Remember When: Jimmy Page Composed the Score to the Film ‘Death Wish II’

The year 1981 was a difficult one for guitarist Jimmy Page. The previous September his Led Zeppelin bandmate, drummer John “Bonzo” Bonham, passed away after 24 hours of excessive drinking that led to him asphyxiating on his own vomit. In December 1980, the iconic group announced their breakup—they could no longer continue, feeling the emotional pain and internal friction caused by their bandmate’s untimely death. Page, vocalist Robert Plant, and bassist John Paul Jones retreated from the spotlight for a time before indulging in their own individual projects.

In 1981, director Michael Winner, who happened to be a neighbor of Page’s although they had never met, was assembling the film Death Wish II. It had been seven years since his original Charles Bronson-starrer became a controversial cultural touchstone and influenced myriad exploitation movies that came in its wake. The sequel follows New York vigilante Paul Kersey (Bronson) and his adult daughter Carol to LA. After she is murdered by gang members, Kersey’s thirst for vengeance returns and he seeks to gun down all of the men responsible for her death.

Paging Jimmy

While studio execs had already worked out that Isaac Hayes would compose the music (for literally nothing), Winner was not happy with this prospect. He did not like being left out of the decision-making process and wanted someone else. Considering that Page might have some time for new projects, he contacted Zeppelin’s manager Peter Grant and worked out a deal where the famed guitarist would work on the soundtrack for little or no pay. (It hasn’t been revealed what that sum was; the idea was to get his creative juices flowing again.) Page had actually written a half hour of droning, unsettling experimental music for Kenneth Anger that went unused in his 1972 horror short film Lucifer Rising (but was later compiled on the 2012 compilation Lucifer Rising and Other Sound Tracks). Here the guitarist was going to write more music and with more variety.

“To actually do something like the Michael Winner thing, which in essence was 45 minutes of music in a 90-minute film, that’s a lot of music,” Page told Discussions Magazine in November 2015. “Some things may only only last five seconds long, all the way to something called ‘The Chase,’ which is the longest piece of music in the film. There were all these bits and pieces and I put them together as an album. However, there were all these extra pieces of music that I really wanted people to hear outside of the context of what might have been used in the film. It was a good thing just to show all the different directions—the journey—I took for the project. Some of the soundscapes were done around that time as well. I thought I might use them in the film, but it was far too radical at the time to use that sort of thing. It still sounds good and still sounds like the sort of stuff you could use in something now, really.”

“Bloody Dangerous”

The Death Wish II soundtrack was reportedly recorded in August and September of 1981, with the film coming out in February 1982. Page was fired up about the project but did not allow Winner to visit his studio while he worked on the music. Winner’s editing staff warned him this was “bloody dangerous,” especially as Page had never scored a film. But just as he trusted Herbie Hancock for the first Death Wish and Gato Barbieri for Fire Power, both unconventional choices for studios, Winner trusted Page.

“Jimmy then turned up with the score, and it was absolutely magical,” Winner told Uncut magazine in 2008. “Not only was it a great score but you know, filming is done to a 24th for a second. There are 24 frames of film go through every second … and everything hit the button totally! It was one of the most professional scores—well, I’ve never seen a more professional score in my life. On his own—we gave him the film, we gave him timings, and he did it all on his own. I personally edited the film and I laid the music on the film, and I’ll never forget, it was in my attic here in the house next to Jimmy’s—I put the two together, I put his start mark against our start mark, and I said ‘F–k me! This is absolutely f–king incredible! Great music and its hits every f–king thing it’s meant to hit at the right time to the 24th of a second!’ I was flabbergasted … he hit everything! You know, Herbie Hancock was adorable but he didn’t hit everything. … Herbie was great, don’t get me wrong, but Jimmy was immaculate.”

Page’s Death Wish II soundtrack certainly featured many Zeppelin-ish sounding moments, including the opening rock track sung by Chris Farlowe. Elsewhere, one could hear everything from dramatic strings (“The Chase”) to delicate piano playing and romantic strings (“Carol’s Theme”) to discordant synths (“Hotel Rats and Photostats” and “A Shadow in the City”). Page acquired a Roland guitar synthesizer he used in some spots to contribute to the diversity of sounds that fit the different scenes in the movie. He worked with Fairport Convention drummer Dave Mattacks and Bay City Rollers bassist David Paton, as well as an orchestra. The track “Prelude” was reportedly inspired by “Prelude No. 4 in E minor (Op. 28)” by Frédéric Chopin.

Recycling the Soundtrack

The Death Wish II soundtrack album—the only one of Page’s solo albums to be released on Swan Song before it became exclusively a reissue label—hit No. 50 in America, No. 40 in the UK, and No. 28 on the Canadian album charts. The movie was profitable enough for a hyperviolent sequel to be ordered, this time by ‘80s exploitation purveyors Cannon Films, a company that was notoriously cheap with their budgets. Winner decided to recycle a lot of the music from Death Wish II and have it rearranged for Death Wish III, which was released in 1985. He said he got Page’s permission to do so without any financial compensation, but at least he got a film credit for Death Wish III even though he had nothing to do with the reworked compositions. Michael Moran was the arranger and conductor who generated the new score.

Winner also approached Page in 1984 about working on another one of his films, the horror film Scream for Help, but the guitarist declined and referred him to Zeppelin bassist John Paul Jones, who took up the challenge. Page did not continue on with soundtrack music, but at least he took the plunge here and expanded his horizons, giving fans something different to listen to. The CD reissue of the soundtrack has long been out-of-print, but in 2011, Page released a very limited edition vinyl of 1,000 copies that featured additional music not used in the film. They’re all collectors’ items now. At least the original soundtrack can be found on YouTube.

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.

Photo by Everett/Shutterstock