Online gallery Drop Top Images is selling prints from a stash of long-forgotten negatives of classic rock acts such as Led Zeppelin, The Who Rod Stewart and Fleetwood Mac (below), recently rediscovered by former music photographer Pete Minall. Minall, who got to know many of the bands in the early days of their careers, sometimes got access backstage as well as taking live shots, and found the historic negatives among family photographs
“These photographs were all taken during a brief period of my life lasting only a year or two, around 1970 and 1971,” Minall explains. “After moving to a new house many times over the intervening decades, alongside 50 years of culling excess belongings, I recently discovered a series of old negatives hiding away amongst family photographs. It was a fabulous surprise, having no idea they still existed.”
Minall was just a teenager when he started taking pictures of the bands, but clearly had the gift of the gab to get invited backstage – see Fleetwood Mac shot. He would also have had to get past Led Zeppelin’s notoriously truculent and protective manager, Peter Grant (Jimmy Page is shown above). Half a century ago it might have been, but as he notes, younger music fans are still fascinated by that era. “The astonishing thing is that these artistes and their music will last an eternity. Young people nowadays are still discovering the treasures to be found in the huge legacy of their musical back catalogues. At the time, they were just fun shots to take. Who knew they would prove to be of so much interest.”
Click here for the selection of prints for sale. AP readers can get a 15% discount by quoting AP100.
