slave to zep Posted April 22, 2009 Share Posted April 22, 2009 It is - in fact its a European tradition exported to the US. Though you guys took it and ran with it! and lately it has invaded oz as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GeorgeC Posted April 22, 2009 Share Posted April 22, 2009 Its popular and always has been - we have ALWAYS celebrated it in our house as did my parents and their parents etc. It has certainly become more COMMERCIAL in recent years . Mea culpa - I'd assumed the jack-o-lanterns, trick-or-treating, etc., was a strictly North American thing. We seem to have gotten away from the topic of inaccuracies in the dating of LZ album releases... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slave to zep Posted April 22, 2009 Share Posted April 22, 2009 Its popular and always has been - we have ALWAYS celebrated it in our house as did my parents and their parents etc. It has certainly become more COMMERCIAL in recent years . Mea culpa - I'd assumed the jack-o-lanterns, trick-or-treating, etc., was a strictly North American thing. We seem to have gotten away from the topic of inaccuracies in the dating of LZ album releases... hi george seeing as you online atm, wonder if i could ask you what prompted you to write the book ? i mean, obviously you a fan ........ but not all fans write books, so ........? thanks in advance Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SteveAJones Posted April 22, 2009 Share Posted April 22, 2009 hi george seeing as you online atm, wonder if i could ask you what prompted you to write the book ? i mean, obviously you a fan ........ but not all fans write books, so ........? thanks in advance George wrote the book to get lots of chicks and make tons of cash. He got the chicks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aquamarine Posted April 22, 2009 Share Posted April 22, 2009 Its popular and always has been - we have ALWAYS celebrated it in our house as did my parents and their parents etc. It has certainly become more COMMERCIAL in recent years . Mea culpa - I'd assumed the jack-o-lanterns, trick-or-treating, etc., was a strictly North American thing. We seem to have gotten away from the topic of inaccuracies in the dating of LZ album releases... Since you've disappeared for the moment, to continue the offtopicness--I can remember when I moved to the US from the UK in 1983, I sent the folks at home a Halloween card, as I'd never seen one before! And now tell us about all the chicks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Rover Posted April 23, 2009 Share Posted April 23, 2009 George wrote the book to get lots of chicks and make tons of cash. He got the chicks. Now don't be silly Steve..... He did it so he could appear on CSPAN Booknotes ! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GeorgeC Posted April 23, 2009 Share Posted April 23, 2009 hi george seeing as you online atm, wonder if i could ask you what prompted you to write the book ? i mean, obviously you a fan ........ but not all fans write books, so ........? thanks in advance Hi down there from another former colony! In early 2005 I had a proposal for a book on classic rock that I'd been shopping around to publishers and agents for some time and getting nothing but polite or constructive rejections. I sent it to a Canadian agent who, by coincidence (or the interventions of Aleister Crowley) had just heard from the Hal Leonard publishing group that they wanted to put out an unauthorized bio of Jimmy Page. The agent had looked at my classic rock proposal and wasn't sure about my original idea, but asked if I'd be willing to prepare a Page proposal for the Hal Leonard people, since I seemed to have an interest in the rock music of the Sixties and Seventies. He had no idea I was a longstanding Page fan (he didn't even know if Page was still alive), but when he suggested this opportunity it was too good a chance for me to pass up. I did up a proposal for what became MMM (I first called it Presence), and in a couple of months got a contract to write a complete manuscript. From the publishers' perspective, being a fan who played guitar and who already owned lots of Zeppelin music and memorabilia likely made me a better choice to write this - so I wasn't some hack who would only do a cursory overview of a subject I'd had no previous interest in - but having been published already and having some credentials as a professional or semi-professional writer was probably their main consideration. So the lesson for aspiring writers is: be persistent, and you make your own luck. As for the chicks, well, there's my wife and two young daughters, and they hear plenty of Zeppelin around the house (on the stereo and on my 12-string), and of course the lovely ladies here at LZ.com. Other than that, I'm still searching for an angel with a broken wing Thanks for asking, and enjoy... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slave to zep Posted April 23, 2009 Share Posted April 23, 2009 thanks for answering, and i did ! any new books in the making atm ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GeorgeC Posted April 23, 2009 Share Posted April 23, 2009 any new books in the making atm ? I've got another one from the Hal Leonard company scheduled to come out in early 2010 - we haven't settled on a title but it's about rock music and the drug culture in the 60s and 70s. I don't think anyone will be surprised to hear Led Zeppelin gets a number of mentions therein! As it gets closer to publication I'll let the board know. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlanetPage Posted April 23, 2009 Share Posted April 23, 2009 it's about rock music and the drug culture in the 60s and 70s. I'll let the board know. Thank you. I hope to hear from some historians/industry insiders that we have never heard from before, and please don't miss out on the Fashion of the 60's and 70's...It is all too important for cultural Identity of every generation. I love Jimmy's fashion statement both on stage and off stage....(can you please include some details about Jimmy's Dragon Suits, as to who designed it, etc...) tks... :D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Knebby Posted April 23, 2009 Share Posted April 23, 2009 I've got another one from the Hal Leonard company scheduled to come out in early 2010 - we haven't settled on a title but it's about rock music and the drug culture in the 60s and 70s. I don't think anyone will be surprised to hear Led Zeppelin gets a number of mentions therein! As it gets closer to publication I'll let the board know. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE no "Hammer of the Gods" -type exaggerations. It would be so refreshing to read references to this without all the hype usually involved. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Rover Posted April 23, 2009 Share Posted April 23, 2009 PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE no "Hammer of the Gods" -type exaggerations. It would be so refreshing to read references to this without all the hype usually involved. If I hear that fucking "fish" story "One more time" . . . . . Like any "fish" story .... it keeps getting "bigger and bigger".... ! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ledded1 Posted April 23, 2009 Share Posted April 23, 2009 If I hear that fucking "fish" story "One more time" . . . . . Like any "fish" story .... it keeps getting "bigger and bigger".... ! A whale isn't a fish. "Thar she blows" "It's Moby dick dick dick dick.................." Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hotplant Posted April 23, 2009 Share Posted April 23, 2009 I think it would be hard if not impossible to tell tales of drugs in a better light. And, I do believe MMM will sell better now that you have it in paperback. I would be more likely to pick it up now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dmop Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 Hi All - Though I'm always lurking I haven't posted since 2007 (on the old board), but just wanted to say thanks for the comments (pro and con) on Magus. As the author of the book in question I've appreciated the insights, critiques, and corrections offered by the fan community here; there's lots of worthwhile info and fresh ideas to be found, among the queries about back-masking, Satan-worshipping, and the colour of Jonsey's shoelaces in Chicago '77 (the third night). Just to let you know: Magus, Musician, Man is now out in paperback, and I've taken the opportunity to tweak some of its technical and / or typographical errors, as well as update the bio to reflect the 2007 LZ reunion and Page's appearance in Beijing. I understand some readers - esp. the hardcore Ledheads - were hoping to find some firsthand quotes from the subject himself, but generally the response from reviewers and the general public has been positive. For an unauthorized bio, I did the best I could. The book even won a Certificate of Merit award from the Association of Recorded Sound Collections (had you heard of them? I hadn't) for Best Research in Recorded Rock Music. Alas, no complimentary calls from the Tower House have come to my place, but then, we can hope there'll be a third edition of the title documenting the long-awaited and brilliant 2010 solo album... Thanks again! If we could just join hands, if we could just join hands, if we could just join hands ... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dmop Posted May 10, 2009 Share Posted May 10, 2009 totally enjoyed your book, some time ago...nice job Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djzoso Posted May 13, 2009 Share Posted May 13, 2009 dude get hammer of the gods it's updated every couple years Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aquamarine Posted May 13, 2009 Share Posted May 13, 2009 dude get hammer of the gods it's updated every couple years Don't think you'll find a lot of support for that suggestion. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ninelives Posted May 14, 2009 Share Posted May 14, 2009 dude get hammer of the gods it's updated every couple years Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SteveAJones Posted May 14, 2009 Share Posted May 14, 2009 dude get hammer of the gods it's updated every couple years He's no longer putting children thru college so we may have seen the last of the updates Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Evster2012 Posted June 2, 2009 Share Posted June 2, 2009 dude get hammer of the gods it's updated every couple years Ah yes, the TMZ version of the Zeppelin story. Does it still have the chapter on soul selling at the crossroads? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ninelives Posted June 2, 2009 Share Posted June 2, 2009 Ah yes, the TMZ version of the Zeppelin story. Does it still have the chapter on soul selling at the crossroads? I think they expanded it to two chapters now Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Evster2012 Posted June 3, 2009 Share Posted June 3, 2009 I think they expanded it to two chapters now Swell. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GeorgeC Posted June 4, 2009 Share Posted June 4, 2009 Not to plug my competition, but in fairness to HOTG, it was probably the first major narrative account of the LZ story read by most second-generation fans like myself (I was born in 1967). The basic chronology of the band's career is there, as well as workable overviews of each song and album, so if you were eighteen years old in 1985 and wanted to know about "the granddaddies of today's heavy metal explosion," this was the book you turned to. Stephen Davis did meet Led Zeppelin, and seems to have been there for Plant's "golden god" comment as well as other episodes aboard the Starship, so we can give him credit for some firsthand reporting. The big problem with Hammer of the Gods is Davis's journalistic style: it reads as if he was in a hurry to cram in all the factoids about the Zeppelin touring lifestyle at the expense of stepping back to put the whole phenomenon in a wider perspective. As well as taking a lot of his info wholesale from Ritchie Yorke's previous LZ bio and Ellen Sanders' Trips story, he also relies far too much on sources who were at best perhiperal to the group, like Lori Mattix and especially Richard Cole, who each tended to offer up the juiciest, sleaziest anecdotes they could while Davis duly wrote them down. It's the relentless emphasis on the sordid details (as told by people with obvious personal axes to grind) that lowers the book in the opinion of most LZ fans, and certainly on the surviving members themselves. When I first read HOTG, I was hoping to find something along the lines of Philip Norman's excellent biographies of the Beatles and the Stones, which had been released shortly before; instead it seemed something more like Bob Woodward's Wired - an entertaining but one-dimensional collection of gossip and dirt. I'm pretty sure, ahem, that Magus, Musician, Man does a better job of describing the underlying culture of rock music and rock celebrity in the 1960s and 1970s (and beyond), and, while not overlooking the excessive behaviour of LZ in their heyday, concentrates more on the music and professional evolution of Zeppelin's leader than his most titillating vices. I'm biased, of course, but I'd recommend it. Nice to see you back Evster - the tone of the board goes up after you've posted here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Janet Posted June 5, 2009 Share Posted June 5, 2009 George (or anyone else)- Have you read "When Giants Walked the Earth" and if so, can you give us a similar review? I don't want to read it if it's going to focus on the excesses of the time and I don't really care about Jimmy Page's religious beliefs unless it enhances our understanding of the music. Thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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