The 1977 Acoustic Set Posted June 28, 2008 Share Posted June 28, 2008 Hey, I introduced myself on another thread, but I am new to the forum. Been a hardcore Zep fan for many years though. I never saw them live, I was too young(I'm 33), but my Dad and Uncle did in Dallas in '71. My dad past away in 1982. When I was growing up and got into Zep, my uncle told me about the time they saw Zeppelin in the early '70's together. When I really got into them, I started questioning him about the show and what was going on in their lives to pinpoint the date of the show. He thought it was 1970. My Uncle kept saying, "Jimmy was playing a double-neck"! So eventually I figured out that it was 1971. My Uncle said he didn't remember alot about the show(hey, it was the seventies). All he told me was it was a great show, they played there asses off and that he was blown away seeing the gibson double-neck. He also said there was a mix up with the tickets and they ended up getting to go down in front, stage left, for most of the show. I think it was all reserved seating. Unfortunately, my Uncle passed away last year. Cancer just like my Dad. It has been quite a blow. I obviously can't ask him anymore about the show. Does anyone have any info about this show? Did anyone attend? I can't find a boot of this anywhere. I don't think it exists. Any highlights, stories, photos, would be great! It has been nice to see the Houston video on this site from the day after. It's nice to see what they looked liked then and to be able to picture my Dad and Uncle at that time. Thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stairway71 Posted June 28, 2008 Share Posted June 28, 2008 No tape known to exist but some good info in the Timeline - http://www.ledzeppelin.com/show/august-24-1971 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dirigible Posted June 28, 2008 Share Posted June 28, 2008 I saw that show. 1971 marked the year LZ started playing two nights in a row in the Dallas-Ft. Worth market. During their June 1972 tour they gave that market a miss (and I had to be content with just The Stones that month.) The Tarrant County Convention Center in Ft. Worth seated 13,000 with no seats behind the stage, a great venue; the old Dallas Memorial Auditorium (9500 seats) was an echo-ey lozenge-shaped shithole with seating behind the stage. Fortunately I had seats on the fourth row, stage right. Inside Dallas Memorial on 8-24-71 rent-a-cops with guns glared at everyone though a fog of marijuana smoke. A set of green Ludwigs awaited Bonzo with Jonesy's Orange amplification system to the left of them. Not a rune in sight, those wouldn't festoon bass drumheads and Marshall cabinets until after LZ4 was released in November 1971 and Zeppelin toured the UK. I'd seen the band two years before in August of 1969. In 1971 Page was bearded and Plant had the longest thickest hair I'd ever seen on a man except for the drummer of Blue Cheer. The band opened with Immigrant Song, then right into Heartbreaker. I thought it sounded different from the album but enough like it to know the original artist was playing it and maybe playing WITH it. Plant's voice was shot on the sixth night of the tour and the instrumentation was just at the level of pain. The acoustic set featured Going to California and That's The Way, the crowd made a lot of impatient noise during the acoustic numbers and I wondered why the band even bothered doing them. All in all they played half of the unreleased fourth album: Rock and Roll, Black Dog and Stairway To Heaven. These sounded great considering I'd never heard them before, especially Black Dog. The Moby Dick solo was long, loud and got tremendous applause, maybe longer and louder than any other song. The only incident I remember was during the quiet beginning of Stairway there was a big inflatable beach ball being tossed around the audience and somebody batted it up to Plant. The ball sailed through a spotlight beam focused on Robert. I could see how surprised he was that a beach ball suddenly loomed there. But he grinned and knocked it back into the audience as he sang. Of course, the crowd cheered. After the performance as the masses milled around the auditorium the popular consensus seemed to be the band wasn't as good as they had been in '69 and '70. I laugh about that now when listening to the 8-23-71 Ft. Worth and 9-14-71 Berkeley bootlegs. Well, I've wracked my noggin and I apologize but that's all I remember that night about the band. I was only 18 and, for me, the star of the show was my 17-year-old girlfriend. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The 1977 Acoustic Set Posted June 28, 2008 Author Share Posted June 28, 2008 Thank you very much. That was very nice of you to share your memories. You've helped me to picture my Dad, Uncle and favorite band all in the same place in time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
beatbo Posted June 28, 2008 Share Posted June 28, 2008 I saw that show. ~snip~ what an awesome post! thank you for that, D! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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