August 20, 2009
In this issue:
August in Led Zeppelin History
August is an auspicious month in Led Zeppelin history!
Robert Plant was born on August 20, 1948.
In August of 1968, the newly formed band began rehearsing for its debut tour that fall as The New Yardbirds in Scandinavia.
On August 4 and 11, 1979, Led Zeppelin rocked hard at Knebworth House in Stevenage, for what would be the band’s last performances in the United Kingdom.
And this August, a special event celebrating 30 Years Since Knebworth was organized by Graeme Hutchinson and Dave Lewis. An auction in support of the ABC Trust (Action for Brazil’s Children, co-founded by Jimena and Jimmy Page) was held, raising an estimated $1900 for the charity.
By all accounts, tribute band, Boot Led Zeppelin, totally rocked the joint.
For a very entertaining review of the Knebworth at 30 Celebration, check out Dave Lewis’ Diary online at www.tblweb.com The bit about karaoke Zeppelin (and the booze that precipitated it) is especially hilarious!
A couple days ago, I received my limited edition of Dave’s new book, Then as it Was: Led Zeppelin at Knebworth 1979. 30 Years Gone. Although there’s not enough time to review it for this edition of the Enzepplozine, I hope to do so soon. I can tell you, though, it’s a must-have item for any serious collector.
Ross Halfin wrote the foreword and, along with several other people, contributed hundreds of fascinating photos, some of which appear in colour. The book is 250+ pages of personal stories and anecdotes about the Knebworth event by people who were there. Dave has woven them all together in his unique, highly detailed narrative.
If you missed being at Knebworth, this book is the next best thing! Grab your copy while you still can. Visit www.tblweb.com to order.
Given all this August activity and Percy’s birthday, I thought I’d do something a little different for this issue of the Enzepplozine. My collection of live concert recordings includes some amazing aural documentation of those legendary Knebworth performances.
Some of you have commented that I spend too much time writing about Zeppelin’s early years, when most people feel that the band’s best period started with the untitled fourth album and Physical Graffiti. Different strokes, right? To me, it’s all great! I just get off on research and have always been fascinated with how the band’s music grew and changed because all four members were masters of improvisation. So going back to the start is a must.
What you may not realize, especially if you’re new to the Enzepplozine (welcome!) is that I’ve actually studied, documented and written about Led Zeppelin’s musical evolution right up to the end of the band’s career in 1980. I analyzed the music from one live performance to the next based on cue stops and song frameworks. It’s just not all out in print. Yet!
So this month, I’m breaking out of that “early days mindset” to take a look specifically at Robert Plant’s vocal talents, as captured live by concert-going fans at Knebworth in August 1979.
Percy's Voice at Knebworth 1979
In the late 1970s, public taste in popular music had turned toward punk rock. Interest in Led Zeppelin had been on the wane, especially in the UK where punk had originated. Hot off a successful US tour, all four members of Led Zeppelin were super adrenaline-charged for what would be their triumphant return to home turf. The Knebworth concerts would re-establish Zeppelin as STILL being one of the best bands in the world in 1979.
Robert Plant had been screaming and wailing across five octaves for just over a decade with Led Zeppelin before August 1979. Although it wouldn’t be revealed until 1988, he had undergone surgery on his vocal cords in 1973 or ‘74. In addition to the rigours of travel, the gruelling tour schedules often included performing up to three hours for several nights in a row.
It should come as no surprise, then, that the song renditions captured live on tape at Knebworth reveal, in general, a softer, subtler quality in Robert Plant’s vocal stylings than the official studio releases did.
Live at Knebworth - August 4, 1979
On songs performed at Knebworth, as well as at Denmark’s Falkoner Theatre a few weeks previously on July 24, 1979, Plant’s voice sounds whispery, abbreviated and casual. For example, his vocals during The Rain Song, the intro to No Quarter and the verses of Stairway to Heaven no longer resound with the crystal-clear, high-register sustained ululations of past tours. He’s singing with great economy and compactness, picking and choosing the musical moments when he “goes for it” to hit the high notes.
For the songs Over the Hills and Far Away and Ten Years Gone, he sings the verses using vocal harmony lines, delivered mainly in the low to mid register. In the case of Over the Hills and Far Away, he’s been doing this since 1972 and on every tour when this song has been played live. Yet he still manages to create some unique melodic twists and turns that are never done the same way twice.
On Ten Years Gone, he makes good and effective use of the vocal harmonizer on the outro. This song is obviously within the comfort zone of his voice, which stays strong throughout.
Plant had been using the vocal harmonizer since the 10th U.S. and Canadian Tour of 1975. During the August 4, 1979 Knebworth performance of Misty Mountain Hop, he makes great use of it, literally “singing with himself” to add a new dimension to a song that’s been in the Zeppelin catalogue for quite some time now (since the band’s untitled fourth album, released in 1971). The soundboard recording captures this very effectively.
On the same concert bill that August 4, Plant’s work on Since I’ve Been Loving You is a prime example of how he adroitly manages some high-register phrases that border on screams and then artfully returns to the low register for the balance of the lyrics. It’s highly effective and quite different, given the current timbre of his vocals. His blues shouts are well suited to his voice at this time.
Another quality that’s apparent is a faintness or sensation of trailing off as he enters and/or exits certain lyrics and phrases. It almost sounds as though he has laryngitis for a split-second and is having trouble getting his voice to work. This results in a nonchalant, rather unassuming quality in songs such as The Rain Song and Stairway to Heaven. It’s as if he’s giving them an “old favourite” type of treatment.
In the case of Stairway, this could partially be attitudinal because he originally didn’t want to perform “that bloody wedding song” again!
When performing numbers like Trampled Underfoot and the latter part of The Rain Song, Plant’s voice continues to charge ahead, mainly in the low register, with its usual straight-ahead timbre.
Live at Knebworth - August 11, 1979
From the time Stairway to Heaven was first performed in 1971, it always possessed a grandiose quality. Now, at Knebworth, it has taken on a much more melancholy tone. Perhaps it’s understandable, after all that Zeppelin had been through up until that point. For certain, this rendition of rock’s greatest anthem lacks Robert Plant’s usual mood and passion of conviction.
After singing “and the forests will echo with laughter”, he forgoes the usual ethereal question, “does anybody remember laughter?” that so delighted legions of fans on earlier touring versions. Instead, he barely whispers a somber and melancholy, “Oh, I think I could smile. I think I could smile.”
He virtually shouts the last verse of lyrics in a vocal line that bears little melodic resemblance to the original or to subsequent live versions in 1977 that contained a bit more melody than he offers here. Plant’s final high-register wail as he climbs the stairway to the song’s conclusion “and she’s buying a stairway to Heaven” is consistent with the doleful, quiet and contemplative tone his vocals created for the entire anthem.
This rendition provides us with a great example of how a vocalist’s mood and feeling can colour the interpretation of any song. It’s an intangible quality that’s difficult to identify but you can hear it in this version played at Knebworth.
Whole Lotta Love sounds nothing like the official version released on Led Zeppelin II in 1969! Robert Plant is ready for screaming and that he does, although in low to mid register tones. When he starts into John Lee Hooker’s Boogie Chillun, he ventures into higher ranges but in a parsed, compact way compared to the excesses of this section from 1972 and 1973 performances.
Plant even quips some vocal asides for old times’ sake, although in a much rougher and raspier high register at Knebworth than the catty “helium pitch” quips of those days in ‘72/’73.
Nevertheless, his voice is still very strong and has been taking an incredible amount of stress and strain in all registers. As he reaches the grande finale of “Way down inside…you need lovvvve!” his siren voice is back. Nice to know he can still hit it if he wants to! Overall, this song is a fabulous new twist on one of Zeppelin’s sonic staples.
Knebworth, August 11, 1979 was the last time that the original Led Zeppelin line-up would ever play Communication Breakdown. And what a rendition to remember them by!
The late J.J. Jackson told me that from one performance to the next, the introduction changed. He said, “You never knew what Jimmy’s fingers were gonna squeeze out to get this one started!” And that was when the song was being performed for the first time live since the debut album’s release, back in January 1969!
Here, on the band’s last performance of it, Robert Plant pulls out most of the stops. Although mainly singing in the low to mid register, he goes for some vocal cord-busting moments that make you wonder if he’ll ever be able to sing another note after this!
“Won’t you let me hold you”, “Ahhhhh, I wanna tell you” – he screeches both of these phrases up to the stars at Knebworth to spectacular effect. His voice is still rough and ragged, but it’s so exciting to hear.
“I don’t want no communication breakdown” is screeched out with blood-curdling ferocity in the outro for a jubilant and triumphant finish worthy of any epoch in Led Zeppelin’s live performing history.
Let’s take a look at how he performed other songs at that second Knebworth gig. As I mentioned, the crystal-clear timbre that characterized Plant’s vocals at various stages throughout his career is almost completely absent at this point. It’s as if steel wool has been rubbed over his voice, leaving it very strong and distinctive but with a duller and raspier quality, especially in quieter volumes.
In most of the songs, he continues to spit out the low-mid register, guttural oohs and aahs at huge volumes. He intersperses their high-register equivalents with consistently low-mid register vocal lines. Often the vocal lines are quieter in volume and maintain their melodic integrity of the song for him, only to give way to another bout of shouting or screeching lyrics.
He does this in songs such as Since I’ve Been Loving You, The Rain Song, Achilles’ Last Stand, Rock and Roll and Whole Lotta Love. Plant has always been great for singing from a whisper to a roar, right from the start of Led Zeppelin. But the transformation his voice has undergone and how he’s decided to use and manage it at this point affords him a whole new realm of possibilities for musical arrangement and experience within the songs, both old and new material.
His constant vocal adaptation is especially effective in numbers like Trampled Underfoot, Kashmir and Achilles’ Last Stand.
I think I’m getting the writer’s equivalent of laryngitis. That’s enough of that for now!
Jeff Beck an ISC Judge
Are you an aspiring songwriter? The International Songwriting Competition is now accepting entries for 2009, in various categories. There’s $150,000 in cash and prizes, including the Grand Prize of $25K.
Former member of The Yardbirds (pre-cursor to Led Zeppelin), Jeff Beck, joins a distinguished panel of judges that includes other music icons like Jerry Lee Lewis, Steve Winwood, John Mayall, Loretta Lynn, Tom Waits and many more. The deadline for entries is October 7. You can get an entry form and all the details at www.songwritingcompetition.com Best of luck!
E-books Coming Soon!
Last month, I told you that we had almost completed our first-ever e-books. There are still some details to be finalized, but we’re on track to make them available in September. Here’s some more information about them and a sneak peek at how they look.
Led Zeppelin's Music - True Blues & Beyond
This 25+ page e-book is largely based on one of our most popular 2-part Enzepplozine issues with a few new twists to keep things interesting!
It will be publicly available on our site as a downloadable PDF. Best of all, it’ll be FREE!
J.J. Jackson remembers Led Zeppelin
The late J.J. Jackson was very enthusiastic about my research on the musical evolution of Led Zeppelin. We spoke on several occasions and I’ve organized those conversations into six separate interviews.
The first one appears in my book, Sonic Boom: The Impact of Led Zeppelin. Volume 1 – Break & Enter. The second was excerpted for an early Enzepplozine issue but it appears in this e-book in its entirety for the very first time. The last four interviews have never been published in any form anywhere before.
Until recently, the only living souls ever to read them were my sister/editor, Lou Anne and I. Then we sent them to renowned Led Zeppelin authority, Dave Lewis, who graciously agreed to write the Foreword for us.
Those last four interviews are very special for any true fan or scholar of Led Zeppelin. Because J.J. compared the live recordings a fan made at The Boston Tea Party to the concerts he himself attended there on all four nights of Zeppelin’s legendary run, January 23-26, 1969.
To have an eyewitness account of those performances, together with a detailed musical analysis from someone as knowledgeable as J.J. who was also a close friend to the members of Led Zeppelin, is a secret piece of rock’n’roll history too irresistible to miss.
J.J. will tell you where the taper must have been. Listening to the live tapes, he recalled the sights and sounds those nights at The Tea Party, from incidents like Jimmy Page having to stop the show to replace a guitar string and how Robert and Bonzo filled the gap to feedback problems with the Dragon Telecaster. He describes the audience’s reaction when Bonzo started playing the drums with his bare hands and when Jimmy put the violin bow to his guitar.
This e-book contains over 80 pages of information, most of it absolutely brand new. And it’s not just limited to those 1969 gigs. Because J.J. also talked to me about being at the Inglewood Forum in Los Angeles for the gig that became “Bonzo’s Birthday Party”.
He tells how he felt when Robert Plant singled him out and dedicated Since I’ve Been Loving You to him. And he has some hilarious tales about the post-concert party!
This e-book will be free with the purchase of Sonic Boom – Volume 1 and available separately for a price yet to be determined. We’ll also have special offers for Enzepploziners who haven’t purchased the book as well as for customers who have. So there are exciting things to come from Enzepplopedia. Stay tuned!
Until next month, remember Knebworth and rock hard!
Frank Reddon, Author
Sonic Boom: The Impact of Led Zeppelin Volume 1 – Break & Enter
Reminders
Want to learn about Led? Visit Learn-about-Led.com
Order Sonic Boom Volume 1 at Enzepplopedia.com.
And don't forget to tell us what's YOUR favourite Led Zeppelin album!