Led Zeppelin - When Giants Walked the Earth: A Biography of Led Zeppelin by Led Zeppelin

Author:Led Zeppelin [Zeppelin, Led]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Biography, Non-Fiction, Music, Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9780312590000
Amazon: 0312590393
Barnesnoble: 0312590393
Goodreads: 6445712
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Published: 2008-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

ELEVEN: We Are Your Overlords

If the first four years in the life of Led Zeppelin had been about empire-building, the next four – from 1972 to ’75 – would find them overseeing their kingdom with all the splendid pomp and inherent arrogance of Pharaohs. Self-made millionaires so famous they now hid behind armed guards, employed their own drug-dealers and flew by private jet, the same period also found them at their creative zenith, taking their music far beyond the bounds of most other rock groups. Indeed, only the Stones matched them at this time for musical promiscuousness, as both groups toyed, variously, with funk, reggae, country, West Coast…Arguably, Zep went even further, allowing jazz, synthesisers, folk, doo-wop and Asian raga influences to seep into their signature sound. They went further in terms of on the road outrage too. Keith may still have draped silk scarves over his bedside lamps, carried guns and knives and shot up heroin, while Mick certainly kept the ladeez busy, but no-one was busting up rooms, cars, jaws like Bonzo, nobody was a bigger babe-magnet than rocket-in-my-pocket Plant, and not even Keef could keep up with nocturnal Pagey’s non-eating, non-sleeping regime of smack, coke, Quaaludes, Jack Daniel’s, cigarettes, weed, wine, whatever. Plus, Jimmy was the only one using whips and magic wands on any sort of regular basis. As the then new PR, BP Fallon, says now: ‘Do you remember laughter? Mix in yarns of drugs a go go…and fish. Coke? Smack? A red snapper? Was that most meticulous of musicians Jimmy Page at one point drifting too far from shore in the arms of Morphia? Whack in tales of darkened hotel suites and angels with broken wings and white feathers on the bathroom floor. And thus the seeds to some of the many mysteries of Led Zeppelin…’

Still basking in the enormous success of the untitled fourth album, the band took the start of 1972 off. All except for Page who began working on a follow-up almost immediately, compiling demos of new ideas at his home studio. By late April, Zeppelin had hired the Stones’ mobile unit again and begun recording at Jagger’s country pile, Stargroves – where engineer Andy Johns had worked on the Sticky Fingers album – continuing later at Olympic, then Electric Lady in New York. Between times they had fitted in their first tour of Australia and New Zealand, a four-week schedule that saw them headlining 25,000-capacity venues like the Western Spring Stadium in Auckland and the Showground Stadium in Sydney. There had also been a large outdoor concert planned for Singapore but the band was refused entry by customs officials who objected to their long hair.

On their way back from Australia, Page and Plant stopped off in Bombay for a date Jimmy had arranged with the Bombay Symphony Orchestra, recording rough-and-ready versions of ‘Friends’ and ‘Four Sticks’. ‘The idea was to go there and to try and utilise some of the film people because we were told that they were the best musicians,’ Jimmy explained.

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