"You know who knows me? My clothes. My clothes know me very well."

That quote about sums up the confrontational tone set between Jimmy Page and GQ during the magazine's 'Men of the Year' feature on the former Led Zeppelin guitarist -- a conversation that found him repeatedly shrugging off questions about his personal life and irritably refusing to wave away the fog of rumor that's long surrounded the band.

Page took particular umbrage when confronted with the widespread belief that he was strung out on heroin during Zeppelin's later years, and that sessions for the band's 'In Through the Out Door' album proceeded largely without his involvement. "How do you know I had a heroin problem? You don't know what I had or what I didn't have," retorted Page. "All I will say is this: My responsibilities to the music did not change. I didn't drop out or quit working. I was there, just as much as anyone else was."

Regarding the subject of whether he was absent while 'In Through the Out Door' was coming together, Page snapped, "If anyone wants to say that, the first thing you have to ask them is, 'Were you there at the time?' The second thing to take on board is the fact that I am the producer of 'In Through the Out Door.' That's what I did. It's right there in black and white. If there were controversy over this, if John Paul Jones or Robert Plant had done what you're implying, wouldn't they have wanted to be listed as the producers of the album? So let's just forget all that."

Sadly, the conversation never had a chance to get into Page's new music, which may see the light of day in 2015; instead, the interview was run aground with a question about whether Page teamed up with David Coverdale in the early '90s in order to annoy Plant ("That's pathetic. I'm not going to answer that") and another about his interest in the occult. We'll just have to wait and see what Page has planned for his next act -- and remember that when it happens, he'll insist on letting the music speak for itself.

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