Jugula

Jugula is a 1985 album by Roy Harper and Jimmy Page. The original Beggars Banquet 1985 title was Whatever Happened to ..... Jugula, but later reissues of this album has the "Whatever Happened to ....." omitted from the album sleeve.

Overview
With a working title of Rizla due to the album's cover art (an unravelled orange Rizla pack), Jugula, as this album is often called, was released on the Beggars Banquet label and reached the UK Top 20. The album contains a number of roots-folk crafted, original songs written by Harper. It was recorded in a fresh and spontaneous manner, often with only the sound of Ovation guitars and vocals. Occasionally, the spacious arrangements are filled with synthesizer and electric guitar. Harper explained the meaning of the title:

The title for 'Jugula' came from playing Trivial Pursuit, in order to explain to everyone how they should go about answering the questions as straight and honestly as possible I'd say, "Go for the jugula". It was going to be 'Harper & Page' for a while, but that's like selling Jimmy's name, then it went to '1214' which is the year that the Magna Carta was signed... but that was a bit esoteric. So one day we were talking and "jugula" came up, so I phoned the artist and they'd designed up to the 'Whatever happened to...' bit so I said leave it there and put Jugula at the end.

This album in particular brought Harper to a new and wider audience, mainly due to Harper and Jimmy Page's appearances at the Cambridge Folk Festival in 1984, an album tour and a 15 minute televised interview by Mark Ellen on the Old Grey Whistle Test (16 November 1984). The interview featured Harper and Page playing their acoustic guitars on the side of Scafell Pike in the English Lake District, a somewhat different and unusual interview for the time. Songs played included "Hangman" and part of "The Same Old Rock".

The first track, "Nineteen Forty-Eightish", a reference to George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, crescendos with a lead guitar solo by Page. This album was the fifth that Harper and Page had worked on, but the first entire record they made together. Other standout tracks include "Hangman", an emotive song that expresses the feelings of an innocent man condemned to die and "Frozen Moment", a song played entirely in the chord of C. David Gilmour co-wrote the music for the third track "Hope", Harper penned the lyrics, and Nick Harper (Harper's 16 year old son at the time), played the lead guitar on this track (not Gilmour as is often mistakenly stated). "Elizabeth", a song that originally appeared on Harpers 1984 release Born in Captivity, was re-recorded and released as a 12" single. Again the artwork featured an unravelled Rizla package, this time in green. The 12" was released on Beggars Banquet Records (BEG 131T).

1988 Compact disc edition Same track listing and order as the vinyl release.