Freudian slip Steve? 😄

The incident would've been hilarious were it not so sad. The pilot said "sorry the chain broke and it's in a field two miles away. The insurance will cover it, anyway I'm leaving". Grant forced him to phone his boss from Horselunges and the bloke came back in and said "yes he's confirmed, insurance will cover it". Actually the bloke's boss had told him to get stuffed, but the only reason Grant knew this was his phones were recorded in his own house. There's coke paranoia, and then there's tapping your own phone. Tony Montana stuff indeed, "Say 'ello to my leetle friend!" Aubrey Powell had some incredibly funny tales in the Barney Hoskyns Zeppelin book. Truly the music industry in the 70s was another planet.

I think he must have meant in terms of the band + entourage atmosphere rather than the music. According to Aubrey Powell, Bindon was still around Grant at times post Oakland. (specifically where a bike was ordered for delivery for Grant's son at Horselunges and fell off the bottom of the helicopter it was being delivered from, causing Grant to go apeshit). The atmosphere must have been pretty foul at times when that much drugs being done.

"photographs from the band's personal collections" sounds promising. Wonder if that means including Richard Cole's pics? Some of the best and most interesting photos in the Barney Hoskyns book were from "the Richard Cole collection".

This is fair comment re: Page, but apart from San Diego, I'd say Bonzo kept it pretty tight in '77. He was out of it a lot, but it didn't affect his onstage performances imho.

The OP reminded me of those comments you see on You Tube talking about "get on the road and rock, Robert!". There seems to be a certain type of person that can't understand that all of the band are over 70! Just cos the Stones do it (badly) doesn't mean Zeppelin should do it.

Not the usual riffs. Starts off with Hots On For Nowhere, ends with Ten Years Gone.

I think JPJ specifically said Communication Breakdown emerged from onstage jamming on "Train..." late on the September tour. It'd be fascinating to hear some more audience reminisces from that tour than just Jorgen Angel (great as his are). I.e. what on earth did die-hard Yardbirds fans think of this new beast? The equivalent now would be, imagine there's no internet and little information, and you go to see your favorite band. Suddenly there's three new people on stage and the sound is heavier & more aggressive & bluesy. Do you embrace it, demand your money back or just indifferent? I was hoping this would be the kind of thing in the photo book out in October, but it looks from previews like it's for casual fans rather than die hards.

Thing is, this is true of Dazed as a song, but not true of the whole set. As brilliant as that recording from the Fillmore is, the set list 8 months earlier would have been very different. The first shows would not have had Communication Breakdown, probably not Pat's Delight. My guess is September 1968 = Dazed, one of the blues covers, Smokestack Lightning / How many more times, As long as I have you, Flames, old Yardbirds tune, possibly For Your Love. That is substantially different to the Fillmore set, and makes it all the more frustrating there's no known recording of the Scandi shows.

I've long wondered whether Page knew exactly what the lyrics were about, hence why Plant's voice is so far down in the mix.

I think on the first few US Zep tours, Page was vegetarian. Presumably that was to do with his stomach issues, though he was always watching his weight.

https://www.channel4.com/news/basement-battle-jimmy-page-and-robbie-williams-planning-clash Moving pictures from inside the house!! This was on Channel 4 News in the UK last night.

A real sign of how London's changed. Nowadays Cheyne Walk is for the super rich only.

"A select few" doesn't sound like just Pontiac & Seattle though. Out of 44 shows, a select few could be as many as 7 or 8. And then I woke up...

Not just Cole, the director Peter Clifton said this as well. According to him Jimmy got the hump because the climbing the mountain sequence made his bum look big.

Live tapes back to '69! OK, I know, don't get your hopes up, he probably means RAH '70 and got the year wrong. Probably.

Cheers Mook. I'm sure I've seen Mark Blake's name in Classic Rock or one of the music mags. This will be an expensive second half of the year, especially when Jimmy gets round to releasing that chronological live album with never-before-heard 1968 tapes 😰

Jimmy Page himself or Peter Grant confirmed one of the Surrey shows in 68 was multitracked. I don't recall if the date was 10/15 or 10/25 since they played shows at Surrey University on both dates. I know this post is a few years old, but where did Page or Grant confirm this?

I agree he looked heavy at Knebworth but I can't agree his performance was spotty. He is a beast all through the 4th Aug show and tight in the second show. Page's performance varies wildly, but Bonzo played great imo. The second half of the 1980 tour was a different matter and as I posted further upthread, I wonder if his confidence was knocked by the collapse at Nuremberg.

At the Other Place it says that there will be a "led Zep 50th anniversary fireworks partay" at the Cleveland Indians' match on the 14th July. Unless Page has suddenly developed a hitherto unsuspected interest in baseball, I'll assume it's been done off the sports team's initiative.

From clothes etc, I thought it was January '69, either LA or the Fillmore W. Can't recall any colour shots of those shows though.

Because as I understand it, the old quango (National Heritage) used to to step in and deal with these things. The new one (Historic England), leaves these to local councils, saying they're planning matters. This is according to JP himself in the Mail article linked to above. Hence why Jimmy is having to take his luck with Kensington & Chelsea council planning dept.

Any idea that Bonzo's playing had deteriorated can be allayed by watching the Knebworth footage. Specifically Achilles Last Stand. I wonder if the collapse at Nuremberg had knocked his confidence, not in his playing but in his stamina? In all his time, he'd never let the band down once, and maybe that incident put doubts in his mind re the US tour. If you listen to bootlegs he's playing well before Nuremberg, but very conservatively afterwards. As bluecongo said, alcohol being a depressant doesn't help with confidence in the long term. The whole thing is so desperately sad, especially for the impact it had on the family.

The fact that Page is also fighting similar plans from his other neighbour Harvey McGrath shows that this is not some personality / music clash, but that Page genuinely cares about the house.

The great Diamond Head. That riff sounds Page-like.