Robert Plant is back to his young tricks in `Manic Nirvana'

[Cat]

Author: Don McLeese

C'mon, Bob, act your age. The piggy squeals and heavy-breathing that were meant to express a rampaging libido in his days with Led Zeppelin now make the 41-year-old Plant sound like a graying lecher at the edge of the schoolyard, trying to lure young girls to the backseat of his limo.

While "Manic Nirvana" represents Plant's most studied attempt to date at retread Zeppelin, it stunts the musical growth that made his previous solo albums so impressive. In the wake of Zep clones such as Whitesnake, Kingdom Come and the Cult, Plant has more of a right to his former style than his imitators, but "Manic Nirvana" shows little of the adventurousness that marked either the best of Zeppelin or his previous solo work. The playfulness in his remake of 1961's "Your Ma Said You Cried In Your Sleep Last Night" - complete with state-of-the-art sampling of surface noise and some lines from "Whole Lotta Love" - extends to some of the album's original material, but too much of "Manic Nirvana" sounds like pandering, like product.

[SteveAJones]

Thank you, Cat. I have known Don wrote a negative review but had yet to see it in it's entirety until now.