Becoming Led Zeppelin
Now on Netflix: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDKC77QS8WM
I was there, which seems kind of weird sixty years on. Because many fans were not.
Canvass youngsters and ask them if they’re familiar with the Yardbirds. They probably don’t even know “For Your Love.” But Led Zeppelin? Led Zeppelin is FOREVER! Only rivaled in longevity by the Beatles. The Doors renaissance was unexpected, yet I don’t hear any kids talking about the band today. But Led Zeppelin?
Actually, it’s kind of funny. It’s the harder stuff that the kids cotton to. They love Black Sabbath too, the Ozzy years, “Paranoid.” It’s the raw power.
And most have no idea who Iggy Pop still is, never mind was.
So what we’ve got here is history, context, which is not what I expected.
The scene is set. We see footage of Lonnie Donegan. Jimmy being inspired by Rod Wyatt. WHO? We’ve all got our influences, not only household names, but the forgotten kid from the neighborhood who got us started and then dropped out, even though we ultimately went deeper and deeper.
So comparing this movie to the legend…
It was definitely Jimmy’s band. We hear about Robert Plant’s resentment, he and Bonzo being treated not quite as second-class citizens, but less than…
You see Page had a vision. And he executed on it. And it was all a result of history, experience. Not only hours practicing, but actually playing. He did all those studio gigs, he talks about recording Muzak. But after being thrilled to be the youngest member of the faceless studio tribe, Jimmy wanted more.
So Jeff Beck asked him to join the Yardbirds. And then Jeff quit shortly thereafter and Jimmy became the lead guitarist. And he was taking the band into proto Led Zeppelin territory, but few in England cared and America was a slog and then the rest of the Yardbirds told him it was over.
But Jimmy was lucky, he had Peter Grant. Who believed in him, who enabled him. Every great act needs a manager to open doors, smooth the journey, argue for the performer(s). Because chances are if you’re a great performer, you’re a lousy business person.
Don’t compare today with yesterday. First and foremost, today’s acts are focused on money. That’s the number one complaint, THEY CAN’T GET PAID! Spotify is the devil. As if the company were stealing like the labels of yore. And then you see how much money Led Zeppelin was actually making… Even in adjusted dollars, they’re not even in the same league as the bankers, never mind the techies.
But women called into radio stations to tell Robert he was a fox. Money goes a long way. As does fame. But when you’re a musician…music hits people in a unique way, that supersedes cash and even looks. People just want to get CLOSER! Which is why people are watching this documentary to begin with.
I was invited to a screening back in January, I could explain why I didn’t go, but I didn’t. But the film is better on Netflix. Because of the subtitles. Turn them on. It’s not that you can’t understand what everybody is saying, rather the subtitles make the lyrics come ALIVE! Led Zeppelin was so much about the sound, and you know the lyrics, but when they’re in front of your face as the music is playing…there’s a whole ‘nother level of meaning and intimacy.
Now reviews were not universally positive. Then again, most reviewers are not Led Zeppelin fans. They’re intellectuals, they observe from a distance, they don’t want to be all in and run on emotion, which is what it takes to be a Led Zeppelin fan. It’s how the music makes you feel, first and foremost.
And as a movie… There are full songs included. Which sometimes undercut the momentum of the film, but will be studied, be interesting on further viewing. To see how Jimmy played that Telecaster…
Jimmy’s famous for playing a Les Paul. But this Telecaster that Jeff Beck gave him, that he painted in a psychedelic fashion, he wrung all of those sounds from this guitar on the first album. And to watch him do it…
And I’ve seen Jimmy play with the bow, but not from this close, which makes it less of a novelty and more of a sound.
John Paul Jones gets his time, but they don’t focus on the keyboard textures he added.
Robert Plant… He has a sense of humor about himself, and you get more of a feeling about who he was and what he was feeling before he was plucked from obscurity by Jimmy and Peter Grant.
As for Bonzo… They’ve got an unheard interview, which civilizes the man. All the antics he was ultimately known for are absent. But the funny thing is they had to pay him forty pounds a week to quit Tim Rose. You see his wife Pat needed him to get paid, he answered to her.
And John Paul Jones’s wife nudged him to call Jimmy to join his new band.
And somehow during all this Plant impregnates his girlfriend and gets married and you’re watching thinking, THEY WERE SO YOUNG!
As for all the Aleister Crowley stuff, the darkness of Jimmy Page, that’s absent here. And this is before the dragon outfits, he’s wearing jeans on stage, and they’re not always faded.
And at this point people are aware that Jimmy is soft-spoken, it’s not a revelation, but his intellect, his ability to convey what he was thinking and what he did…that’s the essence of the movie.
He wanted to push the envelope, go where no one had gone before, take blues and rock and psychedelia one step further and…THE CRITICS HATED IT! Legendarily hated it!
Now this was the second or third wave, depending on how you count it. The first wave was the Beatles and the rest of the British Invasion. Then came FM rock, with Big Brother and Cream and Hendrix and…Led Zeppelin were one step beyond that. When Led Zeppelin truly broke there was FM radio in nearly every city. Album rock had won.
Everybody hates an innovator, until the innovation breaks through.
And it’s always the public that gets on board first. Spreads the word. Jimmy insisted that there be no singles pulled from the first album, they caused tension for the Yardbirds. But as Zeppelin were touring to full houses as 1969 unfurled, they asked themselves, HOW DOES EVERYBODY KNOW?
One thing is for sure, Led Zeppelin wanted to blow people away on stage. And you hear about a great stage show today, but it’s not the same thing, because you can see a show online, get a feel for it, whereas you used to have to actually go to the venue and if you saw something amazing, not only were you positively flabbergasted, but you lived off the high for days and told all your friends about it and dragged them to see the band the next time around.
These were veterans. They’d paid their dues. And if you insist on doing it your way, you must blow people’s minds. I can’t think of the last time a band’s live performance blew my mind, but I can tell you about seeing Rod Stewart with the Faces in the spring of ’71 and so many more. Some might be caricatures of themselves today, but back in the day…
And no executive could tell Jimmy what to do. He insisted on that. The band made the first album on their own money and Peter Grant ran interference with Atlantic. And that’s very different from today, where the suits all have an opinion, make you employ a cowriter, insist on umpteen remixes.
Then again, the days of the musical group are nearly history. Because you just can’t make enough MONEY! People don’t want to suffer that much. They want to be solo artists. As for the joy of success expressed by Plant… Today everybody’s so busy complaining they’re getting screwed and not as successful as they should be that it taints the entire enterprise.
Then again, music isn’t everything today. These guys heard the sound and had no choice. There were breakthroughs on recordings constantly. Hell, “Led Zeppelin II” eclipsed “Abbey Road” and “Let It Bleed” at the top of the chart. Can you imagine three albums of that quality being released today?
Now Robert Plant woke up one day and decided to come down off his throne and make it solely about the music, and had success with Alison Krauss.
Jimmy could never quite find his niche, the magic once again. There were a couple of numbers with Paul Rodgers and the Firm. Page and Plant illustrated the necessity of having John Paul Jones in the mix, never mind the driving power of John Bonham.
And sans Jimmy and Robert, John Paul Jones is a journeyman.
But once upon a time…
To go from nowhere to everywhere. Not based on hype, but purely on the music.
And Jimmy continued to innovate. “Led Zeppelin III” was a left turn that took decades for people to appreciate. And “Physical Graffiti” doubled-down on the Zeppelin sound like there were no other acts in the universe.
So do you need to watch “Becoming Led Zeppelin”?
Don’t even bother if you’re not a fan of the band. There’s an early gig showing people putting their fingers in their ears, and so many feel this way.
But if you’re part of the cult, or a developing musician, it’s a must-see.
This is not the usual rock doc. Hagiography akin to “Behind the Music.” This is just the story, told in a straightforward fashion. It all happened, they don’t need to embellish it.
But how did it happen? What were the influences? How did it all come together?
That’s what you’ve got here, up through the release of “Led Zeppelin II.”
The band was ramblin’ on, getting a whole lotta love, creating music that we will never hear the likes of again.
This movie brings it all home.
THANK YOU!
