“Remember where music came from”: The forgotten legends Robert Plant thought deserved a lifetime achievement award
Led Zeppelin are still widely considered one of the most prolific rock bands of their generation. However, as Robert Plant would attest, it wasn’t an easy band to play in.
It’s quite often the case that people celebrate Led Zeppelin for having the best individual and collective talent in rock. If you look at every band member as their own person, Jimmy Page, John Paul Jones, John Bonham and Robert Plant, you see four musicians who are all outstanding in their fields. Then, if you combine that talent, rather than egos clashing and creative friction being an issue, they worked together harmoniously.
It was this combination of excessive talent as an individual and as a group that led to the band becoming one of the biggest in rock. Even though they could feel it, as when they all got together to rehearse for the first time, stuffed into a small room in what would become Chinatown, the moment they discovered their sound and latched onto it, it was evident they had come across something special.
Plant admitted decades after the group had broken up that while everyone was an exceptional musician and they made truly great music, Led Zeppelin was also a tricky band to be a part of. When you have so much talent presenting itself in various ways, he admitted, it becomes tricky trying to properly put your stamp on whatever song you’re writing.
“It was a difficult band to sing in because the motion of the group was so powerful,” said Plant, “It was very difficult for me to glue bits of vocal performance in the middle of all that, you know? Because it was really like a steam train.”
However, while it may have proven difficult, the band managed to make their iconic sound, resulting in the creation of timeless tunes. The result is that people all over the world often cite Led Zeppelin as one of their inspirations. Equally, Led Zeppelin are celebrated by different award shows and governing bodies constantly. When the Grammys gifted the band a lifetime achievement award, it seems that Robert Plant had had enough of the acclaim, as he grew tired of Led Zeppelin receiving it over the bands and artists who had originally inspired Led Zeppelin.
“Lifetime achievement… How many old people are there?” He asked, “Give it to Link Rey, you know? Dick Dale and The Deltones, let’s get real about this. What about Rocky Erickson? 13th Floor Elevators? Let’s just remember where music came from apart from the obvious. You know, James Taylor, Led Zeppelin, Aerosmith next. Ugh, so obvious.”
You could tell that Plant wasn’t bothered about receiving the award as he didn’t go to the ceremony to pick it up. Instead, he played some benefit concerts to raise money for victims of a tsunami. When asked about his decision not to attend the Grammys, Plant said that he felt playing the benefit gig was more important.
“I just thought it was more important to work with Damon Albarn, Massive Attack, Portishead, The Coral and my own guys, and help raise money to help people who have just been virtually wiped off the planet, than go and have two days of back-slapping with the same old questions from the same old hackneyed anchormen in the same old hackneyed media,” he said.
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