyzed Zeppelin history carefully for any clues about what might be going on behind the scenes. Among the topics was Mr. Page’s recent habit of canceling concerts because of sometimes vague medical conditions. In 2000 part of his tour with the Black Crowes was scrapped because of back problems. Last year he did not show at two prominent festival gigs. A “serious operation” was blamed for his missing the first, another tribute to Mr. Ertegun in Montreux, Switzerland; he cited knee surgery for the second, the Rhythm Festival in Clapham, England.

One blogger noted an irony from Led Zeppelin’s glory days. In early 1975, just as the band was about to begin a big tour, Mr. Page broke the ring finger of his left hand — “the most important finger for a guitarist,” he said at the time, the blogger wrote.

The tour was deemed too important to postpone, and Mr. Page played anyway.

[Summer]

This is really too bad for all of the people traveling from all parts of the world. They will have to cancel their flights, and hotel bookings, and start all of the way over again. I feel sorry for them, even though I am envious of them too, because I really wanted to go to this concert!

I had a friend who was going to pay my airfare and my hotel for this trip to London had we won tickets, but I couldn't afford to buy my passport or my ticket or bring any money with me for food, etc.! So I would have had to pass on my chance to go anyway! Can you believe that! That would have really hurt had we won the chance to buy a ticket.