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What show or live song are you listening to now?


Misfit

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Woa, was just listening to one of the Knebworth shows and realizing how much better Roberts vocals are than in 75 and 77. I consider the weakest point of the show immy, aldo he's actually pretty good and only here and there e makes a mistake or "forgets" where to put his fingers.

People say he was a bad player by the end of Zeppelin, but i never thought that way. Obviously he was too high on heroin and got blinded for a couple of notes, but he was still the one and only Zeppelin axeman.

Edited by magerogue
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Some thoughts about the June 29, 1980 Zurich concert via the "Swiss Made" soundboard.

While it does suffer from the sterile vibe you get with soundboards, the 1980s generally sound better than the 1977 soundboards. And at least compared with other 1980 shows, the Zurich audience sounds enthusiastic, with moments of spontaneous chanting and singing. A great crowd...unlike some of the German and Dutch crowds with their slow clapping and boorishness.

Overall, a very good concert...near-great at times. Trampled, Rain Song, Achilles, even Stairway are up there among the best renditions of those songs. All the new songs from ITTOD work for me...mainly because as this was the only tour they were played, I haven't heard them 200 times or more already.

I do wish Jones hadn't ditched the mellotron. That Yamaha or Fairlight synthesizer sounds terrible compared to the mellotron on songs like Rain Song and Kashmir. The piano does take a little getting used to on Stairway and SIBLY but it does add a new flavour to the old warhorses.

Beetleron mentions that the Kashmir from Zurich was released on a tribute to Bonham, which I find remarkable because it is a train wreck that takes the band considerable time to recover from. The main culprit is Plant himself...for some inexplicable reson he goes into the "When I'm on my way" ending immediately after the first two verses inatead of the breakdown.

The less said about White Summer the better. At least it isn't very long compared to some of the other 1980 versions that drone on. Jimmy should have ditched the whole thing and just played Kashmir alone. Or if he really wanted to play an intro to Kashmir, cut White Summer and jusr play Black Mountain Side. That is only a couple minutes and the audience doesn't get bored and restless.

Hooray for finally ditching the drum solo, too.

Heartbreaker was a major surprise...mainly because it's not the disaster you fear it will be.

Actually, when all is said and done, it's when you listen to the Zurich and Frankfurt shows back-to-back that you see how good the 1980-81 US tour could have been with a little further tweaking of the setlist.

Ditch White Summer. Add another ITTOD song like Fool In The Rain or I'm Gonna Crawl. In fact, replace SIBLY with either Tea For One or I'm Gonna Crawl. Maybe add Wearing and Tearing, too.

One last highlight of the Zurich show...Claude Nobs gets a shout out!

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Agreed Strider! Frankfurt has become one of my favorite shows, I love to hear JPJ playing more bass and less keyboards. I know Melotrons are a PITA to keep tuned but they are part of the "Zeppelin sound" plus by that time there were many synthesizers which could have been programmed to sound like one. Black Dog rocks, WLL is absolutely awesome, not too long, nice theremin duel, good solo (comparatively). Page should have dropped the White Summer/Black Mountain Side or cut it down to an intro for Kashmir. And Tea for One replacing SIBLY would have been the way to go. Maybe they could have worked up something different from PG to throw in the set list too.

When do we get a matrix of Zurich?

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I have to get a complete copy of Zurich.....

Been listening to Blueberry Hill (9/4/70 LA) and Blueberry Hill II (9/2/70 Oakland). Two great shows!!!

Whole Lotta Love absolutely kills during that tour!

:yesnod:

Oakland is under rated because LA is a better recording BUT, I think Oakland is a better show.

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My vacation is over and I'm on that long train ride back home.

Just listened to the O2 rehearsals and now I'm listening to the actual Dec. 10 2007 concert.

As good as the boot sounds, the official release will be a mindblower! Can't wait to hear Jimmy's bow solo and the theremin in 5.1 sound! And "Kashmir" and "No Quarter" will be seismic!

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12.10.07 O2 Arena, London

Listening again to this, and I've gotta say that I don't think "Dazed and Confused" is as big a trainwreck at the end of the solo as some people claim. I don't think it needs to be fixed at all...I hope Jimmy leaves it alone. It sort of adds to the spookiness of the piece. The song is called Dazed and Confused after all.

One thing that stands out about "Stairway to Heaven" to me is how much better it sounds with Robert singing close to the original melody line and sticking with just a few restrained "and it makes me wonder" at the end of the verses.

In the old days, I found some of his performances on "Stairway" overwrought, with too much screeching. I think the song works better with a 'less is more' vocal approach...save the big voice for the end.

So it is refreshing to hear "Stairway" the way it was performed at the O2.

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Watching 7/17/77 again. I think this show is underrated. While it certainly isn't a performance that deserves a place in the pantheon of great Zep shows, it's still very enjoyable. It's too bad that a soundboard doesn't accompany this show like the last 2 EC shows and Knebworth, but I suppose a decent video feed/audience tape matrix (if there is one) will suffice. Plus, it's still the closest experience I've got to watching Pontiac, and it does a decent job at it most of the time. It's also too bad that the picture quality isn't as good as certain releases of the EC and Knebworth shows, but I guess nobody's willing to put in the effort. It just bugs me when people talk about this show as if it were as bad as Tempe, it's certainly a much better show that THAT.

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Berkeley, 9-14-71, of course! Fantastic show, and maybe the best-sounding audience tape from 1971.

Word.

On my way home from the Fiona Apple concert and have the Sept.14, 1971 Berkeley show blasting! I'm listening to the recent Godfatherecords release "Berkeley Daze 2nd Night".

Not only is this one of the best audience tapes of 1971, it is one of the best-sounding audience tapes ever. Up there in the all-time Top 10, along with Mike Millard's tapes and the July 24, 1979 Copenhagen audience tape.

Of course, it's not just the sound quality of the tape that makes this show special...the performance quality is off the charts! 1971 was a spectacular year performance-wise for the band and 9-14-71 is one of those dates that go above and beyond the performance norm.

It is a date that should be seared in every Led Zeppelin fan's memory. There should be a plaque commemorating the event in Berkeley.

Too bad the taper was paranoid...and somewhat incompetent. "Since I've Been Loving You" was the third song in the set, early enough so that a taper shouldn't have to worry about flipping his tape over. Yet for some reason there is a gap in the intro solo to SIBLY, which is a shame as this SIBLY is one of the best ever.

And one can only speculate how blazing "Celebration Day" and "Thank You" might have sounded on this night. CD was a consistent highlight of the 1971 setlists, so its a shame we'll never hear it from this night.

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