Official release date of Zeppelin 1 in the USA

[Robbie California]

On this site and many others, January 12, 1969 is used as the release date of Zepplelin 1 in U.S.A. and Canada, which can't be right. That was Super Bowl Sunday (Jets beat The Colts). According to one of your documents, an Atlantic Records Promo memo dated December 30, 1968 states that the album will be released on January 20, 1969. Just thought I should bring that to your attention.

[sam_webmaster]

I think it was then changed to January 12th, which I've always understood to mean "the week of January 12th" since it was actually a Sunday.

[mikezep61]

For what it's worth, and I know that Robert's "plantations" can be unreliable, but during the 1/5/69 Whisky show he states: "the fantastic album that comes out on the 15th on Atlantic."

[Strider]

Whether it was the 12th or the 20th or some date inbetween, I cannot say for certain, as I don't have my newspaper database handy.

What I can say for certain is that the Super Bowl played no part in any of the decision making process about the release date.

The Super Bowl back then hadn't attained the overwhelming event status in American(note I said American...despite ESPN and NFL propaganda, aside from GI's stationed around the globe, the rest of the world couldn't care less) life that it occupies today. Yes, Joe Namath talked and played a pretty good game, and the Jets upset of the Colts certainly helped the Super Bowl gain popularity.

But if a record company had a record scheduled to come out on a Sunday, the Super Bowl wasn't enough of a deterrent back in 1969 to make a record company switch release dates.

For one thing, back then, the counterculture and sports, especially the NFL, did not mix. For most hippies and stoners, the NFL was too militaristic, and with the Vietnam war raging, anything suggesting the military was discouraged. If a rock record happened to be released on a Super Bowl Sunday, well, most rock fans back then weren't going to allow some stupid football game keep them from heading to the record store.

Another thing to consider is that unlike today, where release dates have been standardized, with Tuesday being the almost universally recognized release day for records, back in the 60s and early 70s, albums could be released on a Sunday, a Friday, or a Monday, whatever...it didn't have to be a Tuesday.

[mikezep61]

Super Bowl Sunday may not have been a deterrent, but Sunday blue laws would have been a deterrent. I'm not saying the official "release" date wasn't a Sunday, but I am saying that many, if not most, record shops and other retail establishments were closed on Sunday back then.

[Strider]

Oh yeah, "blue laws"...I forgot about those. Living on the West Coast, we didn't have those ridiculous laws.

[Robbie California]

Well I can assure you they didn"t release it on Sunday..2/3 of the record stores wouldn't be open. I would actually go along with Plant's statement about the 15th. This is starting to make sense to me as I was at a party on the Friday and the album was just in my local LA record store that morning. We got to the party, opened it up and played the first side and everyone there was in a totally stunned state. There were half of us who were not sure if we wanted to turn the record over or just listen to side one "again" as it was so amazing. We ended up flipping it over and over and over. It was the only record played that night. Everyone was dancing to it! Anyways, that it was released on the Wed. sounds right. The Sunday release date (just for the fact it's a Sunday) didn't make sense to me.