Led Zeppelin To Do a Benefit Show

Cross posted at newcritics.

Led Zeppelin is announcing a reunion concert in London to benefit the Ahmet Ertegun Education Fund. Too bad that even in their prime their concerts sucked like an Oreck. Zeppelin were the only band ever to have had the pleasure of being blown off the stage by Grand Funk. The sound of a recent busboy kitchen accident at my local Chinese restaurant was more compelling than any Zeppelin show I've ever heard.

Unlike other trios that multi-tracked their records and then toured with backing musicians, Led Zeppelin opted to forgo that route and instead play paired-down arrangements of their songs during live performances. Not a good idea. Their records usually consisted of Jimmy Page playing 4 or 5 guitar parts (often doing dozens of takes,) the oft underrated multi-instrumentalist John Paul Jones covering several keyboard parts as well as the bass, and singer Robert Plant adding multiple vocal tracks. And while they did make some great ones using that technique, their live versions of those records were at best - mildly interesting, and at worst – an abomination. Not only were the arrangements lacking by comparison to the recordings, but Plant couldn't reproduce his trademarked falsetto live and Page's guitar work was revealed as sloppy. I shudder to think what they are going to sound like today.

Having said that, I’ll probably still rent the requisite DVD so I can revel in my own self-righteousness at the sheer banality of the show…