Music - Led Zeppelin . . . more on . . . comments and links

Led Zeppelin [mostly via Jimmy Page] has been in the news a lot lately (for example, this cool multi-media from USA Today on 6/3/14) and it follows a little music study I did a few weeks ago. After 'Spotify' put the entire Zeppelin catalog online earlier this year, I systematically listened to the first six albums while researching the band, each album, and each track. Afterwards, I thought about where this music could be placed in our popular culture and how it might be seen within the personal histories of myself or my contemporaries. Foremost, I think it well to consider how this particular batch of artistic and musical endeavor (i.e. the Zeppelin collection of nine original studio albums between 1969 and 1982) is evolving. Here's a nice summary that's taken from a very well done Wikipedia article: "Led Zeppelin are widely considered to be one of the most successful, innovative and influential rock bands in the history of music. Rock critic Mikal Gilmore said, 'Led Zeppelin—talented, complex, grasping, beautiful and dangerous—made one of the most enduring bodies of composition and performance in twentieth-century music, despite everything they had to overpower, including themselves'." In addition, other factors continue to help this group's work stand out and above so many others from the 1960s and 1970s such as (1) newly remastered / released material, (2) the success of various tribute bands, and (3) the popularity the music still garners in sales, on radio, and through online apps and networks.

By the time I personally saw the band in concert, in 1976 at the first event held in the then new and now decrepit (check out these recent images) Pontiac Silverdome, Led Zeppelin was well past its live performance peak. Comparing the music heard by that vast arena crowd of 75,000+ with the raw and unspoiled talent as witnessed by a modest television studio audience at Copenhagen, Denmark on March 17, 1969 might be likened to a Michigan-style fresh spring day in late-May with a decaying fall evening in late-November. Here's the link to the TV performance recorded for Danmarks Radio / Danish TV Byen that was broadcast and simply titled Led Zeppelin on Monday May 19th, 1969. This performance was rebroadcast on the BBC on December 31, 1989, and finally released as an official DVD in 2003. The set list includes (1) Communication Breakdown; (2) Dazed and Confused; (3) Babe I'm Gonna Leave You; and (4) How Many More Times.

Following the disbanding of the final lineup of the The Yardbirds in 1968, Jimmy Page founded Led Zeppelin and this American Blues-influenced band was busy touring Europe and the U.S. by the end of the year. 1969 was the seminal year for the band. Its first two albums were successfully released and the group became widely known, wildly admired, and musically mature. It's interesting to note that the taped Copenhagen show was completed at the time of Led Zeppelin's earliest American tours which included several dates in Detroit and L.A. as outlined on the group's current website and on the excellently done Motor City Music Archives:

January 2, 1969 -- West Hollywood / United States / Whisky a Go Go
January 4, 1969 -- West Hollywood / United States / Whisky a Go Go
January 5, 1969 -- West Hollywood / United States / Whisky a Go Go

January 17, 1969 -- Detroit / United States / The Grande Ballroom
January 18, 1969 -- Detroit / United States / The Grande Ballroom
January 19, 1969 -- Detroit / United States / The Grande Ballroom

March 17, 1969 -- Copenhagen / Denmark / TV Byen / Danmarks Radio

May 2, 1969 -- Pasadena / United States / Rose Palace
May 3, 1969 -- Pasadena / United States / Rose Palace

May 16, 1969 -- Detroit / United States / The Grande Ballroom
Oct. 18, 1969 -- Detroit / United States / Olympia Stadium

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