Jimmy Page hails Arctic Monkeys ahead of Finsbury Park shows

Jimmy Page has spoken out in praise of Arctic Monkeys, head of their huge shows at Finsbury Park in London.

Alex Turner and co are due to headline two gigs in North London's legendary Finsbury Park this weekend - playing to over 80,000 people across two nights, cementing them as one of Britain's biggest guitar bands. 

"The Arctic Monkeys, right from their very inception, you could tell straight away that they really, really thought about it," said Page. "Alex is superb, isn't it he? They've really worked hard at it and you could tell that straight away. They stood out a mile from everything else that was going on."

Page also praised new talent in the form of Ivor winners London Grammar and Tom Odell.

Asked about his favourite modern songwriters, he replied: "The ones today - London Grammar and Tom Odell. I knew of Tom Odell because my son goes to the same school that he went to. The whole of that school was alive resounding Tom Odell as he was surfacing through the media...I've heard him - he's really talented."

He added: "We've got some great talent over here. It's always changing, that's the thing, that's how it is. It changes over a period of years and in five years it will make an incredible shift. There's some really good intelligent writing going on over here in new muscians. That's what we want, isn't it?"