any Led Zep projects in the works?

To my mind, the official DVD and The Song Remains the Same already reveal many of Zeppelin's significant live flaws. Their greatest strengths were also their greatest weaknesses, and vice versa. It's not like we don't already know that they were capable of coma-inducing 30 minute drum solos, flubbed notes, and interminable jamming.

On other hand, this year I had the chance to hear the famous Japan '71 shows for the first time, and despite the sometimes-wretched sound quality and coma-inducing 30 minute drum solos, there are also moments of sheer brilliance that ought to be made officially available. A Bright Midnight- or Follow That Dream-online only fans label would allow the hardcore fans to hear this stuff in the best possible quality without confusing the casual fan who buys CDs at Wal-Mart.

 

I would love it. Have SH do them on vinyl too. Ok, maybe not.
But really we're talking about a guy that took almost 30 years to release a 2nd proper live album.

Summer 1971 is the glaring omission in the live catalog though. I really wish it could be filled officially with Japan or any of the LA area shows.

Realistically, I think the (success) of the Beatles remasters will get him to look at/remaster the catalog again and that's all we'll get.

 

I'd love that but I can understand why Page wouldn't want to do that.

Others could explain or describe this better but most of the FOH (front of the house) SB tapes have the vocals way out front. Makes sense as they would have to the a lot of the vocals coming out the PA to compensate for the roar of Jimmy stacks. The raw 2 track SB's (especially the '73 US tapes) are very, very dry with Plant high in the mix. That is a problem as by '73 Plant had blown his voice out so you have several songs each night with Plant croaking and sounding like a 13 year boy and no way to fix that in the mix.

I like the Euro '73 boards better but the guitar is pretty low in the mix for most of the tapes. The '75 SB tapes are more balenced for some reason but Page was off a lot on that tour. Some good nights but way below what he was doing a few years earlier. Ditto for '77 and '80. This is why for a lot of collectors a good audience tape is more enjoyable than a SB tape.

All that said I wonder how the '71 SB tapes sound. I think we just have a couple from '71 and they are pretty wonky but may be from poor sources. No '72 SB's have surfaced.

 

I've never seen a concert where the band didn't have flaws. LZ was so good those flaws are not a problem to any real fan.

 

I agree. Elvis's Follow That Dream fans' label has released Elvis soundboards with many, many flaws, but, like shokhead said, Elvis was so good that the fans want to hear them for the brilliant moments contained on them.

 

I agree with you on the drum solos and flubbed notes and I'll add Plants vocals on TSRTS but they weren't jamming that much at that point. The setlist was pretty tight and while Dazed was really long it had the same structure each night. They did away with the Whole Lotta Love medley on that tour as well. I think '73 was a little past their peak. I'd probably go with Euro '73 as the peak if it wasn't for Plant.

Real fan here and I have problems with a lot of live Zep post '73

 

Isn't there a Whole Lotta Love medley on The Song Remains the Same?

 

yes, of course and it's freakin' fantastic.

 

Yes, but by the 73 American tour they had really scaled it back from earlier versions. The WLL on HTWWW from the 72 tour is 23+ minutes and that had parts edited out.

 

Actually I'm slowly reading through it and other than those absolutely ridiculous second-person bits that come every so often, it's thus far one of the better LZ biographies I've read. It's not as good as Keith Shadwick's but it tended to get a bit too focused on analysing the music and ignoring the story of the band as people. Steven Davis work is just sensationalist crap and a lot of the other ones are just gaga fanboy nonsense.

Granted, quoted excerpts I've seen online from later parts of the book show that Wall fell into the sensationalist trap when dealing with the occult stuff but as I said, so far, (I'm only at LZIII, slow reader with too much work to do) I'm much more impressed that I expected to be. As for his blog, like I said, the discussion of his difficulties working with Page, Plant and Jones in 2003 are interesting.

 

Well if you're referring to rumor about Page working with Jeff Beck, it would be cool but I don't see it happening. Beck was in Montreal earlier this week and he told the local newspaper he and his band are planning to work on a new album this fall.

The new project could be something with Plant but I doubt it. Plant is not busy with Alison at all. There were some blog entries in the US a couple of months ago from someone in Nashville saying he showed up there for some business meetings but Alison has supposedly put a stop to all work with him for at least 18 months. His previous solo band have pretty much all gone on to other projects so he's just sort of sitting around watching football these days (which may be all he wants/needs). And, as I wrote above, JPJ has moved on and was quoted awhile back (third-hand mind you) as telling a reporter somewhere that there are no plans for any further Led Zeppelin reunions, at least none he's involved with. Too bad. I was hoping for at least some new joint, Jones-Page collaboration.

 

I think the Davis book, although offensive to hardcore Zep fans, is actually an amusing romp through the silliness of Led Zeppelin. It has major flaws (it overlooks, of all things, the essence of the music, and ripped off Ritchie Yorke in places), but I prefer the snide comments and bitchy asides to, as you say, gaga fanboy nonsense.

Shadwick's work is solid, but one really can't go past Dave Lewis for Zeppelin material. He's simply The Man - obsessively uncovering the minutaie with both passion and critical objectivity.

 

Absolutely agree that a 'fans label' would be great, but, even if Zeppelin is the most bootlegged act in history, I think Page still pretends that his worst live moments can be kept from the general public. It's not just his 'flubbed notes' - sometimes, it's just absolutely #$%@#@! awful. Releases of Live Aid (and to a lesser extent, the Atlantic show) have been completely nixed, and whilst those might be extreme cases, I'd suggest Page would have issues even with such celebrated dates as the Earls Court shows. Yes, we got some Knebworth on the DVD, but those performances were very carefully selected, with Page's work treated with judicious reverb (and some extra harmonized guitar lines on 'Achilles', among other things).

I think there are some Zeppelin live dates that would require major surgery, and I doubt Page has the patience. It's not as if his restraint in releasing material has hurt the catalogue so far...

 

Even audiophile vinyl reissues are nowhere on the horizon.

 

Well, for me, I'd pick MY wild imaginative idea:
"Great edits of 'Stairway to heaven'"



<a href="http://sjcarrasblog.blogspot.com">Pokey</a>

 

I've yet to hear Jimmy nail the solo live in Stairway. Am I wrong?

 

Either Tokyo`71 Stairway.

 

We can discuss theory after theory as to why they aren't going to be any fan type releases and they will all lead to the same place we are now.

Ultimately these things take time and I doubt Jimmy wants to spend the rest of his life going through tapes anyway.

The less he focuses on Zeppelin the better he will be able to move on and get some music out there for fans and more importantly himself.

Eddie

 

Why not? Page has got all day to focus on archive cds,we have to discuss these things on forums while at work!LOL.No just joking of course I know what you are saying about Page getting some new music underway.Zeppelin,especially live has always been my favorite music to obsess about vault material or at least distract me from Beatles remasters

 

Depends what you mean by nailing it. If you expect him to play it exactly like on the studio album, forget it. Never happen. It wouldn't have happened in 1970-71 either. He always improvised. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't. I like the version on the original TSRTS soundtracks album a lot, but once I got to hear bootlegs of all three MSG concerts, I was shocked at how different the solos were each night. In fact, that TSRTS version was edited together from a combination of those nights (www.thegardentapes.co.uk). The nature of Jimmy Page's approach to guitar and especially soloing was always one of improvisation. He had basic riffs and structures he used as launch pads and depending on how he was playing on a given night, they'd either take off or else just go along. For instance, there's some live footage circulating from a Page-Plant '95 version of Black Dog where Page is on fire and just keeps soloing on for awhile. you can see the whole band just getting into it and really grooving. At the end of it, he's got a huge smile and a "Holy f@#$ I didn't know I could still do that!!!!" look on his face! Yet other nights on that tour he just played the standard "rote" solo.

As for Stairway, I've always kinda liked that solo from the original BBC FM broadcast (can't remember if it made it to the official BBC Sessions releases, it's been years since I listened to that. I had a cassette of the FM broadcast for years)). It's the one where he doesn't arpeggiate in the solo intro but instead does some basic power chording on the A-G-F progression. I also liked some of the '77 Stairway solos, whereas others sucked. And although the whole performance was sloppy, I always liked his ramshackle solo on the Live Aid Stairway.

 

I agree with Eddie on this. Page needs to move on with his music. I was a big supporter of relaunching Led Zeppelin after the O2, not for some world tour but for a new album, which Page seemed to hint was what he wanted too. When Plant backed out and the rest decided to form a new band, I was all for that as well. Unfortunately the press seized the whole thing and made it sound like they would actually try to go out on tour as LZ with a new singer, which they all clearly said would never happen. I think it was more a case of the negative press making them realize no matter what they did, if JP, JPJ and JB did anything together, it would be perceived as LZ with a new singer whether it was or not.

So now Jones has moved on to another project. We don't know what Jason's doing. Plant is in "drydock" until Alison does a Union Station album and tour for a couple of years, so yes, I'd say it's time for Jimmy to move on. Actually I wouldn't mind seeing him join in on the Jones, Grohl, Homme project. I've always thought Grohl was a pompous clown, but hey if it works and it rocks, what the hell.

 

In my experience, top musicians rarely try to copy what they did in the studio note for note. The solo on the studio recording was just the solo that he played that one time. Think of it as a moment in time.

 

Yeah, and he was probably sitting down when he played it too.

 

I have always, always thought that Jimmy "nailed" the Stairway solo in TSRTS. You can even see in the footage he's making these faces like he's blowing his own mind. Fantastic!

 

Well, he has written music for 'It Might Get Loud'. But I think part of the problem is that, no matter what he does, Zeppelin casts a huge shadow. That's been less of a problem with Plant (and certainly Jones), but Page always has the invisible albatross of times past around his neck. Unfortunately, the constant reunion talk only contributes to that, and he's partially to blame.

What I would love to see from Page is a solo acoustic album. Forget all the mess and fuss of a band - simply record an album of acoustic material (albeit to Page's typically high recording standards). Page's roots in such albums as Bert Jansch and Folk, Blues and Beyond are well known, and he'd wisely sidestep all the 'Rock God' bull$@& by taking this approach (and, let's face it, his post-1980 rock material - with Plant or without - typically betrays his age). He's a tremendously gifted acoustic player, and I'd love to hear where his head is at in this regard circa 2009.