Q+A: Robert Plant

[Cat]

Q+A: Robert Plant

Esquire Magazine June 2005

Author(s):Scott Frampton

IT'S TROUBLING when rock legends don't have the courtesy to preserve their legacies with a well-timed overdose or plane crash. Thus, we must endure Rod Stewart's coughing up a lung all over the American songbook. And thus, our ingrained image of 56-year-old Robert Plant as Led Zeppelin's leonine, tight-panted banshee is compromised by his stubborn insistence on rocking well into Buick-buying age. He has a new band, Strange Sensation, and its latest, Mighty Rearranger (May 10), kicks up '60s psychedelia with rhythms from the Spice Trail and Massive Attack--style electronics. It even has the temerity to be good.

ESQ: This record doesn't sound like what most people would expect from you. Was that on purpose?

RP: I didn't want my new record to sound like a purist moment from 1967. It's edgy. It's fractured. The vocals have been fucked with. I just wanted to make music interesting for me now, so I can go off on my Granddad-on-the-warpath thing. I'm glad if you like my new record, but then again I know it's really fucking great or else I wouldn't be here. After all, there's a tot of tennis to play.

ESQ: Was not going to the Grammys to accept the lifetime-achievement award a conscientious-objector moment?

RP: I was busy doing this [album] in Milan. And I was also troubled as to where I would find the other Zeppelin guys when I got there. There's a time for me to get my reward. And that won't happen in the back of a limo.

ESQ: Are you doing Led Zeppelin songs live on tour?

RP: We do a version of "When the Levee Breaks" with four-part harmony. It's like Staple Singers go to Haight-Ashbury. That's the whole feel of the band. It's not losing any reverence for anything; it's just taking it on.

ESQ: Too reverent and it's a tribute act.

RP: Oh, yeah, and I was already in a tribute band for a long time.

ESQ: The Honeydrippers?

RP: No, Led Zeppelin. There's no point stepping up to the golden platform if you're going to repeat yourself.

ESQ: Which we see plenty of.

RP: We certainty do. Plenty for Planty.

[zooma]

Q+A: Robert Plant

Esquire Magazine June 2005

Author(s):Scott Frampton

IT'S TROUBLING when rock legends don't have the courtesy to preserve their legacies with a well-timed overdose or plane crash. Thus, we must endure Rod Stewart's coughing up a lung all over the American songbook. And thus, our ingrained image of 56-year-old Robert Plant as Led Zeppelin's leonine, tight-panted banshee is compromised by his stubborn insistence on rocking well into Buick-buying age. He has a new band, Strange Sensation, and its latest, Mighty Rearranger (May 10), kicks up '60s psychedelia with rhythms from the Spice Trail and Massive Attack--style electronics. It even has the temerity to be good.

ESQ: This record doesn't sound like what most people would expect from you. Was that on purpose?

RP: I didn't want my new record to sound like a purist moment from 1967. It's edgy. It's fractured. The vocals have been fucked with. I just wanted to make music interesting for me now, so I can go off on my Granddad-on-the-warpath thing. I'm glad if you like my new record, but then again I know it's really fucking great or else I wouldn't be here. After all, there's a tot of tennis to play.

ESQ: Was not going to the Grammys to accept the lifetime-achievement award a conscientious-objector moment?

RP: I was busy doing this [album] in Milan. And I was also troubled as to where I would find the other Zeppelin guys when I got there. There's a time for me to get my reward. And that won't happen in the back of a limo.

ESQ: Are you doing Led Zeppelin songs live on tour?

RP: We do a version of "When the Levee Breaks" with four-part harmony. It's like Staple Singers go to Haight-Ashbury. That's the whole feel of the band. It's not losing any reverence for anything; it's just taking it on.

ESQ: Too reverent and it's a tribute act.

RP: Oh, yeah, and I was already in a tribute band for a long time.

ESQ: The Honeydrippers?

RP: No, Led Zeppelin. There's no point stepping up to the golden platform if you're going to repeat yourself.

ESQ: Which we see plenty of.

RP: We certainty do. Plenty for Planty.

I think Robert is in a tribute band now, and has been since Fate of Nations. First Unledded then Dreamland and now Raising Sand all of which have been a nod to past songs. Mighty Rearranger was a great album why he didn't continue in that vein is a mystery to me. Black Dog with a slowed down tempo and a Banjo is not progress to me, it's a visitation to the past.