Pre-orders accepted for remastered Roy Harper album with Jimmy Page solo

Pre-orders are now being accepted online for a newly remastered CD version of Roy Harper's 1971 album, which features Jimmy Page on one track.

This month marks the second time the album Stormcock will have been available on CD – it was first available in 1994 on Harper's label, Science Friction – although this new reissue improves on the old one sonically.

"Certain lines and certain words will not chop your ears off at high volume any more," says a quote attributed to Harper himself, displayed at a fan discussion site named after the album. "Bottom end is taken care of properly."

Recorded in 1970, the album's four tracks include the 12-minute opus "The Same Old Rock." It is the cut that includes Page's guitar solo. The album, originally issued on the Harvest label in 1971, credited the solo to the pseudonym S. Flavius Mercurius.

Preorders for the remastered disc and expanded 20-page booklet of expanded liner notes and photographs are now being accepted online at the Roy Harper Shop. Unexpected delays prevented the artist's official store from offering the album on the previously announced date of Oct. 15.

Harper has long been a friend of Led Zeppelin's members, becoming one of only two actual people named in a Led Zeppelin song title. Led Zeppelin III, released in 1970, closes with a blues medley titled "Hats Off to (Roy) Harper." (The other actual person named in a Led Zeppelin song title is Ian "Stu" Stewart, who contributed piano to Zep's "Boogie with Stu.")

Page also played on Harper's 1973 disc Lifemask, and Harper's 1975 album HQ includes John Paul Jones on bass. Harper and Page released an album together in 1985 called Whatever Happened to Jugula? Science Friction reissues of these albums are all available at the Roy Harper Shop.

As reported earlier on LedZeppelinNews.com, the new Stormcock disc is also said to contain at least one hidden surprise fans might appreciate. "There are one or two secrets," Harper said of the reissue. "You may eventually spot them. It won't matter much to the general public that much, but it sure does matter to me."