Led Zeppelin Concerts - Legends In Live MusicPeople who have attended Led Zeppelin concerts often maintain that the live experience exceeds even the band’s studio work. Zeppelin has always been one of the most popular live bands in rock history. What makes the group so sensational? Led Zeppelin started off touring Scandinavia as The New Yardbirds in September 1968. Audiences who were expecting the original Yardbirds were disappointed. That is, until they heard the band play! Then it was a solid wall of startling new sound. Returning to England, the band changed its name to Led Zeppelin and recorded its self-titled debut album, although the LP wouldn’t be released until January 1969. They played a few more gigs in the UK then headed to North America. Led Zeppelin played its first-ever concert on U.S. soil on December 26, 1968 at Denver Auditorium Arena in-the-round. Although not even advertised on the bill, the band opened for Spirit and Vanilla Fudge. Noted Led Zeppelin researcher/author, Robert Godwin, was the first to confirm this important fact. That’s The Spirit!In the group’s earliest days, a Led Zeppelin concert consisted of many original songs, covers of old blues tunes and clever medleys. All four musicians were masters at improvisation. This is largely what made their live concerts so exciting. They performed such a medley that night they opened for Spirit, at Zeppelin’s first-ever American concert. Into As Long As I Have You, a song by rhythm’n’blues artist, Garnet Mimms, they sandwiched a chunk of Spirit’s song, Fresh Garbage! When I interviewed Ed Cassidy, Spirit’s drummer, I asked him what he and his band thought of that. Were they annoyed? On the contrary! Cassidy’s magnanimous response was, “I was actually flattered. I think we all were. We didn’t view it as stealing our stuff or a rip-off of our material. It was interesting the way they put that medley together.” Zeppelin’s members would continue to improvise individually in solos or together like this throughout the band’s career. In Buffalo, they inserted Elvis Presley tunes after having heard the King perform that very afternoon in New York City!
A Tempest In A Tea CupThroughout that First U.S. and Canadian Tour of 1968-’69, Led Zeppelin concerts kept laying audiences to waste! In San Francisco, New York, Chicago, Toronto and perhaps especially in Boston, people couldn’t get enough of this amazing new band. When Zeppelin first landed in North America, no one had ever heard of the band and there was no album to enlighten them! That changed on January 12, 1969 with the official release of their debut LP. Shortly after that, Zeppelin was booked at Ray Riepen’s Boston Tea Party. The band was such a hit (promoted in no small part by local deejay, JJ Jackson), an extra night was added to their run to meet the demand. Zeppelin’s “Boston Marathon” was a four-night run: January 23 through 26. JJ Jackson and I listened to bootlegs of the first and last night’s live concerts at The Tea Party and compared them to the official studio LP. All different! At that early stage of the band’s career, these four talented musicians were setting a precedent that they adhered to throughout most of their career: no two concerts would ever be performed exactly the same way. Discover how JJ Jackson began his illustrious career in broadcasting and enjoyed a lifelong friendship with the members of Led Zeppelin. See pics of him introducing Led Zeppelin live and in concert at Framingham’s Carousel Theatre, August 21, 1969. It’s all in
Sonic Boom: The Impact of Led Zeppelin. Volume 1 – Break & Enter.
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