I was 18 and I just camped out at a friends house, We literally saw the whole thing(of course not the London stuff) .For me Zep's performance was unfortunate, but when Jimmy, Robert and JPJ took the stage, it was like the second coming. There was so. much cheering, as you could tell that Zeppelin was so sorely missed, even on TV you could feel this tremendous wave of love coming at the band. What I remember too was the backstage interview after playing, Jimmy was glowing and Robert looked like he might get back into Zep. I'm not exaggerating, Jimmy and Robert looked like they too were blown away by the crowd response.

What was said about many drummers in any town easily as good as many great famous drummers live, some aspects yes, many no. There are many guitarists in every town who can play live just as well as Jimi Hendrix. There are ?? I've never seen anyone get even close to the whole enchilada. A few songs, maybe, but that's it. Michael Lee, who drummed with P/P, was well liked by Jimmy for his Bonzo like boisterousness, but lacked many of Bonzo's subtleties. A final fact : Jimmy had a hell of a time after Zep finding a proper drummer for his playing, and Jimmy even said this caused much frustration.

Well that sounds great but I'm not sure either issue(replacing Bonzo with Jason for a full tour) or Page coming up with a real hard rock album after ITTOD would have been pulled off. Jason was excellent at the 07' reunion, but IMO in relation to other rock drummers, not his father. Just listen to the bootlegs, and in 90'-91' when Zep almost toured, Robert said of Jason, "He's just not that good". A long time ago, but Jason as much as he has improved, is just not his father. And Jimmy when in his polysubstance abuse has sometimes blown hot air. There was a really cool interview/article in Musician magazine earlier in 83' where Jimmy was talking up maybe onstage playing the Roland synth guitar, not his usual guitars, and saying that he was working on very interesting material not sounding like Zep. And saying that it will still be something Zep fans will appreciate. Now does this sound like the Firm ??

The Who were cheated, but in fact Townsend and Daltrey beyond the 70's were never close to poor, or even upper middle class. However Moon went thru money like water, and Entwhistle lived a round the clock sex, drugs, and rock'n'roll plus mansions etc. lifestyle. Being rather mild millionaires and not heavily rich like Page for example, Townsend said a few times they went on the road because Entwhistle was close to destitute, although mainly by his own hand. I only read this stuff for a bit, but it was sad but fascinating how The Ox had no sleep/off switch, just on full blast 24/7.

Left alone, right. But I also think a lot of Jimmy's playing with Zep , Bonzo provided an inspiration/adrenaline machine not present in any other drummer. When Bonzo died, Jimmy knew that whatever lied in his musical future, It very likely wouldn't approach Zep. You may think this is rather presumptuous, but Jimmy didn't really regain form till the Outrider tour/project. Jimmy wasn't sloppy with the Firm, at some shows he did play some amazing B-bender solos, but many times he was pretty uninspired. No Bonzo really floored him.

Yeah, consistency wise Jimmy was IMHO noticeably better in 80' than in 77'. Problem was fewer train wrecks, more even tecnique , but also not many really good/great solos and still a decline or absence of the long lyrical passages of the past. Jimmy's style kept evolving(even in 80' there were new solo ideas, etc.), to give him some credit. At the same time though, it is still a jolt to hear a 80' boot and Jimmy sounding uninspired half the time. That reminds me of the 5-6 NY area Firm shows I saw. At least at the shows I saw, my friend( a guitarist like me)and I were saddened that although Jimmy never messed up or was sloppy, his ability to solo/ jam was gone, total meandering. To be fair, I have 6-7 audio/video shows where Jimmy is playing amazing kamikaze B-bender solos, not repeating any Zep licks, and having killer technique. But what happend in NY ? At one show I was in the 2nd row almost center, Page almost never smiled, barely moved, looked very wasted or drunk. A wild guess, but I think at times I think Jimmy was not satisfied with the Firm, and possibly had to drag himself on stage somewhat conflicted, regardless of pro responseability. But Firm, not sloppy, but little fire.

Sure, and it's quite interesting as well that of all the girls I've been with/ known, Jimmy was hands down the most popular soloist. Many girls/women tend to not even like too many guitar solos. Shredders, metal particularly, have almost no female fans. Jimmy turned girls on with his often lyrical solos.

Well, just one more thing; I thought Jimmy after Zep was going to do more films, and really go for it with amazing soundscapes or combinations of musc never before attempted. The Firm........Now I shut up a bit.

Mercurious, you definetly see all the complexities of rating Jimmy's playing and the "sloppy" thing. One important fact that I only saw written up once was that from mid to late Yardbirds till 71'-72', Jimmy said he made it a point to play 3 hrs a day, usually practicing difficult phrases so he wouldn't have too many technical hurdles. So this is partially a shredder's practice routine, hence the lightning runs of 72'-73' in particular. My view is that ultimately Jimmy was a sound sculptor, and a bonafide artist, not just a musician simply producing musical commerce. I mean VH had some poppy songs, but Eddie's playing ( with Roth anyway ) was quite artistic as well . I only mention him because of all the clown imitators which he gets roped in with, just like the pathetic Page imitators. And with every Zep tour, even 80', a good 25% ?? new solo ideas, good or bad. And 80' TU, sometimes amazing, delay and wah. However, I really doubt past 75' Page kept up any reasonable play/practice regimen. But, as you mention, some of Page's flubbery....Sick Again, that song seems made to sound rather ragged,may well be Page making sure there is tonal/ aural variety , not the same thing repeated. I sit in the camp that Page's laziness caused the later goose eggs, otherwise why were the 77' acoustic sets always technically exc. ?? surely the substances , but the excuse, well Jimmy's sitting down, what about all the so-so WS/BMS in 77' ??

Yeah, great idea. There is ample evidence for and against this topic. As a guitar player, I will say ultimately that Jimmy at his highest technical ability is not far off from any of the shredders mentioned. What is relevant to this thread is that Jimmy tries to not repeat the same ideas and motifs in each song, so just because he is not going berserk technically in every song or solo, he doesn't have that constant "ability". Vai and Satch are great in their own way, but 95% of their stuff they can't ever hang for than even 10 seconds of "background guitar". So, as Jiimmy can "hang" if he wants to, this unfortunately may grease the gears for some saying he doesn't have the ability to play cleanly for long periods in every song. Ridiculous, Jimmy tries to make each solo unique, yes sometimes at some mistake, the shredders for the most part after 10-15 minutes start sounding one dimensional. I must confess I did see Satch in 88' and he managed to be amazing, no rulebook, but other shows on TV or DVD , net etc.,the shredder's trap prevailed. Page is looking at the integrity of the whole song, not focusing on the solo as the centerpiece. This is important to this thread.

I think it's great that there are so many champions of the 77' tour. I do heavily see that many were attendees of the shows, which IMO changes the lens thru what you are seeing/ hearing. I do believe the tour has been demonized somewhat, but particularly Jimmy's playing even in some of the better shows is just too inconsistent from track to track, I can't take the alteration from good to great playing and very near trainwreck, literally in the space of 10 seconds, or two excellent songs followed by two really mediocre guitar performances. But I fully understand the scope and scale of the shows, and how obviously the band was aiming to produce a true sonic and visual spectacle. I know some musicians who saw some of the "weak" shows, and they said the volume, Jimmy strutting around, and Bonzo often murdering his drum set, it tended to mostly gloss over some of the musical infirmities.

The last 8 or 9 posters, you have (in a good way) made me almost fall over laughing. Plant, yes the teeth, but many chicks I know/knew thought he was hot. And he is described here a bit as some sort of smelly man/ape hybrid homeless derelict wearing discarded shower curtains. Ha Ha Ha. And I'm gonna ask you to step outside if you mention Kenny G in the same sentence as Coltrane or Parker. I am truly sickened by someone comparing aural wallpaper to sculpted art. Not. I must go on this apparent flamethrower site for good laughs. Cheerio !!!!

One thing that I remember was that in Creem magazine after the whole 73'' tour( not sure if published in 74' or 75') Page absolutely mentions getting very little sleep and being pretty wasted for almost all of the shows. Yes Jimmy was doing some coke then, but it sounded more like drunkeness. The only reason I mention all this is that Jimmy up to that point was obviously playing probably at home and whereever probably almost daily. To me this really makes me think about some 75' , and all the rest., because I would like to hear of some other player(s) who were totally trashed in 5 different ways like Jimmy, yet kept up their practicing yet ended up sounding as ragged as Jimmy. Please, no Keith Richards......He almost never screws up, and used to get onstage with no rehearsal with the old blues guys, and never screwed up. Heroin was obviously the killer, but mainly because Jimmy played much less. Although at home Jimmy usually played acoustic; That's very likely why Jimmy wasalmost impeccable on the 77' acoustic sets. There are famous guitarists who need little maintenance to play well, Jimmy's hands needed constant stretching, every player is different. So fluid in 73',, guitar constantly in hand.

Look, any entity, group, or outfit that is going to have as their main objective to create the most powerful, loud, audacious, and or extreme/ limitless art or music is by it's very nature going to have detractors. Even among fans Otherwise listen to smooth jazz. Zep were gods musically, but they are also legendary for acting like gods, however distasteful.

Jimmy did disclose in a Creem magazine talk/ interview very early in the 75' tour that he actually had to spend time working out a three finger technique because of the injury. Page, practicing on tour !?!?!? maybe very early on, hard to imagine 77' or later. But that is likely why Jimmy sounds almost more fluent early in the tour then later at times. IMO Jimmy certainly worked out maybe 40-50% of his leads or solos as guidelines( many versions of live 73'-75' D&C have some stock solos) but he tended to repeat ideas, approaches, or motifs rather than strict repeated live solos exactly alike.

Well, one arguable exception was the complexity of the 75' TSRTS. Tone not as sweet as 73', and a few mediocre versions, but being a gtr player myself, trying to duplicate what Page is doing, throw all conventional picking and soloing conventions out the window. On this song anyway, crazier than like 30-40% of Van Halen stuff, like where do I even begin, insane rhythmic and structural complexities.

That's it. Among hard rockers, EVH as well would be improvising heavily even on the chord changes. All the different types of metal bands, with almost no exceptions( tell me who ??) may change solos, but juggle arrangements from one gig to the other, almost unheard of. Even among the jam bands, Grateful Dead in particular, the real improvised arrangements take place over the simplest of patterns rhythmically and harmonically. Great band, but no one has to keep track of the hairpin musical turns as exist in Zep. I think Metallica is great, but James Hetfield does not change his playing rhythmically even minutely from studio to stage. Sorry, sliding off a bit.............

One thing mentioned on other threads/forums is that 90% of the 75' D&C have a ratherr clean and unboosted guitar sound. 73' wasn't exactly distorted, but Jimmy's settings for D&C then had more meat and a thicker tone. 75' NQ Jimmy's tone was fine, also Sick Again. I would also say it's a shame that much of Jimmy's tone in 77' is really expressive, just as his technique was starting to tank. Although from 73'-77' Page tended to have the same "sound " for a given song on a given tour, to my ears even this issue could be haphazard. I don't think it's just a bootleg matter, you can really distinguish it. In 75' TU, IMTOD, Kashmir, etc, all had rather random guitar tone and distortion from one show to another. In a way this makes things more interesting, but listen to 3/11/75, Jimmy is not just uninspired(not really sloppy), but has a rather uninspiring tone straight thru. 3/12/, the next night, yes Jimmy is much better, but also he seems to have made some adjustments for a more lively tone overall, but still drier than most of 73'.

Very important. Check out the live versions of SRTS from 73' and even more so 75'. What was said previously stands. Page is often playing " Hendrix"'level at the solos and fills in this song. To my ears, I've never heard any guitarist play anything close to Page's crazy quilt of bluegrass, country, and pentatonic mandolin and banjo licks, topped off with some "rock" licks spiced in. Impossible to describe, actually.

I think one of the best ways to describe Page's "decline" would be that from 75' on the length of Jimmy's lyrical lines or spots of lengthy musical flow became shorter and shorter. Not so much in 75', but on the 77' tour the stickiness would often result in short bursts of notes broken by a sustained note or a tiny stop. Actually from the beginning Jimmy played like this at times, but now he was kind of stuck, obviously from no practice or the substances. However you could make some argument that Page never played the same on any tour, and actually some will be howling that I consider the 5/22/77 ALS solo to be amazing. Slightly out of tune, but Page is both sloppy and lightning fast in a 5 second phrase, and, just like the album, makes the guitar sound like a siren. I stick with Euro 73' but there are gems to be found. I initially hated the5/22 solo, until I thought of it as sound sculpture, as opposed to "rock guitar solo". But Jimmy does play like a 7 yr old in some of the real amateur mistakes, unbelievable.

Well that's a tremendous story, and others have pointed out to me that hearing a sbd or excellent audience tape is not at all comparable to being at the show. And I would say Jimmy's slide in playing ability was subtle from 73' to 75'. Still many amazing shows, but now there would be the hint of what would come in 77', sometimes a few songs in a row or more with Jimmy playing erratically. I agree that drug highs( onstage, I would totally bet coke,possibly alcohol, on top of heroin addiction) can create real instability in physical ability. However having had experience with these things, if Page was snorting 2 lines of coke every few songs, this likely would create total exhaustion eventually, as your adrenals would just work barely. I'm not a doctor, and I think Jimmy did fall down once during the 77' tour, but either Jimmy has/had superhero stamina in 77' despite the drugs, or maybe then he had to go to speed. All speculation, but other bands like Aerosmith, Sabbath(Ozzy) etc. did in fact have total or near collapse onstage, coke exhaustion the main culprit. Look, Jimmy doesn't talk, actually had nasty stomach/intestine trouble before Zep. If Jimmy could tell his drug/alcohol misadventures particularly in 77', I think it would be an amazing story. Otherwise, my murky guesses.

I just want to point out, something about Jimmy's playing and health/appearance which may not be mentioned much. Supposedly up to about 71' , 72', Jimmy made a determined effort to practice 3 hrs a day. You can quite easily trace Jimmy's dexterity going quite clearly down noticeably from 75' on. Substance downfall, yes, but I really doubt Jimmy was 75' on practicing regularly let alone hours a day. Possibly spending much time turning a studio track into a workable live version, sure. Also many musicians who do a lot of heroin still play well if they keep up their practice. Another conundrum is Jimmy's stomach troubles, it got to the point where he was blending banana daiquri's with vitamins and protein powder. Any doctor will tell you such a regimen cannot substitute for real food, it's a bit comparable if you're in a hospital very ill and being fed IV, you'll lose weight. Stupid to put in the alcohol of course, and certainly some heroin addicts can get pretty thin. But of course there isn't much fact to be found here. Like at Knebworth, Page was still too thin, but facewise he IMO looked healthy. Even Nick Kent said so.

Ha Ha. Stuck my foot in my mouth with the dbl-neck. I think what was heroic about Jimmy, at least until the drugs and booze sabotaged him eventually, was live it really seemed like he wanted to put on a spectacle and give every fan his money's worth. So he was cheap with money, but he fully gave himself very generously with his art. The albums, the album covers, of course the studio tracks, Jimmy was not satisfied until every song was cut with diamond precision. Of course some tracks were first or second takes, etc.,. And Jimmy was not always healthy, and not just because of the drugs. The drugs may have initially helped with his frailties, not just a partying thing. He may have not even got thru those 77' marathons without drugs, although that is speculation. Not going to hear it from Jimmy, for sure.

Yeah, that's a real good sum-up. 77' and 80' at full force Jimmy was often overplaying, although I liked some of his "hysterical woman" bits in the solos for ALS and SIBLY. Never ceases to amaze me how few fans know about Jimmy's practical Phoenix rising from the dead in 98'. Of course it's not Zep....but Jimmy is literally as consistent as any Zep period, and many versions of HMMT and NQ are just blistering.

I knew the guitarist in Jason's current project, and I must say in the main band he played with before the Zeppelinitis, he really had some interesting originals. Some had some Zep, Hendrix, and Sabbath influence, but a good number of songs actually were pretty creative. The guitarist liked U2, believe it or not , and there was one original which incorporated some U2 elements. Now, the guitarist's first name starts with T, right ?? Only asking because I don't understand that "unmasking" business. The guitarist I speak of has actually played with Jason since 97' in some other Zep only project.