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The band Led Zeppelin was formed by guitarist Jimmy Page, vocalist Robert Plant, bassist and keyboardist John Paul Jones, and drummer John Bonham in 1968. During the time rock bands were dominating music charts, groupies were known to follow bands in hopes of meeting the members. While Plant has shown he felt “sorry” for Led Zeppelin’s groupies, Page ended up dating one.

A black-and-white photo of Robert Plant and Jimmy Page performing
Robert Plant and Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin | Jay Dickman/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images

Jimmy Page reportedly dated an underage Led Zeppelin groupie

In 2019, Rolling Stone broke down and corrected different rumors about Led Zeppelin that have followed the band for decades.

According to Rolling Stone, rumors swirled that Page was involved with a groupie named Lori Maddox who was based in Los Angeles.

Rolling Stone reports that the rumor is that “Page became infatuated with her and had a roadie bring Maddox up to his suite at the L.A. Hyatt House” and that “the pair went on to have a torrid affair over the next few years.”

While some fans of Led Zeppelin might hope that Page never crossed that boundary and dated a young teenager, Rolling Stone reports that the rumor is indeed true.

According to Rolling Stone, “Maddox was, amazingly, just 14 when she met Page, though Page did what he could to keep the relationship hidden. Even in the swingin’ Seventies this kind of thing could put you in jail. But with no TMZ or Us Weekly, Page got away with it. He eventually dumped Maddox for the of-legal-age Bebe Buell.”

Robert Plant had a different view of Led Zeppelin’s groupies

While Plant is documented to have dated one of Led Zeppelin’s groupies, Plant did not seem to take the same approach as his bandmate.

In a 1975 interview with Rolling Stone, Plant admitted that he felt “sorry” for the young women that followed Led Zeppelin around.

“I haven’t lost my innocence particularly. I’m always ready to pretend I haven’t. Yeah, it is a shame in a way. And it’s a shame to see these young chicks bungle their lives away in a flurry and rush to compete with what was in the old days the goodtime relationships we had with the GTOs and people like that. When it came to looning, they could give us as much of a looning as we could give them. It’s a shame, really,” Plant said.

He continued, “If you listen to ‘Sick Again,’ a track from Physical Graffiti, the words show I feel a bit sorry for them. ‘Clutching pages from your teenage dream in the lobby of the Hotel Paradise/Through the circus of the L.A. queen how fast you learn the downhill slide.’* One minute she’s 12 and the next minute she’s 13 and over the top. Such a shame. They haven’t got the style that they had in the old days … way back in ’68.”

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Robert Plant thinks the people surrounding Led Zeppelin changed

In the interview with Rolling Stone, Plant admitted that while the members of Led Zeppelin had fun in LA in the past, he thinks the band members and the people surrounding them changed.

“Nowadays we’re more into staying in our rooms and reading Nietzsche. There was good fun to be had, you know, it’s just that in those days there were more people to have good fun with than there are now. The States were much more fun. L.A. was L.A. It’s not L.A. now. L.A. infested with jaded 12-year-olds is not the L.A. that I really dug,” Plant told Rolling Stone.

Page is reported to have been involved with Maddox from 1972 until 1975. “Sick Again” was released in 1975.

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