For fans of the late, lamented rock group Led Zeppelin, the
\nrelease of any new material (new, of course, meaning not
\ncommercially released prior to their breakup in 1980) is cause for
\ncelebration. It was reason enough to drop $70 for the four-CD
\nself-titled box set in 1990, which gave the world only two new
\nsongs (one of which, “Travelling Riverside Blues,” was widely
\nbootlegged).<\/p>\n
So being given
\nHow The West Was Won<\/i>, a three-CD set capturing Jimmy Page
\nand crew in two concerts from July 1972 (prior to the release of
\nHouses Of The Holy<\/i>) should be enough to send Zep-heads into
\nnear rapture. Indeed, this does supplant
\nBBC Recordings<\/i> and the abysmal
\nThe Song Remains The Same<\/i> to become the live recording of
\nLed Zeppelin’s discography.<\/p>\n
And, like Led Zeppelin, this set captures both the good and the
\nbad that was this group, leaving the listener both pleased with the
\nend results\u2026 and a bit of an empty feeling, as if something
\nelse should have been included to make this release better.<\/p>\n
Actually, throughout the first disc of
\nHow The West Was Won<\/i> (taken from shows in Long Beach and Los
\nAngeles), it feels like Page and crew can do no wrong. Even with a
\nbit of a distorted and sloppy opening to “Immigrant Song,” the
\nenergy that the band pours into its instruments (and, in Robert
\nPlant’s case, his vocals) is a reminder to everyone just how
\nintense Led Zeppelin could be on stage. Sure, it might be the
\nmillionth time you’ve heard “Stairway To Heaven” in some form, but
\nhearing it in this setting just feels right, as if you’re sitting
\nin the first few rows and are watching Page work his magic on his
\nGibson double-neck.<\/p>\n
What sets this first disc apart is that this is the first time
\nthat Led Zeppelin has ever released any of their live acoustic
\nmaterial – namely, the versions of “Going To California,” “That’s
\nThe Way” and “Bron-Yr-Aur Stomp”. The interplay between Plant’s
\nvocals and the string work from Page and John Paul Jones speaks
\nlouder than any 190-decibel blast from a Marshall stack could, and
\nmakes me wish that more material like this would see the light of
\nday. (I’m still working my way through DVD — we’ll get to that
\nsoon here on “The Daily Vault”.)<\/p>\n
Disc two starts off well enough with “Dazed And Confused,” a
\nsong which does seem to have a little more power when you can
\nactually see what Page and crew are doing. And while this version
\ntops the one that was on the album release of
\nThe Song Remains The Same<\/i>, nothing I’ve heard — even on
\nbootlegs — has topped the version that was on the film for sheer
\nkinetic energy.<\/p>\n
Where things start to slip for
\nHow The West Was Won<\/i> is on “Moby Dick” — otherwise known as
\nJohn Bonham’s drum solo. Now, there is no denying that Bonham was
\none of the most electrifying and powerful drummers in the history
\nof rock. But the visual of Bonham’s attacking his drum kit is a
\nmajor factor in this power, and just being given an audio
\ndemonstration gets boring – especially when you have 19 minutes’
\nworth of skin pounding. If you never saw Led Zeppelin live or have
\nnever seen the movie
\nThe Song Remains The Same<\/i>, you might not know that Bonham
\nwould, at one point, drop his sticks and play his drums with his
\nhands. Visually, it’s powerful; audio only, it’s underwhelming.<\/p>\n
The final disc of this set almost feels like it’s trying to
\natone for the mistakes that “Moby Dick” made with this set — and
\nagain, it feels like Led Zeppelin doesn’t follow the formula of
\n“less is more”. I know that “Whole Lotta Love” often got stretched
\nout to mammoth proportions, especially with Page’s theremin solo
\n(which seems like a bit of a waste this time) and the band’s dive
\ninto the rhythm & blues that made up their backbone. But
\nsometimes, it feels like Zeppelin overplays their hand in this
\nregard, featuring, if I counted right, about 15 minutes’ worth of
\nroots worship. It just feels like a lot of overkill, especially
\nwhen there was no questioning the band’s roots or power by this
\ntime in their career.<\/p>\n
The game of “catch-up” concludes with a pretty standard version
\nof “Rock And Roll,” an early rendition of “The Ocean” (which is
\nstill pretty tasty) and a final blues\/roots number, “Bring It On
\nHome”. Again, it sometimes feels like Led Zeppelin are trying too
\nhard to justify their rights to play the blues, and this last track
\nalmost seems to be anticlimactic.<\/p>\n
Don’t get me wrong, any official release of live Led Zeppelin
\nmaterial is always a joy, and
\nHow The West Was Won<\/i> is still very much a worthwhile
\ninvestment, even if it could have been pared down to a two-disc
\nset. But part of me has to wonder why Page selected this particular
\nshow for release. There is, for example, a soundboard recording of
\nZeppelin’s final show from Berlin in 1980. (I know\u2026 I have
\nit.) There is the series of recordings from Detroit that are known
\nas
\nDestroyer<\/i>, possibly the best-known of the Zeppelin bootlegs.
\nOne has to wonder just how much more material Page has in the
\nvaults, or if he’d even consider releasing a series of cleaned-up
\nbootlegs a la Frank Zappa. Until then, this will do just fine.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":26388,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[5700],"rating":[5612],"class_list":["post-37619","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-led-zeppelin","rating-rating-b-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/37619","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37619"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/37619\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37619"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37619"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=37619"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=37619"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}