There\u2019s a memorable scene in Joel Schumacher\u2019s 1994 film The Client<\/i> where lawyer Reggie Love, played by Susan Sarandon, is challenged to name her favorite Led Zeppelin track by the cocky young kid she\u2019s representing. After giving it some thought she replies \u201cMoby Dick, live version. Bitchin\u2019 drum solo!\u201d The live version she\u2019s referring to is found on the soundtrack album of Led Zep\u2019s bloated and self-indulgent cinematic endeavor The Song Remains The Same<\/i>. <\/p>\n
Re-released in a newly expanded form, The Song Remains The Same<\/i> CD now boasts a generous total of six bonus tracks not featured on the original release, as well as liner notes from former Rolling Stone editor Cameron Crowe. Originally released in 1976, the album provides a captivating, if somewhat lackluster, snapshot of Led Zeppelin at the apex of their ascendancy to global domination as the biggest, boldest and loudest rock band in the world. <\/p>\n
While the film itself is an artless mishmash of candid backstage clips, concert footage and four dubious fantasy sections (one centering on each band member), the soundtrack album thankfully focuses exclusively on the live concert material.<\/p>\n
Recorded by legendary sound engineer Eddie Kramer, the music is taken from three concerts the band performed at Madison Square Gardens on July 27-29, 1973. In this new expanded edition, the bonus tracks have been inserted throughout the running order to more accurately represent the set lists from those three nights in New York. <\/p>\n
Kevin Shirley, who previously worked on the band\u2019s How The West Was Won<\/i> live album and 2005\u2019s Led Zeppelin<\/i> DVD, has worked wonders with the remastering of this album. Gone is the dull, tinny sound of the original album and in its place is a glorious brand-new mix, overseen by the band, that sonically sweetens the album immensely — breathing new life into what is, it must be conceded, a fairly pedestrian example of the band\u2019s live repertoire.<\/p>\n
This reissue, like the original album, opens strongly enough though with a hi-octane rendition of the classic song \u201cRock And Roll.\u201d Jimmy Page\u2019s revved up guitar howls viciously like a banshee and the explosive fury of John Bonham\u2019s drumming comes on with a sound like a wrecking-ball colliding with condemned masonry. This opening salvo segues effortlessly into the second track \u201cCelebration Day,\u201d not giving the audience time to breathe. As a testimony to how potent the band had become at working the concert format to maximum effect by this stage in their career, it\u2019s an unbeatable one-two combination.<\/p>\n
The version of \u201cDazed And Confused\u201d here clocks in at almost a full half an hour in length and is indicative of the worst musical excesses of the era. Led Zeppelin were never ones to shy away from stretching their songs out to extreme lengths in a live setting, and this track is certainly no exception. It starts off slowly, stirring like some awakening behemoth with John Paul Jones\u2019 leaden bass intro leading the way for Jimmy Page\u2019s chiming harmonics and Robert Plant\u2019s opening vocal lines. Page takes the opportunity during this song to perform his party-trick of playing the guitar with a violin-bow and Plant playfully drops in a few lines from Scott McKenzie\u2019s Summer Of Love anthem \u201cSan Francisco (Wear Some Flowers In Your Hair).\u201d It\u2019s during this violin-bow digression in \u201cDazed And Confused\u201d that you get an opportunity to hear just how consummate a guitarist Jimmy Page really is. This is not just some ego-fuelled showboating but, instead, the sound of a virtuoso musician experimenting with the form and yet always remaining focused on the structure of the song.<\/p>\n
Of the new bonus tracks, \u201cMisty Mountain Hop\u201d probably hits the hardest, skilfully weaving the mythology and mysticism of the song\u2019s lyrics around Bonham, Page and Jones\u2019 strident, indefatigable groove. Other highlights are an achingly melancholy rendition of \u201cThe Rain Song\u201d and a crowd-pleasing version of the perennial \u201cStairway To Heaven,\u201d introduced by Plant with the words \u201cThis is a song of hope.\u201d The album closes with a disappointingly dull version of \u201cWhole Lotta Love,\u201d which features a cheeky rendition of John Lee Hooker\u2019s \u201cLet That Boy Boogie\u201d midway through the song, as if to acknowledge the debt the band owes to the blues.<\/p>\n
It has to be said that although this album is a solid enough example of what a Led Zeppelin show was all about, the underlying problem is that The Song Remains The Same<\/i> doesn\u2019t come close to demonstrating just how incendiary the band could be in concert. Anyone who saw the Led Zeppelin <\/i>DVD or heard How The West Was Won<\/i> could attest to that. Many of the performances here are accomplished but somehow lacking in real fire and passion — a fact the band was acutely aware of, prompting Page to comment upon the album\u2019s original release \u201cObviously we were committed to putting this album out, although it wasn’t necessarily the best live stuff we have. I don’t look upon it as a live album…it’s essentially a soundtrack.\u201d <\/p>\n
Still, with the excellent remastered sound and generous helping of bonus tracks, there\u2019s plenty on offer here for fans looking to upgrade their collection with this new edition. For those just wanting a taste of what Led Zeppelin were like live, this album is reasonable enough, but there are much better examples of the band\u2019s live prowess available on the How The West Was Won<\/i> CD.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":63,"featured_media":29097,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[5700],"rating":[11204],"class_list":["post-40617","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-led-zeppelin","rating-rating-c-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/40617","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\/63"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40617"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/40617\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29097"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40617"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40617"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=40617"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=40617"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}