The Golden God of Rock
I’m first flight Gen X, yet I am not quite old enough to have attended Led Zeppelin live.
I was only 12 years old in 1980, when Zep played their last concert and John Bonham passed away a few months later.
I envy you Boomers who saw Led fuckin’ Zeppelin live.
They are, rightfully so, the reigning kings of hard rock.
Yes, I’ll fight you about it.
As I’ve said previously in the halls of this column, there’s a triumvirate of the most influential ‘classic’ rock bands in history…the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, and Led Zeppelin. I often cite them with a cutesy classification; the Fab Four got the pop, the Glimmer Twins got the blues, and Percy, Pagey, Jonesy, and Bonzo got the heavy. No other outfits, outside of the solo godfathers of rock like Elvis or Chuck Berry, come close to these greatest rock talents of the twentieth century.
It’s just how it is.
Yeah, I know. You diehard Queen fans and Who fans doth protest. I hear ya. In terms of influence, they didn’t have quite the same impact due to their radically unique niche of pseudo-rock opera, a difficult genre to replicate and its own animal entirely, what with The Who’s Quadrophenia and Tommy, and Queen’s one-of-a-kind lead singer. By the by, there are two absolutely irreplaceable lead vocalists across the entirety of the classic rock ‘scape: Freddie Mercury of Queen and Geddy Lee of Rush. Yes, Brian May has toured as Queen with that dude from American Idol or whatever, but let’s face it, there’s no adequate emulation of Freddie despite the fact so many people try in countless karaoke bars.
Side note of interest…the most commonly requested songs in karaoke? Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody, Eagles’ Hotel California, Dancing Queen by ABBA, Sweet Caroline by Neil Diamond, and Don’t Stop Believin’ by Journey.
Anyway. After Bonzo died, Page and Plant did a tour together, then Page fired up the Firm. John Paul Jones basically retired for a good while, then came out the gate in 2009 by joining a super group called Them Crooked Vultures. And Percy carved out quite the eclectic place for himself post-Zeppelin, having become a metamorphic demigod equally comfortable across a variety of genres such as bluegrass rockabilly with T-Bone Burnett and Allison Krauss, funk fusion with his solo outfit Band of Joy, and Delta Blues-West African folk rock with the Sensational Space Shifters.
I didn’t see Bob live until much later in life. The first time was in 2007, on his Raising Sand tour with Allison Krauss at the Santa Barbara Bowl. I’d put off seeing him because, all cards on the table, I’d heard his solo outings generally eschewed Led Zeppelin songs, and I admit, sorry to say, I was among the chuckleheads of Pax Americana who viewed Bob solely through the Zeppelin lens. The extent of my exposure to his post-Zep output were random radio spins of his biggest solo singles In the Mood and Tall Cool One, two decent tracks that don’t adequately represent his overall genius in post-Zep works.
All that changed when I beheld the bluegrass glories of his partnership with Allison, a stellar artist of her own accord. I owe that overdue dip in his post-Zep pool thanks to my wifey, a fervent fangirl for Led Zeppelin. Her favorite song of all time is Black Dog, tied only by the Stones’ Sympathy for the Devil. She practically ordered me to take her to see Bob at the bowl here in town back in ‘07. I was reluctant. I had little interest in seeing a ‘countrified’ Robert Plant. While I respected T-Bone Burnett’s producer presence in the industry, the thought of the man who brought Stairway and Kashmir to the world crooning some bluegrass ballads just didn’t grease my wheels. Finally, I relented, and we ponied up for pit seats and went to the gig, where I was shown the egregious error of my ways. I’m happy to admit when I’m wrong. Boy, was I wrong. Friggin’ amazing. Krauss’ voice was angelic and their harmonizing was incandescent. Burnett played his axe right alongside them, and the new album’s central track Gone Gone Gone was lovely.
Plant’s vox definitely stood the test of time, as he mustered up enough mojo to emulate some of his signature sustained howling from days of Zep past. He satisfied my old school expectations by offering Delta-tweaked versions of Black Dog and When the Levee Breaks, tandem editions with Krauss supplying co-billing vocals. Simply outstanding. Levee is my second favorite Zeppelin track, only trailing Trampled Underfoot from Physical Graffiti. When they sang Black Dog, my wife lost all sense of reality, yet not near as much as when I had to catch her from fainting in disbelief at the start of the show, when she called out to the Golden God of rock from the pit, her hand on her heart in reverence, and he actually turned to her, smiling and nodding, making eye contact with her and putting his own hand on his heart in symbiosis. My wife promptly lost her shit, as you might imagine.
After that gig, I became a loyal acolyte to Bob’s fusion art. He really is a talented mofo beyond Zeppelin. He turned down half a billion dollars to reunite Zeppelin, with Jason Bonham replacing his father on the drums, electing to continue his solo works playing smaller sheds and amphitheaters. The dude is a friggin’ zen master monk in terms of western cowboy capitalism, clearly. Though later that year in 2007, after the Raising Sand tour, he did agree to a one-off reunion show to honor Ahmet Ertegun, founder of Zeppelin’s label Atlantic Records. Millions of people entered a worldwide ottery to try and get tickets to that long coveted gig, including myself. I don’t fly. Like, at all. Would I have made an exception to cross the pond to see a Led Zeppelin reunion? I surely would have. I entered. I did not win access, alas.
My next Plant gig was again at the Santa Barbara Bowl, in 2011 with his outfit the Band of Joy. Not unlike his bluegrass collaboration with Krauss, the Band of Joy offered a smooth, roots folk sound uniquely showcasing Plant’s signature velvet vocals, with a setlist including modified Zeppelin stalwarts like Houses of the Holy, Ramble On, and Black Country Woman.
Two years later in 2013, we caught him yet again at the SB Bowl, now with his newest incarnation, the Sensational Space Shifters, ramping up the Plant-based funk (I just can’t help myself) with West African and Moroccan influences. Utterly magnificent. Again he rendered several Zep tunes for the likes of dumb purist whiteboys like me, including Going to California, Whole Lotta Love, their Joan Baez cover of Babe I’m Gonna Leave You, and a personal fave, Bron-Y-Aur Stomp, ‘cause of its homage to Bob’s beloved collie mix Strider. (doggie guy here, you surely know by now). :)
The last time we saw Bob and the Space Shifters was just a year later in 2014, down in West Hollywood at the Palladium. Loyalist readers might recall the Palladium is not one of my favorite venues, for any number of sweaty, drunken, GA clusterfuck reasons. Nonetheless, it was high time we saw Bob in a venue out of town, and so off we went. It was a shorter set, both a blessing and a downer given my Palladium bias, but it was terrific, a set full of covers and Zeppelin tunes with the likes of Howlin’ Wolf’s No Place to Go, Bukka White’s Fixin’ to Die, Blind Willie Johnson’s Nobody’s Fault but Mine, plus funkalicious versions of Zep’s No Quarter and Thank You.
He’s the golden god of rock for a reason. His tenor vocals have become a permanent part of global culture in this era of human history. One would have to travel far and wide to find a culture on earth outside of isolated islands, remote Siberian villages, or Amazonian tribes not having assimilated some aspect of Led Zeppelin to some degree.
My favorite ‘solo’ work of Bob’s? Outside of Zep, it’s gotta be Raising Sand. The album was that good. I already mentioned Levee and Trampled, but really, any Zep fan worth their salt would be excommunicado if they failed to name Physical Graffiti as a seminal presence in their lives (for you, Zep fans). Believe it or now, my favorite Led Zeppelin project isn’t among the nine studio albums. It’s The BBC Sessions, their 1997 piecemeal compilation album composed from a number of 1969 BBC studio recording sessions. I love the way Jimmy’s tone sounds on that record. Sure, it’s engineered to high heaven, but it’s kind of one of those ‘live’ albums that isn’t really live, it’s ‘studio-live,’ which I admit is one of my preferred sound vibes. The BBC Sessions also include a pair of ‘lost’ Zeppelin tracks ranking among my faves: The Girl I love She Got Long Black Wavy Hair and Traveling Riverside Blues.
It’s funny, isn’t it? How the English Invasion more or less usurped the reigning crowns to pretty much all of rock and roll. English whiteboy duos like Plant and Page, Lennon and McCartney, Jagger and Richards, Mercury and May, they just swept aside all that lay before them in terms of ‘classic’ rock. Equitable American versions like Roth and Van Halen, Tyler and Perry, Axl and Slash, the Wilson brothers, they didn’t quite summit that top tier in terms of legacy, longevity, and overall world domination. Zeppelin reigns supreme among my circles as far as classic hard rock, but me personally, I pretty much split the diff between Zep and the Stones. I love the Beatles, but they’re pop children of a lesser godhood for me. Ya gotta love Bob for turning down a half BILLION dollars for a Zeppelin reunion tour to keep playing clubs and sheds doing his own thing instead of riding the nostalgia train into retirement. Takes mad cajones, that. Well done, sir.
Lastly, concerning Bob and his backstage antics of youth, as far as the infamous mud shark groupie urban legend we’ve heard all of our lives? It’s never been proven or debunked, and the band members laugh it off as a lark rumor and no more. It’s certainly a testament to the wilderness of old school rock and roll shenanigans. The idea of rock’s most respected statesman taking a turn at pleasuring a groupie with a shark seems far beneath him, but his younger self?
Who knows. :)
If you enjoyed this segment and want to tip without a monthly commitment, you’re welcome to buy us a one time coffee. We remain, as always, your faithful servants of the pen and the meta-sword.
Amazing 🥰
Never got to see them. BUT when I was in the Navy, I got to see The Firm at the Concord Pavilion in California. Got to see Jimmy Page!!! They were awesome, and got to see JIMMY PAGE!!!!!!