Led Zeppelin Flies Again
Led Zeppelin has been and always will be my favorite band.
When I was a young boy, I'd often put a radio, tuned to a Houston rock station, under my pillow at night and drift off to sleep. That radio would play all night long.
Years later, I'd hear a song on the radio, one that would get my juices flowing. I wouldn't know who it was, but as the song ended and the DJ said who it was, it turned out to be Zep a frightening number of times.
Their music, inexplicably, had found a permanent place in my subconscious.
As a young teen-ager - when Zep was still touring and putting out albums - I began to buy their records one by one. I'd buy one and play it over and over for months. Then I'd buy another and do the same. I never got tired of listening to them.
One like Friday afternoon, my dad, quite aware of my Zep fascination, brought home the double album "Physical Graffiti," held it up and said: "Yard mowed and raked. Gutters cleaned. Driveway and front walk swept."
I was done and listening to that classic album - still my favorite - for the first time by 10 a.m. the next day.
After collecting all their albums, I turned my attention to live bootlegs, for which I paid ridiculous prices at an underground Houston record store.
So obsessed was I with this band that I paid $200 to a scalper in 1980 to pre-buy two Zep tickets for their upcoming U.S. tour. Back then, that was a lot of money to pay for tickets, whose face values had yet to top $15 for many rock shows.
Alas, while driving from home to school on my lunch break, I heard on the radio that the drummer, John Bonham, had died of an alcohol overdose.
I was devastated.
Months later, the group broke up. My dad went down to the scalper and got back my $200.
Since then, the surviving members have played a handful of one-off gigs but never a full-blown show.
Until now.
At the request of the widow of Atlantic Records founder Ahmet Ertegun, Led Zeppelin will play a two-hour show at the 02 arena in London. Bonham's son, Jason, fittingly will take his dad's place behind the drums. Proceeds will go to Ertegun's education foundation.
I, like many other Zep plan, have had mixed feelings about a reunion. Singer Robert Plant's voice is a fragile shell of its former self. Guitarist Jimmy Page, whose post-Zep career has been spotty, at best, is old and gray. Plant has been the reunion's biggest roadblock, preferring to preserve the band's legacy rather than attempt to build on it.
Initially, the guys planned on a short 30-minute show, but as they began to rehearse, they realized they still had some of the old magic, according to various news reports.
The more I've thought about it, the more I'm liking this reunion, despite it supposedly being a one-time thing.
With the Rolling Stones and The Who still going, and bands such as The Police and Van Halen doing reunion shows, why the hell not? As old as these acts are, they still kick the stuffing out of just about everything else touring out there today. Their music lives on, but do you think anyone will be listening to Korn or 50 cent in 20 years?
Apparently, others think the same way.
To get Zep tickets, you had to toss your name and credit card number into a lottery system. An eye-popping 25 million people applied, with only about 18,000 tickets available.
They also came up with an interesting way to beat the scalpers. Those selected in the lottery are given a code, and the code, identification and credit card all have to match for the winner to pick up a ticket.
Already, scammers have been trying to sell their codes on Ebay, but it won't work.
http://www.harveygoldsmith.com/news-and-press-release-item.php?item=19
So without playing a note publicly, Zep has already recreated the mystique-enhancing circus that followed it throughout the 1970s, when it was hands down the world's biggest band. Only a Beatles reunion, impossible since Lennon's death, would be bigger.
I don't think they'll be able to top themselves when they play Nov. 26 in England, but despite all the passing years and their ages, I have a feeling Page, Plant, Jones and Bonham can still bring it, and do so in a fresh way that will surprise even their most hardcore fans like me.
When I was a young boy, I'd often put a radio, tuned to a Houston rock station, under my pillow at night and drift off to sleep. That radio would play all night long.
Years later, I'd hear a song on the radio, one that would get my juices flowing. I wouldn't know who it was, but as the song ended and the DJ said who it was, it turned out to be Zep a frightening number of times.
Their music, inexplicably, had found a permanent place in my subconscious.
As a young teen-ager - when Zep was still touring and putting out albums - I began to buy their records one by one. I'd buy one and play it over and over for months. Then I'd buy another and do the same. I never got tired of listening to them.
One like Friday afternoon, my dad, quite aware of my Zep fascination, brought home the double album "Physical Graffiti," held it up and said: "Yard mowed and raked. Gutters cleaned. Driveway and front walk swept."
I was done and listening to that classic album - still my favorite - for the first time by 10 a.m. the next day.
After collecting all their albums, I turned my attention to live bootlegs, for which I paid ridiculous prices at an underground Houston record store.
So obsessed was I with this band that I paid $200 to a scalper in 1980 to pre-buy two Zep tickets for their upcoming U.S. tour. Back then, that was a lot of money to pay for tickets, whose face values had yet to top $15 for many rock shows.
Alas, while driving from home to school on my lunch break, I heard on the radio that the drummer, John Bonham, had died of an alcohol overdose.
I was devastated.
Months later, the group broke up. My dad went down to the scalper and got back my $200.
Since then, the surviving members have played a handful of one-off gigs but never a full-blown show.
Until now.
At the request of the widow of Atlantic Records founder Ahmet Ertegun, Led Zeppelin will play a two-hour show at the 02 arena in London. Bonham's son, Jason, fittingly will take his dad's place behind the drums. Proceeds will go to Ertegun's education foundation.
I, like many other Zep plan, have had mixed feelings about a reunion. Singer Robert Plant's voice is a fragile shell of its former self. Guitarist Jimmy Page, whose post-Zep career has been spotty, at best, is old and gray. Plant has been the reunion's biggest roadblock, preferring to preserve the band's legacy rather than attempt to build on it.
Initially, the guys planned on a short 30-minute show, but as they began to rehearse, they realized they still had some of the old magic, according to various news reports.
The more I've thought about it, the more I'm liking this reunion, despite it supposedly being a one-time thing.
With the Rolling Stones and The Who still going, and bands such as The Police and Van Halen doing reunion shows, why the hell not? As old as these acts are, they still kick the stuffing out of just about everything else touring out there today. Their music lives on, but do you think anyone will be listening to Korn or 50 cent in 20 years?
Apparently, others think the same way.
To get Zep tickets, you had to toss your name and credit card number into a lottery system. An eye-popping 25 million people applied, with only about 18,000 tickets available.
They also came up with an interesting way to beat the scalpers. Those selected in the lottery are given a code, and the code, identification and credit card all have to match for the winner to pick up a ticket.
Already, scammers have been trying to sell their codes on Ebay, but it won't work.
http://www.harveygoldsmith.com/news-and-press-release-item.php?item=19
So without playing a note publicly, Zep has already recreated the mystique-enhancing circus that followed it throughout the 1970s, when it was hands down the world's biggest band. Only a Beatles reunion, impossible since Lennon's death, would be bigger.
I don't think they'll be able to top themselves when they play Nov. 26 in England, but despite all the passing years and their ages, I have a feeling Page, Plant, Jones and Bonham can still bring it, and do so in a fresh way that will surprise even their most hardcore fans like me.
posted by Brian Pearson at 2:36 PM
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