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2013 NORTH AMERICAN TOUR DATES - ROBERT PLANT PRESENTS THE SENSATIONAL SPACE SHIFTERS


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Yep, it probably is a bit disconcerting that after creating a legacy that is still going so strong AND being honored after 40 years, that the POTUS is cracking jokes about TV sets flying out of windows and the person inducting you mentions things that you were sick of being asked about way back then (deals with the devil, et al).

Good point as this is the stereotype for Zeppelin. For us great fans we focus on the music and not stupid crap like that and don't want to hear for the who knows how many times. They just don't know how diverse LZ was and just want to concentrate on tabloidish type thing and so on, because they are naive and uneducated about a band as grand and surreal as Led Zeppelin was and continues to this day. Don't know how to say this. Hope, it came out ok.

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Robert - for the love of horses...please change your set-list with the SSS.

Why, with all of your musical output over the years, do you play virtually the same

songs every night of your current tour with the SSS. And what's up with "Black Dog"?

On every tour over the last 13 years you have played that song in some form or

another. Why? It was great as a Zeppelin song but every version since then was

a weak, scattered, and head scratching exercise in "WTF" !

Change it up Robert!

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I'm sure there are many people on this board who would have used that opportunity to say much better things. :thumbsup:

When I was watcing it I felt embarressed he was saying those things

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Good point as this is the stereotype for Zeppelin. For us great fans we focus on the music and not stupid crap like that and don't want to hear for the who knows how many times. They just don't know how diverse LZ was and just want to concentrate on tabloidish type thing and so on, because they are naive and uneducated about a band as grand and surreal as Led Zeppelin was and continues to this day. Don't know how to say this. Hope, it came out ok.

You've expressed it more than eloquently. This is exactly how I also feel!

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Deb! I'm so glad you had a good time at the concert. I was thinking about you on Friday night and wishing I was there with you. :)

Regarding the Jack Black comments, I was actually at the Kennedy Center Honors and I thought JB was really funny. His introduction was much longer than what aired on television. He came across as a true fan of LZ. Having said that, I can understand why Robert was annoyed by his comments.

"There's one or two musicians who always kind of keep popping up who generally massacre the songs that they touch."

I wonder if this was aimed at Foo Fighters for butchering the two songs they played. Hmmm... I'm a huge FF fan, but they didn't exactly shine that evening.

Thanks for posting this interview. It was a great read!

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"There's one or two musicians who always kind of keep popping up who generally massacre the songs that they touch."

I wonder if this was aimed at Foo Fighters for butchering the two songs they played. Hmmm... I'm a huge FF fan, but they didn't exactly shine that evening.

Hi Gigi,

I have always thought Taylor from the Foos a very weak singer, Dave is better. So they def were weak that night.

I don't know how Kid Rock sounded live, but on the broadcast he sounded horrible!

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Hi Gigi, wished we could have went together as well. I did have a fun group of people around me, but not the same as when we saw him last.

I also think JB is a true fan.

I fell out of my chair when I read the part where he fell in love with STH again :thumbsup: I still say it is a masterpiece musically, always has been to me, always will be :peace:

Edit: Cookie, thanks for the post. Really enjoyed the read:-)

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Hi Gigi,

I have always thought Taylor from the Foos a very weak singer, Dave is better. So they def were weak that night.

I don't know how Kid Rock sounded live, but on the broadcast he sounded horrible!

Yeah, Taylor Hawkins certainly needs to work on his vocals. He can only improve. He was pretty bad that night as well as at Wembley when he sang "RNR" with Page and Jones. They were so good that Taylor almost destroyed the song. Grohl is a much better singer. although never been much of a fan of their music, with the exception of "This Is A Call" from their first release.

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What a tease you are, Robert Anthony! Lol! :)

Really don't want to get involved with this stuff as it never comes to be fulfilled. Just another rumor for the millionth or so time and most quotes taking out of context by the media to boost sales of their publication or hits on their site.

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Really don't want to get involved with this stuff as it never comes to be fulfilled. Just another rumor for the millionth or so time and most quotes taking out of context by the media to boost sales of their publication or hits on their site.

I agree, SD.

But I can't help but think Robert likes having a little fun with the media and us! :)

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Had a great time last night watching the Golden God bring it at Mohegan Sun. Disappointed to see quite a few people head for the exits afer WLL and not staying for the encore. Robet's voice was powerful and you could tell he still loves performing. When The Levee Breaks was an awesome surprise as I don't believe they have played that this tour (played inplace of WIAWSNB). My wife and I also left the casino with few hundred extra dollars in our pockets. Thanks again Percy for displaying your passion and gift to us. Great night!!

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At the Mohegan Sun Casino in Connecticut now for Robert Plant concert #39. Bombino just came on.

I am sure you had a great time! Can't wait for your write up. I thought Bombino was amazing when they opened for Robert last Friday!! :peace:

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Whole lotta food -- but no booze -- for Robert Plant

By John ByrneTribune reporter

7:44 a.m. CDT, July 26, 2013

Legendary rock music partyer Robert Plant belted out "Black Dog" from the stage at Taste of Chicago this month, but his deal with the city indicates a backstage scene more in line with a restaurant's blue plate special than the rambunctious excesses of his Led Zeppelin youth.

The singer's contract rider requested an assortment of hot sandwiches, no-fat yogurt, a tray of fresh vegetables with dip and tuna fish salad — "light on the mayo please."

Plant received $125,000 for his July 12 set at the Petrillo Music Shell, making him the top earner among the acts at the five-day Taste.

The bacchanalian potential for the group, officially known as Robert Plant Presents the Sensational Space Shifters, was curtailed by the city's refusal to provide alcohol to Taste acts. So Plant's usual request of six bottles of wine and 42 bottles of beer for the band and the crew went unfilled. At least by the city.

Robin Thicke collected $75,000 for a Thursday R&B set in which he elicited some thrusting dance moves from Mayor Rahm Emanuel that became an Internet sensation. The city declined to provide Thicke with the "well-iced" Heineken he usually has in his dressing room along with a bottle of Jack Daniel's, a bottle of vodka and two bottles of chardonnay.

And singer Jill Scott dropped her usual requirement that her dressing room have black "pipe and drapes thru out the entire room." Scott was paid $100,000, according to her contract.

In all, the city paid out $562,500 to 10 performers during Taste. Two kiddie acts, Chloe and Halle and IM5, were not paid for their Saturday morning performances.

This year's Taste music budget was lower than the $655,000 the city paid in 2012 to a lineup that included Jennifer Hudson and Death Cab for Cutie. Nobody among the 2013 performers got as much as the $175,000 Hudson pulled down or the $150,000 Death Cab received.

But officials with the city Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events said the $25 tickets for the reserved seats at Petrillo sold better this year than the lackluster returns in 2012, with four of the five headlining acts selling out.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/chi-robert-plant-tops-list-of-taste-of-chicago-earners-20130725,0,241634.story

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MUSIC

Robert Plant revisits the music of his

Sensational youth

By Ricardo Baca

Denver Post Pop Music Critic

POSTED: 07/07/2013 12:01:00 AM MDT

20130704__20130707_E1_AE05MUPLANT~p3.jpg
Members of the Led Zeppelin, from left, John Bonham, Robert Plant and Jimmy Page, pose with
singer Sandy Denny in London in 1970. (Associated Press file)
20130704__20130707_E1_AE05MUPLANT~p2_200
Robert Plant performs with wife
Patty Griffin and the rest of Band
of Joy in 2011 in Nashville.
(Joe Howell, The Associated Press)

Robert Plant was talking on the telephone from his house, which looks out on his Shropshire property, an inspiring plot of English countryside near the Wales border.

"Right now I'm looking at a beautiful, verdant, windswept, rain-sodden British summer," Plant said a few weeks ago, "which is probably why I go on tour so much, to be honest."

When we caught up with Plant, he was prepping his summertime project, the Sensational Space Shifters, which just started its North American tour and will stop by Red Rocks on Wednesday. And in more ways than one, the new band is representative of Plant's ever-shifting sense of time, place and aesthetics.

Plant is best-loved as the iconic Led Zeppelin vocalist, but his potent comeback as a folk-music steward — via his work with Alison Krauss and later his own Band of Joy — gave him a newfound musical life in the odd environs of Tennessee and Texas.

That new life also introduced him to his wife, folk hero Patty Griffin, who he met while she was backing him up in Band of Joy. And it's Griffin's love of her own hometown of Austin that started Plant's discussion on his physical whereabouts.

"Patty's based in Austin, so I've been hanging out in Austin quite a lot, and I've enjoyed it a lot," Plant said. "I've met a lot of very charming and stimulating people there. But I have one major issue with it, and that's the heat. I can't do 97 degrees every day ... It's a good place to visit and be in the cooler months, but I'm stuck here on the island of the blessed. Patty's coming here in early July, and I'll be near Red Rocks at that time."

The life of the Plant-Griffin party is a busy one, and sure enough it doesn't overlap as often as Plant wishes it did. It doesn't help that the Band of Joy is laying low; Griffin is back touring solo, focusing on her excellent new effort "American Kid." And Plant is taking a break from the roots music that has so thoughtfully guided his comeback in favor of something, he says, that "sounds very interesting and unusual, really.

"There's more than one way to skin a cat, but I keep dancing around to the music of my past, and I keep on swinging it around, and it beats going to work. And it's certainly a lot better than it might be if I did the same thing all the time."

You couldn't accuse Plant of repeating himself much — as much as Zeppelin fans wish he would arrange a more traditional reunion. Instead Plant is geeking out over his new mash-ups of some old passions: Think of the Sensational Space Shifters as Delta blues as seen through trip-hop, psychedelic rock and traditional African music lenses.

20130704__20130707_E1_AE05MUPLANT~p4_200
Robert Plant reinvented his musical
career with folk music, performing
with Alison Krauss at the 2008
Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival.
(Jeff Gentner, Getty Images file)
Is that a lot to take in? Think of it as a recipe, the root of which is the blues: "A lot of the stuff I was really into when I was a kid was the Mississippi blues," Plant said.

Add to that some trip-hop royalty: "There's nothing wrong with the old twang so long as it's accompanied by the guy from Massive Attack providing some psychedelic loops to go along with it," said Plant of frequent Massive Attack and Portishead collaborator John Baggott, who is a part of the new band. "John commands some of Massive Attack's great sounds, and he does the same sort of thing with us. It's a cacophony of sounds. It's very exciting."

Add to that a skilled west African multi-instrumentalist: "Bringing Juldeh Camara from west Africa into the fray, when he isn't familiar with anything else that I know about, it adds a whole different color to things. He can take a Mississippi Delta blues piece from Howlin' Wolf and turn it upside down, and I can sing and turn on the voice, and it takes me from dancing with Mississippi music, as I did when I was 14 and 15 jumping around, into the pre-Led Zeppelin/early-Band of Joy stuff, which was coming from some kind of brother root. It's good. It's pretty trippy."

One last ingredient should solidify Plant's new (if kind of old) aesthetic: His hand-picked opener at Red Rocks is neo-psych rock band the Black Angels. This blues/trip-hop/African collision is ultimately another one of the artist's experiments in psychedelic rock.

"I came back over here, and I knew I wanted to do something out of the British-African collision," Plant said. "And this is powerful, and it takes no prisoners ... It's blues trip-out music. The Bristol element to it, the Massive Attack-like, huge drum loops that crash and bang are pretty heavy. But at the same time, they're crashing and banging on blues scales."

Ricardo Baca: 303-954-1394, rbaca@denverpost.com or twitter.com/bruvs

ROBERT PLANT. The legendary Led Zeppelin vocalist brings his new band, the Sensational Space Shifters, to Red Rocks at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday. Tickets, $60.75-$72.15, via ticketmaster.com.


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Robert Plant Rearranges Led Zeppelin Songs for the Road


| July 09, 2013 11:33 PM EDT By Associated Press

2602519-robert-plant-led-zeppelin-press-
Robert Plant's 14 Best Lines From Led Zeppelin Movie Event: 'Sometimes We Were Fu--ing Awful'
Robert Plant knows his fans want Led Zeppelin and he's happy to comply. On his own terms.

Plant is on the road this summer with a new band, The Sensational Space Shifters, and he's offering up fan favorites - rejiggered a bit to keep him excited about the music he's been performing for more than four decades.

"You just hit it, give it a good bang," Plant said. "It's sort of like taking a can of wasps and giving it a good bang with a stick, and then opening the lid. It's just like, `Ooooh!' That makes me sing better and it makes me go back to not feeling that I'm a cliche, that I'm not actually just going through the motions. ... This is obviously a gig but nonetheless you can still make it into a great pleasure dome for yourself, which is what I do."

Plant is on tour with The Space Shifters through July. He's hitting Red Rocks in Colorado and the Forecastle Festival in Louisville, Ky., this week with stops in Atlanta, North Carolina and Boston before wrapping in Prospect Park in Brooklyn July 27 after successful runs in South America, Europe, Australia and New Zealand.

He and former Zeppelin bandmates Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones, who ended the band when John Bonham died in 1980, incited public hope for a reunion when they appeared in London and New York together last year to promote "Celebration Day," the film and music release of the band's 2007 concert at London's O2 Arena. The band testily deflected questions about a reunion.

"We rode on the crest of every wave for a period of time, us bunch of guys," Plant said in a phone interview from San Francisco. "And sadly that couldn't last because one of the guys vanished. And so what happens now is I'm a man of the world like so many people, like in his own way Ry Cooder and Peter Gabriel. ... You pick up so much stuff along the way, you know, and you put it all together, you switch the power on and people smile and then they dance and then they sweat and then they scream, and it's either that or sit on a stool and sing George Jones songs."

The tour effectively marks the end of a seven-year Americana period for Plant that started with "Raising Sand," his 2007 Grammy Award-winning collaboration with Alison Krauss and T Bone Burnett, and continued through his most recent work with girlfriend Patty Griffin, Buddy Miller and Band of Joy.

The Space Shifters turn it into something of an abrupt ending.

"I went back to the U.K. and I said to my pals, `Let's go urban, let's go British, let's go African. Let's turn the volume up and let's just stick the fire underneath it again,'" Plant said.

As the name suggests, the band brings a spacey, psychedelic and sometimes improvisational quality to Plant's back catalog. The group consists of four players Plant used before his Americana period - guitarists Justin Adams and Liam Tyson, bassist Billy Fuller and John Baggott on the keys - and recent additions, drummer Dave Smith and

Julmeh Camara, a specialist in traditional African instruments from Gambia.

Once the run ends, Plant may return to the studio for a follow up to "Band of Joy." He says he's already completed an album's worth of material with Miller and will soon take 20 songs with him to Los Angeles where he'll begin work with a producer he coyly would not name.

"I'm going to make an amalgam of all these various elements I've been creating, then I'm going to get a guy who has a bag of fairy dust and sort of chuck it over the whole thing so that it melds together," Plant said. "I need a personality that runs right through the whole lot and I think I know exactly who is going to do it, and how and when. And then I'll go back and be an archaeologist on the Welsh border for a little bit."

http://www.billboard.com/articles/news/1569389/robert-plant-rearranges-led-zeppelin-songs-for-the-road

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