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Hi, I'm Nancy Cartwright. You may know me better as the voice of Bart Simpson on Simpsons Declassified. We're diving into the mysteries that keep the Simpsons forever young. Have you ever wondered how the Simpsons regularly predicts future events? Who better to ask than the show's creators, performers and writers, the celebrity guests? Be sure to follow and listen to Simpsons Declassified wherever you get your podcasts.

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Jake Brennan (18:15)

The notion of a stately house or sprawling manor in the English countryside, which is very, very old and which also happens to be very, very haunted, is hardly a novel one. Do a quick Google search and you'll find more examples of haunted houses in the UK than you'll know what to do with. And better yet, I'll just give you a few examples. There's Blickling hall in Norfolk, built in 1616, where Anne Boleyn, one time Queen of England and the second wife of Henry viii, still walks around with her severed head in her hands. And there's Temple Newsome in West Yorkshire, where you can still hear the screams of a nursemaid who was suffocated to death by a fellow servant in 1704. And then there's Littlecot House in Berkshire, where a midwife witnessed the murder of a baby in 1575, and where that same midwife can now be seen as a phantom who sits in the corner of one of the house's bedrooms, rocking infant against her breasts. This was the tradition Jimmy Page was buying into when he moved his band out to Headley Grange for sessions in the middle of 1970. And while Jonesy and Bonzo never really warmed up to the place, Headley's charms did factor into the early stages of great new songs like Immigrant Song, Gallows Pole and Out on the Tiles, just to name a few of the things they started working on there. But before long, the urban heads prevailed and the band quickly returned to London, where they finished making the album at a studio on Basing street owned by Island Records. When Led Zeppelin 3 was released in October of 1970, many Zeppelin fans focused on Jimmy Page's wizard like production techniques, which now included experimental bits of tape, echo, fly on the walls segues between songs, and a blend of electric and acoustic instrumentation that masterfully fused the darkness with the light. But just as many complained that beyond Immigrant Song, the record was lacking in the kind of meat and potato rock and roll that their first two albums served up, that the boys had gone soft with all that bearded folky bullshit. Jimmy Page, on the other hand, saw as Zeppelin 3 as a creative success. It proved that in the right environment, Led Zeppelin could pull powerful music out of thin air. To his ears, the new song sounded better than anything they'd ever recorded in a London studio alone. And so, just a few months later, Jimmy Page convinced the band to return to Headley Grange, where he was convinced they would make the biggest, most impactful musical statement of their career. January 1971. At least a dozen cables streamed out of the Rolling Stones mobile recording van. They threaded across the ground and snaked through one of Hedley Grange's open windows all the way into the lobby where John Bonham's drum kit was set up. Outside, it was cold. Inside Headley, it was cold. And inside the Rolling Stones van was also cold. Audio engineer Andy John sat in the back of the van, shivering, trying in vain to stay warm while listening on a pair of headphones to John Bonham laying down the drum track to win the Levee Breaks. Beginning in Headley's lobby, a large staircase wrapped all the way up to the third floor, which meant that the ceiling of this particular part of the house was three stories high. When a musician says that a room has great acoustics, this is the kind of thing they're talking about. Two microphones hung from the railing on the second floor, dangling above Bonzo's kit. The sound of the drums was huge. Back in the van, Andy Johns gave that sound a boost. He ran the signal through a Binson echo wreck, an old delay effects unit. And this is what gives Bonzo's drums that slap back sound on when the Levee Breaks. But the totality of this sound, of one of the greatest drum tracks of all time, the environment in which it was recorded and how it was recorded, you couldn't replicate that in some antiseptic recording studio back in London. You. You had to create it here in a busted old building that was cold and damp and creepy. And that night, Andy Johns got his first taste of creepy. The day's session had gone extremely well, and by the looks of the empty bottles littered all over the floor, the afterparty had gone well, too. In just a few hours, the sun would be up. Andy, like everyone else, was dead asleep in one of the bedrooms until he was jolted awake by a loud thud. He propped himself up on his elbows, his hair a mess, his eyelids weighing a ton. And then he heard it. The sound of furniture moved around in the room directly above him. Heavy furniture. Slow, deliberate scrapes. Then the sound stopped. Andy sat up straight, and for a moment, all he could hear was the ringing in his ears from that day's recording session. Suddenly, the noise upstairs started again, and this time louder and faster than before. Andy shot out of bed, ran out of his room and bounded up the stairs, busting through the door of the room directly above his. And nothing. The room was completely empty. No furniture, not even a single chair. The next morning, over cups of hot tea, Andy told the band about the Strange sounds he'd heard in the middle of the night. Robert listened with great interest and Jonesy was silent, taking it all in. And Jimmy just sat back, smiling and nodding his head. But John Bonham was beside himself because he'd heard things too. Someone breathing in the corner of his room. And no, it wasn't the creaking of an old house or the wind or whatever the fuck. Instead, all night long there was this deep inhale, exhale of another person. But there was no one there and it freaked Bonzo out. And Bonzo, being the hulking giant that he was, wasn't one to get freaked out easily. He was going to sleep downstairs from now on, even if that meant sleeping on the floor. Jimmy, on the other hand, wasn't interested in sleeping. Headley didn't make him uneasy. Quite the opposite actually. The energy here got him high. He grabbed his harmony acoustic guitar and wandered off to the the quiet parts of the house. He sat cross legged in cold unlit rooms and messed around with different tunings. He paced hallways while strumming new chord patterns. And he listened as the sound from his instrument bounced off the walls and returned to his ears. The sounds spoke to him. And then one afternoon, it happened. Jimmy was in Headley's sitting room, seated on a chair next to the fireplace. The boiler in the house no longer worked, so this was the only way to keep warm. The fire crackled as Jimmy finger picked a new chord progression. It was a winding hypnotic ladder of notes and it inspired Robert, who was sitting next to him, to begin scribbling lyrics in a notebook. Later, Robert would say that it was like he wasn't writing the words himself. He was the vessel. Someone or something was riding through him. Right then the fire popped. A log shifted, collapsing inward and sent a spray of red sparks into the air. Jimmy didn't look up from his guitar and Robert kept writing. And by the time the fire died down, the song Stairway to Heaven was written. Weeks later, Led Zeppelin was back at the studio in London recording some final overdubs for the album that fans would come to know as Led Zeppelin 4. This included Jimmy's now iconic guitar solo for Stairway, which he played while leaning against the speaker. No headphones on, just playback at full blast, his body absorbing every sound while a cigarette smoldered in the headstock of his Dragon Telecaster. I just winged that solo, really? Jimmy said. Only Jimmy Page could wing a solo like that. A solo that unfolded like a good book or a good movie. One that had a beginning, a middle and an end. Very definitive, super dramatic, far out and locked in at the same time. One that sounded like it had lived inside of him and then escaped and changed everything around him. Just like he'd lived inside Hedley Grange and changed it. And the next time Jimmy went back to that place, it was more than obvious that the old house had changed too. In fact, it had learned something new.

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Jake Brennan (30:12)

In November of 1973, exactly two years after it was originally released, Led Zeppelin 4, the album with Stairway to Heaven as its centerpiece, was still riding high on the charts, as was its successor, the most excellent Houses of the Holy, which had been released just months earlier in 73. As usual, it didn't matter if a writer for Rolling Stone called Houses of the Holy quote one of the dullest and most confusing albums I've heard this year, which they 100% did say, can you fucking believe that the song remains the same. The Rain song, Over the freaking hills and Far Away. Dull and confusing. None of it mattered because Led Zeppelin were untouchable. Zeppelin were Reggie Jackson and Pete Rose combined. Untouchable. To continue with this sports metaphor, the same year they played shows in ballparks and football stadiums on a godlike scale. I'm talking about shows like the one in Tampa, Florida, where they played for over 56,000 people and raked in over 300 grand, which at the time was the single most profitable performance in the history of show business, steamrolling a record previously held by the Beatles. Zeppelin were rock and roll gods, and they were bringing the hammer down night after night. And a big part of this unprecedented success, as Jimmy Page saw it, was their unorthodox decision to continue to go back to the well at Headley Grange. But when they returned in the spring of 1974 to begin work on their sixth studio album, none of them knew it would be their final visit. Robert, Jonesy and Bonzo did know that this time would be different and that all three of them refused to stay at Headley Grange anymore. The place was deteriorating worse than ever. The vines outside were thicker. The dampness was now wetness. It smelled of slimy stone and rot. Plus, Bonzo wasn't fucking around anymore with disembodied breathing. So while the three of them checked into the posh Friends Pond Hotel and Spa three miles up the road, Jimmy held down the Ford at Headley. Alone by day, the quartet tracked the new record by tapping into that magic, magic with a K, the telepathic bond that made them who they were, that made them better and more successful than all the rest of the bands, a bond strengthened and driven by whatever spirit Jimmy Page had revived up there at Headley Grange. The songs kept coming. Custard Pie in the Light, Trampled Underfoot Cashmere. And by night Robert Plant, John Paul Jones and John Bonham. They packed up, leaving Jimmy Page to his own devices at Headley. And that's when the house really started to come alive. You hear it first on the wind, not unlike the wind that blows in off Loch Ness at your place in the Scottish Highlands, where Malcolm Dent is learning to live with things that the naked eye can't see. Long wind. Low moans drift from the hall upstairs. And then you hear footsteps. They're slow, pacing back and forth like someone is walking a guard shift. You grab not a flashlight but a candle because it fits your mood. It fits Headley's mood. You light it and walk guided by the flickering light from the sitting room over to the lobby to that big winding staircase. Once you heard Bonzo playing the shit out of the drums right here and now, you just hear the house. Then up ahead, look there, going up the stairs to the second floor. You see it. A tall, thin figure, a gray man, shimmering and translucent. You can feel it beckoning you, calling to you. If it's speaking, it's not a language that you can understand, but you can make out the intent. It's that telepathy magic with that big K. It pulls you and you follow the flame on top of your candle, nearly extinguishing as you hustle up the first flight of stairs. You get to the top and keep following the gray man ahead, coming in and out of focus, stucking into that room, room that Andy Johns investigated years ago, the one from which loud noises arose in the middle of the night, but where there was nothing. Well, one man's nothing, being another man's everything. You follow in the gray man's footsteps and the flame in your hand, burning brighter and hotter. Now and then, as you pass through the threshold, the door slams shut behind you. Audio engineer Ron Nevison arrived at Headley Grange early the next morning outside the mobile recording van owned by Ronnie Lane, former bass player for the Small Faces, and then just the Faces was ready to roll tape. The rest of the band wasn't due in for a little longer, so Ron found Jimmy still alone, moving microphones around in the dining room. Ron greeted Jimmy good morning. And then his attention was driven to the floor, where he could see the chalk markings. Geometric, deliberate circles and intersecting lines. What's that? Ron asked, pointing at the spot on the floor. Jimmy grinned. Mic placement, he said. Gotta get the sound right. Mic placement, Ron thought. Pattern seemed too intricate for that sort of thing. Too intentional. Weeks later, Ron had forgotten all about it. Led Zeppelin packed up and left with eight songs in the can for what would become their 15 track double album, Physical Graffiti. And as I said earlier, they never went to Headley Grange again. But the ghost stories didn't stop. In fact, they multiplied. And the question became not is Headley Grange haunted? The question was Headley Grange was haunted by what? Before I get into the rest of this Headley Grange story, earlier in this episode, you might have heard me talking about Malcolm Dent, the caretaker for Jimmy Page's Bullskin house in Scotland. We included that scene here to set up the general themes in our bigger story in this full episode that you're listening to now about Headley Grange. However, if you want to hear more on this, if you want to hear the rest of the creepy story about what Malcolm Dent saw and heard during his time at Jimmy Page's movie Bolskin House, the place formerly owned by occultist Aleister Crawley, you can hear that entire story in a brand new mini episode of Disgraceland, which is easily available for our All Access members. Just go to Disgracelandpod.com membership to sign up with Patreon or Apple Podcasts. That's to hear the rest of that Led Zeppelin, Malcolm Dent, Aleister Crowley, Bolskinhouse story. All right. However, this story about Led Zeppelin and Headley Grange, let's get right back into it.

Audio Technician or Music Analyst (38:03)

I'm gonna fast forward now and you can kind of get a feel for the song. Very mellow, you know, almost pretty. Very interesting guitar.

Jake Brennan (38:11)

I noticed one little phrase here because, you know, sometimes words have two meanings. That's in the same second verse there that really caught my.

Audio Technician or Music Analyst (38:21)

And I think, you know, we've proved that tonight. Revolution number nine. Number nine has turned me on Dead man backwards. Two meanings, other pieces in here. There's a feeling I get when I look to the west. And in medieval times, the west was the direction of hell.

Jake Brennan (38:37)

All right, now I'm going to play this backwards, right?

Audio Technician or Music Analyst (38:42)

I've actually taken the exact piece of tape that you just heard it off of. I've reverse thread the machine and I'm going to play that exact piece of tape backwards. Now.

Jake Brennan (39:10)

What you just heard was actual audio from Christian televangelists in 1982 who painstakingly proved, to their own satisfaction, at least, that when played backwards, Led Zeppelin's Stairway to Heaven revealed hidden satanic messages. Most striking among them being the phrase my sweet Satan. Of course, this is utterly preposterous. The only thing that playing Stairway backwards truly reveals is that Jimmy Page's guitar solo was. Was fucking badass even in reverse. But it's objectively laughable to think that Led Zeppelin planned out all this subversive backwards speak on one of their biggest hits. However, I am also in no way saying that Jimmy Page was not creating music in the 1970s while under the spell of some weird occult shit, because. Well, just ask Kenneth Anger and he'll do the debunking for us. Now, Kenneth Anger, an avant garde filmmaker and fellow Aleister Crowley obsessive, a guy who had Lucifer tattooed across his chest, once said this about Jimmy Page and the occult. And I quote, jimmy was just a dabbler, a rich kid who liked to play dress up and hey, what do you know? Jimmy page Agreed. In 2017, during a live Q and A at the Oxford Union, a student asked Jimmy about his involvement in the occult. And Jimmy's response downplayed the whole thing. He said he was merely interested in Eastern and Western mysticism as a young man, and so he read a couple books about it, no big deal. Which is a slightly calmer reaction to that question than he gave to the writer Chuck Klosterman, who profiled Jimmy for GQ magazine three years earlier in 2014. Was your interest in the occult authentic? Did you ever actually attempt magic, Jimmy? Well, we can finish the interview with me saying I won't answer that question. So that brings me to another quote, this one by journalist Nick Kent, who once said, jimmy Page is very contained. He's always editing himself, and inevitably most of what comes out of his mouth is very guarded, like he's got something to hide. Back in 1974, after Zeppelin vacated the premises to Headley Grange, the band Genesis moved in. This was when Peter Gabriel was still the lead singer with the weird reverse mohawk, and Phil Collins was still only the drummer. They were there to rehearse material for what would become their classic prog rock double album. The Lamb Lies down on Broadway at Headley Grange. Phil Collins couldn't sleep a wink. All night long, he listened to the footsteps of people who weren't there. And he would spook so much, he refused to close his eyes. I don't know, maybe drummers are easily freaked out or something. Anyway, Peter Gabriel heard those footsteps, too. And whenever he'd leave a room and then return a short time later, he'd find that the furniture had all been rearranged. Now, before arriving there, Peter Gabriel and Phil Collins and the guys in Genesis have been told that the place was haunted. After all, this was part of its charm, so to speak. But Peter Gabriel, like Jimmy Page before him, was in a different state of mind from everyone else in his group. At the time, he was in direct communication with the director William Friedkin, who was seriously pursuing Peter Gabriel to write the screenplay for his upcoming adaptation of the Exorcist novel. And through this lens of demonic possession in the occult, Peter Gabriel believed that the haunting of Headley Grange had only begun a few years prior, upon the arrival of led Zeppelin in 1970. According to Peter Gabriel, Headley Grange was, quote, partly haunted by Jimmy Page's black magic experiments. If correct, that would mean the Headley Grange wasn't haunted like all those other old English estates. That would mean Headley Grange wasn't haunted before Led Zeppelin. Headley Grange was haunted by Led Zeppelin. I'm Jake Brennan and this is Disgraceland. All right, thanks for hanging out with me, guys, on this special spooky edition of Disgraceland. Listen, question of the week for you here. I'm Led Zeppelin. I want to hear your haunted house stories, your spooky stories that time you're hanging out, whether it was in your house, someone else's house, record recording studio, wherever, whatever the structure when things got a little weird. 617-906-6638. You don't have to be Jimmy Page to have experienced some sort of haunting. Get at us on voicemail and text and let us know and you might hear your answer on the next after party. Coming up after this Disgraceland pod on the socials disgraceandpodmail.com to send me an email if you guys want to hear that mini episode. Become an All Access member today. Go to descrand gracelandpod.com membership to sign up. You'll get a little more Led Zeppelin this week in your feed. I gotta get out of here. Here comes some credits. Disgraceland was created by yours truly and is produced in partnership with Double Elvis. Credits for this episode can be found on the show notes page@gracelandpod.com if you're listening as a Disgraceland All Access member, thank you for supporting the show. We really appreciate it. And if not, you can become a member right now by going to Disgracelandpod.com membership rate and review the show and follow us on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter and Facebook disgracelandpod and on YouTube@YouTube.com disgracelandpod Rocka Rolla He's a bad bad man. And Doug Limu and I always tell you to customize your car insurance and save hundreds with Liberty Mutual. But now we to feel it. Cue the emu music. Limu Save yourself money today. Increase your wealth. Customize and save we say that may have been too much feeling. Only pay for what you need@libertymutual.com Liberty Liberty Liberty Liberty Savings Very unwritten by Liberty Mutual Insurance Company Affiliates. Excludes Massachusetts.

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