Re: Incredible News Archive Findings (Led Zeppelin)

[TangerineMan <tangerineman@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Nech writes:

> As you can imagine, I spent too much of my time over the weekend
> "researching" this and somehow do not find myself convinced that this
> particualr open reeel was used as Jimmy's echo effect.

I'm tending to agree... and I'll go even further and say it was a
reel-to-reel deck recording the gig. Sure, there's a lot of wishful thinking
behind my opinion, but I'm going to try to make a serious case here; see
below. Man, I love this trainspotting stuff.

By way of introduction: I haven't read the R-O thread, and while my intent
is certainly not to taunt anyone over there (read: who may be subbed here as
well), why should the fact that it's been "hashed to death over there" mean
the subject is closed? :-)

Now, on to the evidence and conjecture once again.

Jumping on from your idea that "what if, at this particular gig, [the tape
machine] couldn't go anywhere else?"...

If you look at the last photo on this page
http://www.stripes.com/photoday/zep/index.html, there is another roadie/tech
in the picture, and more assorted gear (behind Plant). The techs are in a
rather cramped L-shaped space behind and beside Jonesy's cabs, and it looks
like the walls are really close.

In the fifth picture down, where the reels are clearly visible, the arm
positions of the tech with the darker shirt definitely say to me he's
working a console (either that, or he's playing a keyboard and/or operating
tape machines to supply those pre-recorded sounds that the Finnish reviewer
was on about! ;-) )

Must say I didn't have the time/energy to scour thru other photos of the
period for an open-reel machine vs. an Echoplex, as you did, so kudos to ya
and thanks for sharing the results!

The point being, dear FBO readers: if Jimmy used an open-reel machine for a
time before acquiring the Echoplex, there would be ample visual evidence of
this in pictures of the band onstage from the period. The unit would have to
have been accessible to him while playing, thus on top of one of his amps
(or beside them, or on a table - but not _behind_ his amps). Not only that,
messin' around with the record and volume knobs on a r2r machine while
playing live onstage just doesn't seem like a very reliable system to me.
Especially if it had to be 3 reel decks slaved together (1 record + 2 play
heads)... with tape running through thin air, or down into baskets? Naaah...
Maybe a fun setup for Robert Fripp picklin' lark's tongue down in his
studio, but not Jimmy Page ragin' on stage.

So I vote for: venue was really cramped, plus the fact that there was
fan-caused damage at the last show there, ergo soundboard, techs along with
r2r and all kinds of other gear were up on stage with them for this
particular gig rather than partway back in the hall.

And so I say the reel-to-reel machine is in the picture because this gig was
recorded by the band. We know in later years ('73-) they recorded cassettes,
whence all them '73 board tapes... Who's to say they didn't tape all kinds
of gigs in '70,'71 onto reels?...

Don't we know of at least one SBD reel recording, Hampton '71? (Although
some collectors say it's actually an EX AUD...)

And, if you come back to an oft-quoted quote down through the years about
Jimmy's project for a massive chronological live album... Doesn't that quote
go back at least as far as Ritchie Yorke's biography and the Creem/Circus
articles of the mid-70s? In other words, he had to have a fairly large
number of Early Days shows in the can to be considering such a project.
Despite recent (i.e., when "DVD" was released) assertions that there's
"nothing left in the vaults."

Cliché time: it all comes down once again to "We can always hope". But I'd
like to think that at least detective work like this, in addition to being
fun and a great alternative to the work that's pilin' up on my desk here,
gives us a little more reason to hope.

> One thing I was very glad to see, is the cast of names this particular
> thread has brought out.

Yeah, me too! 

Thanks for playing Mythbusters with us, everybody :-)

Now, when's that Whiskey a Go-Go gonna hit Traders' or Dime already?!!