![]() Phil Carson, who was Atlantic’s liaison with Zep, guided me through their entire history with the label and his days on the road with them. ![]() (Clive Davis explained how he and Columbia Records got fucked by them!) Jerry Greenberg laid out exactly how Peter Grant and Jimmy got to Atlantic Records. ![]() You’ll be with Robert and Bonzo as they bounce from band to band in the Midlands, along with characters from the Moody Blues, the Move, Fairport Convention, plus Jim Capaldi, Stevie Winwood, Dave Mason, Steve Gibbons, Bryan Ferry, and the two “losers” who could never get a Saturday-night gig, Ozzy and Tony (later Black Sabbath). There are little gems everywhere: for instance, you’ll be with Jimmy Page the night he meets Mick and Keith (pre-Rolling Stones) when they go to hear a guitar player billing himself as Elmo Lewis (really Brian Jones!), which is the night Mick and Keith meet Brian as well. I even spoke to the historian at Marshall Amps who gave me incredible insight of how rock ‘n roll in the UK shifted from tiny Vox amps to Marshall stacks (responsible for much of Zep’s sound). Roger Mayer, the inventor of the fuzz box (and Jimmy’s boyhood friend) detailed how he created the effect (now standard for all guitar players) for Jimmy and Jeff Beck. I also listened to the album with other musicians - for example, Carmine Appice explained to me from a drummer’s perspective how Bonzo played those incredible fills. It’s the first book in which the reader will be right there with the band as they create their music at rehearsals and in the studio.Īnd because I’m a musician, I was able to explain, in laymen’s terms, how the music evolved. This book takes you behind the scenes of the band’s entire history, from their earliest, teenage bands to the formation of LZ to each of their recording sessions, their tours, and every important meeting they ever had. And everything transpired from those beginnings. And to Terry Reid, who Jimmy initially chose to be Zep’s vocalist but was instrumental in bringing Robert and Bonzo into the band. I spoke with several artists who were session players with Jimmy and to Shel Talmy who hired Jimmy to play on the earliest Who and Kinks singles. I talked to Glyn Johns who also grew up a few streets from Jimmy and “produced” (the real story is in the book) the first Zep album. I started from scratch, with Jimmy Page, of course, and found his best friend/next-door neighbor who bought all the blues records that Jimmy learned to play from and was there when 16-year-old Jeff Beck came banging on his door, and was at Jimmy’s first gigs. Zep needed a definitive, authoritative biography. And several of the more “authoritative” Zep books featured “recreations” of scenes based on what the “authors” fantasized happened. None of those books were sourced, so we have no idea where any of the quotes came from or were even reliable. Richard Cole’s book has been largely discredited, and Hammer of the Gods is nothing more than a chronicle of bad behavior in which the “author” places himself at the center of the stories. With Zep, I read the litany of things written about them (about 130 books, etc.) and found most of them either written by fanboys or hacks. Voila: I produced a completely different story than anyone had ever heard, all based on fact, not legend. ![]() So, I set out to set the record straight by talking to every eyewitness and source, 355 in all. There were 700 books written about the Beatles when I began to research, but all of them were based on the Hunter Davies book and Paul confided to me that they’d made up half those stories to protect their families, wives, and girl-friends from some of the grittier details. ”But the more complex answer is similar to why I wrote The Beatles. SPIN: Why a book about Led Zeppelin in 2021?īob Spitz: The easy answer is that it’s the 50 thanniversary of LZIVand “Stairway. I spoke with Bob about the reason his is the essential Zep biography, why they’re not “golden gods”, and why he was, as he says, the “perfect” person to write this book. “I spent five years tracking people down and writing this book, following every lead, and there are 35 pages of source notes at the back of the book, so the reader will know exactly where every quote and detail comes from.” And he took his time to get things right. The author of previous bestsellers The Beatles: The Biography, and Dearie: The Remarkable Life of Julia Child, Spitz was undeterred by the more than 100 books already out there on the band. Sparked by the 50th anniversary of Led Zeppelin IV and “Stairway to Heaven,” seasoned, deep-dive journalist and book author Bob Spitz set out to write the ultimate account of one of the most legendary bands of rock ‘n roll.
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