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Why RP frustrates me.


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 First of all, let me explain, I've loved LZ since 1980 when John Bohnam's death prompted a friend to let me borrow LZ 2 for a listen.At the time I was into the Beatles and thought nothing could be better than them.After my first listen to LZ 2 I returned the cassette to him and said "Thanks, but I don't really like it, I cant understand the lead singer and just wasn't into it".Maybe a week later I heard "How many more Times on the Radio", but didn't realize it was LZ, but I knew I loved the song.Once I found out it was LZ it made me re-think my musical tatstes and get out of "the Beatles zone".So I bought LZ 1 and was hooked.I loved it so much that the song "I Cant quit you Baby" made me go out and buy a guitar so I could try to possibly play and make sounds like that.Fast forward  37 years to present I still play guitar, I have JP signature Les Paul looking guitar and cant believe its been 10 years since their O2 reunion.

 Anyway way, why does the present day RP frustrate me? Simple, he has no problem re-hashing or re-performing LZ songs or versions of them(very bad versions in my opinion)on his many different tours of his many different bands, but claims he does not want to re-live or re-hash the past.Then don't play those songs at all.Stick to your original material and don't touch the LZ stuff at all.So I think he's being quite hypocritical.Also, Robert , if you read this,without the fans of LZ and yourself you would have nothing.So for many years the "fans of LZ" have very badly wanted the 3 to re-unite and tour.But you wont give the fans what they want eventhough they gave you everything.

Just my opinion, please feel free to criticize or discuss.

 

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If his current renditions of Led Zeppelin songs are so embarrassing to you then don't listen to them, it's not like they're on everywhere you go unless you're going to all his gigs with the sole purpose of being offended.

Btw, you don't speak for every Led Zeppelin fan, personally I'm glad they knocked it on the head in 1980 and kept their dignity as a band intact. It could never be the same without John Bonham.

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Robert Plant has every right to play whatever he wants with whoever he wants whenever he wants. Same as you or me. He doesn't want to be a nostalgia act so he changes and reinvents certain songs. Some of them I don't like, but I get where he's coming from.  Ever onward.

Like Mook also said, Led Zeppelin ended in 1980. 

Robert likes being his own boss, a solo artist. 

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You know what frustrates me about RP? The fact he is almost 69 years old and no longer looks and sings like the 25 year old Plant I grew up with. I mean...WTF???

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On 7/22/2017 at 2:24 PM, weapon2010 said:

Anyway way, why does the present day RP frustrate me? Simple, he has no problem re-hashing or re-performing LZ songs or versions of them(very bad versions in my opinion)on his many different tours of his many different bands, but claims he does not want to re-live or re-hash the past.

Frustrating (&*&%$) isn't quite the word I would use, but agreed. There's a live video of RP and one of his new bands (can't remember the name, don't care) doing "Going to California" and after a few bars I couldn't take it any more. He won't play with Jimmy and Jonesy weaving all sorts of cool patterns up and down those chords but is apparently content to go through the motions with, well, whoever those guys are.

21 hours ago, SuperStatic said:

I recommend that you do what I do, CLICK. Then find the original and enjoy. I don't have time to listen to him butcher classics like that.

Yeah, that's what I did. The version Jonesy does (live video 2000) from the House of Blues in New Orleans is great, and there are plenty of Zep boots to listen to.

Got taken in with the hopeful mental anguish r.e. the reunion that never came together in 2008, foolishly, and never paid much attention to the Allison Krause project he was doing. A year or so later was in a Starbucks and a nice '70s-sounding country rock thing happening on the shop's sound system caught my ear. "Nice," I thought, "Didn't know Neil had a new album out." Gave it a few seconds more and realized it wasn't Neil Young, but something else. It dawned on me that I was listening to Plant-Krause ...  "Please Read the Letter that I Wrote" was the song. Funny, all that rigmarole over the reunion so he could go off and sound like Neil Young on a half-baked T-Bone Burnett Americana record. Sounds nice, but No thanks, RP.

The reunion that should have been but Robert wouldn't let be was in 1991. Haven't had much use for him since, unless it involved JP. He was the greatest rock singer ever in the greatest rock band ever, yet he's incapable of doing what I want him to do. Oh well. Coverdale-Page, Zooma, Live at the Greek, The Thunderthief, Them Crooked Vultures -- great albums all. 

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'he's incapable of doing what I want him to do'.

There's your problem right there, good musicians don't do what people want them to do, they do what they want to do.

Led Zeppelin died in 1980, I think some people need to move on like Plant has done.

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After recently watching the ''Brian Johnson's Life on the Road'' interview with Robert it's obvious that he is comfortable and happy with his life. He is doing and has done exactly what he wanted. Most interesting was what he said about the O2 reunion show in 2007 "it was just a "gesture".    To me it was a fleeting glimpse of what was and what will never be again, quite rightly so too imho. Led Zeppelin ended thirty seven years ago, there are people who are younger than that who have had children who have had children, it's a long time a go......

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19 hours ago, Mook said:

'he's incapable of doing what I want him to do'.

There's your problem right there, good musicians don't do what people want them to do, they do what they want to do.

Led Zeppelin died in 1980, I think some people need to move on like Plant has done.

You see my point, sir. Nine years ago, maybe it was different, and how Robert relates to/uses Zep was worth talking about.   It's not a problem at all these days. I'm not one advocating or hoping for a reunion or any new material. I would like Jimmy to pull together the Yardbirds release that he's been talking about (simply because he was talking about it) and I wouldn't mind a second TCV effort, but they've done so much for all of us already. I'm just glad I was around during their time.  

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The main frustration with Robert is that since the release of all those projects starting about 2000, Robert simply doesn't

play with other musicians even close to his ability( a few exceptions). As everyone knows he does this mainly "World Music"

thing, with some other obscure curiosities along the way. I think Robert still sounds great, but he uses all these competent

but mediocre musicians and the experimentation falls flat . Of course Jones and Page could easily come in and make the

material much more exceptional. But Jimmy has in the past created much angst and  various nonsense for Robert to deal

with. But Robert, get your ego out of the way and hire some musicians closer to your talent level. Some of the guitarists

Robert uses, Jimmy could play those parts with one hand tied behind his back.

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1 hour ago, Mithril46 said:

The main frustration with Robert is that since the release of all those projects starting about 2000, Robert simply doesn't

play with other musicians even close to his ability( a few exceptions). But Robert, get your ego out of the way and hire some musicians closer to your talent level. Some of the guitarists

Robert uses, Jimmy could play those parts with one hand tied behind his back.

More than a "few exceptions" I would say.

The musicians on Raising Sand were all top-notch Nashville session men, and then the Band of Joy featured similar high-quality musicians and even had the brilliant Buddy Miller on guitar.

The lead guitarist with the current line-up of TSS (Liam Sean "Skin" Tyson) is fantastic and I remember a rendition of the Rain Song live was brilliant.

"Jimmy could play those parts with one hand tied behind his back."

Page hasn't done anything live, of significance, since the 02 and has not played a full scale tour since 1998.

No one knows what shape his playing is, and at the age of 73, time is not on his side.

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5 hours ago, Mithril46 said:

The main frustration with Robert is that since the release of all those projects starting about 2000, Robert simply doesn't

play with other musicians even close to his ability( a few exceptions). As everyone knows he does this mainly "World Music"

thing, with some other obscure curiosities along the way. I think Robert still sounds great, but he uses all these competent

but mediocre musicians and the experimentation falls flat . Of course Jones and Page could easily come in and make the

material much more exceptional. But Jimmy has in the past created much angst and  various nonsense for Robert to deal

with. But Robert, get your ego out of the way and hire some musicians closer to your talent level. Some of the guitarists

Robert uses, Jimmy could play those parts with one hand tied behind his back.

Competent but mediocre musicians that are nowhere close to RP's talent ? what an insult, the SSS are a brilliant band of musicians, so you are questioning RP's integrity in his choice of players, unbelievable.. Lullaby and the Ceaseless Roar was the best album of 2014 it was so refreshing to hear something different, nothing else from that year came anywhere near it. I'm hoping the next RP album is more of the same world music excellence that LATCR had, and I don't know what you mean by "the experimentation falls flat", what experimentation.. I'd love to know what ego RP has to put aside, he's his own man, he does what he wants that's not being egotistical. Oh and I love the refreshing reworking of the LZ numbers in Robert's live set, spine chilling excellence in my opinion..

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There's a bit no one seems to appreciate re: Plant reworking Zep numbers. As the co-writer of most of these tracks he has the right, they're his songs as much as they are Page's, Jones or Bonham's. It sounds arrogant when he said "it's my prerogative" but it's true. If he wants to rework some of his own music what's the problem?

 

As with Jones, Zeppelin is now just one of the things Plant has done. No one has a go at Jones doing a mad steel guitar reworking of When the Levee breaks so why treat Plant differently?

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20 minutes ago, 76229 said:

There's a bit no one seems to appreciate re: Plant reworking Zep numbers. As the co-writer of most of these tracks he has the right, they're his songs as much as they are Page's, Jones or Bonham's. It sounds arrogant when he said "it's my prerogative" but it's true. If he wants to rework some of his own music what's the problem?

 

As with Jones, Zeppelin is now just one of the things Plant has done. No one has a go at Jones doing a mad steel guitar reworking of When the Levee breaks so why treat Plant differently?

The key difference is that Robert is the one refusing to reunite Led zeppelin and that annoys fans.

they view it as hypocritical that he won't be a "jukebox" playing the old songs, but then reinterprets them with his own solo band.

 

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2 hours ago, Boleskinner said:

The key difference is that Robert is the one refusing to reunite Led zeppelin and that annoys fans.

they view it as hypocritical that he won't be a "jukebox" playing the old songs, but then reinterprets them with his own solo band.

 

I'm a fan, have been for over forty five years, not long before the fourth album was released. I'm not in the slightest bit annoyed that there no longer is a Led Zeppelin, they've been done for thirty seven years, apart from Live Aid, the Atlantic 40th and the O2 ''gesture'' reunion. It's over...accept it.

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Boleskinner, I understand why the fans are irate about that, at times Plant wants to have his cake and eat it. But to keep it on topic for the thread: imo he gets unfair stick for not wanting the reunion - has anyone pining for one thought how they'll feel if there was one and it was terrible?! Better to let sleeping dogs lie.

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Don't think they should try and recreate something from almost 50 years ago, that is never gonna work, so Robert's lack of enthusiasm for a full on led zep reunion is understandable... but the 3 of them plus Bonham junior could have made some new music, they didn't even need to tour or anything, just make a new record, as the musical writing talent they have is beyond comprehension...

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