Re: My immediate thoughts on Robert

[Rob Weinstein <rawb.87@xxxxxxxxx>]

Take another look at this...if *I* went to a Robert Plant concert and
did NOT hear a Zeppelin song, I'd be pissed.


It wouldn't be the same, it might be a hack job of a performance...But
I'd still feel cheated and end up saying the show was par at best.

Because Robert fucking Plant will always be the front man of Led god
damn Zepelin to me.

On Sun, Sep 13, 2009 at 9:33 AM, Steve Thomson <zeppelin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Wyatt Brake wrote:
>>
>> I have to wonder if the vitriol expended in Plant's direction by many
>> Zeppelin fans would be more or less than it presently is if they had
>> not reformed with Jason Bonham for the O2 show in December 2007.
>> Would the resentment be of greater or lesser intensity?
>
> Good question, Wyatt. I think the level of resentment would be somewhat
> less, but it would still be there for many of us simply because he'd still
> be doing those twisted, "different for the sake of being different" versions
> of LZ songs. What pissed me off personally after seeing/hearing the Youtube
> footage yesterday is that the vocal performance was definitely good enough
> for him to be doing LZ songs with LZ. If it were still 2005 and he was doing
> that wheezing old geezer, out of tune/breath voice, I'd regrettably say to
> myself, ok he's incapable of doing LZ justice and it would be just downright
> embarrassing for all concerned if he tried. But that's not the case. His
> pipes may not be Osaka 1971 capable, but he sounds closer to the late 80's
> strong, resonant voiced Plant, the kind who could really belt out "mature
> Zeppelin." Likewise, we saw at the 2007 O2 show a rejuvenated Page, a Jason
> Bonham worthy of the drum seat, and of course Jonesy who never needed
> rejuvenation!
>
> So the sad reality is that the window of opportunity was there, and Plant
> blew it. In public, he played a cat and mouse game with the fans by dropping
> statements denying any intention of reforming so he could point back to them
> and say "Hey, I bloody well told you I'd never do it again" while at the
> same time throwing out lots of little threads and hooks we could all cling
> to for a possible LZ reunion down the road. It's no wonder some of the more
> cynical among us have felt he was doing this in a perverse sort of way to
> drum up publicity for Raising Sand.
>
> That brings me to a similar but different question. How well would Raising
> Sand and the subsequent tour have done had there not been a 2007 Led
> Zeppelin reformation with all the hype, media coverage, etc.? By 2007 Robert
> Plant as a solo artist was a commercial failure. I know you liked Mighty
> Rearranger, but face it, the album opened high in the charts on advance hype
> but then nosedived off the charts. On tour, he packed a few big halls but
> played to a lot of half empty ones too and often chose small venues sure to
> be filled somewhat by those faithful fans who'd go supposing he read the
> phone book! Had he gone from that directly to Raising Sand, it would
> probably have been nothing more than a footnote.
>
> And so here we are in 2009, the window for LZ is gone. We can cling to blind
> optimism and hope something will change in the remaining years these guys
> have to be musically active, but my take on it is that Jones is gone, gone,
> gone done moved on. Sure, that can be blamed on Page for apparently holding
> out for Plant and not following through on the idea for a new group with
> John and Jason plus a new singer, but I'm not talking about that, I'm
> talking about the "reconstituted" Led Zeppelin, the band that wowed so many
> at the O2. The momentum for THAT band continuing is dead. There's only one
> person to blame for that. To hear him continuing to perform the music in
> such a twisted way is something akin to his digging up the corpse and
> painting it with clown make-up and dressing in some ethnic clothing.
>
>
>
>
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