In through the out door with Led Zeppelin

Experiencing the movie documentary Becoming Led Zeppelin  - entering a world that timed out a long time ago

I was a young teenager when Led Zeppelin were just getting started. For a few years until my life got pretty challenging, I enjoyed listening to their super-group music and wishing I would be allowed to buy one of their LPs. (I wasn't allowed, too decadent and raw. Bee Gees were OK). High school kept me busy with academic and performing arts pursuits. I did not have a boyfriend at that time.

As a much older person now and also a musician (I'm a bassist), I really appreciate the absolute talent of each member of this group and how, like the Beatles, the combination of musicians just clicked together to create something extraordinary during an era that fit them like a glove and, dare I say it, was so musically creative that we'll never see the like again, because the world and the music industry has changed so much and not for the better.

With a happy heart I sat with my daughter in Academy Gold, a very intimate cinema in Christchurch, hoping such a small room would have a good sound system and wondering if I might need to take my hearing aids out OUT. Led Zeppelin were always loud in a wonderful sense and we were about to watch the documentary Becoming Led Zeppelin. There had been much Facebook marketing and hype about it promising unseen footage and interviews. The sound system was adequate but not impressive. I wanted to feel the bass thumping through me as it would have done at a LZ concert. Nope.

I already knew a lot about the group having lived the era and I've read Jimmy Page's heavy coffee table book on the guitars and costumes used throughout his extraordinary career but  seeing and hearing it all was a thrill.

The film starts with blues and skiffle musical influences and family backgrounds on each of the four members: Jimmy Page (guitar and production), Robert Plant (vocals and harmonica), John Paul Jones( bass, keyboards and arrangements) and John Bonham (drums). Cute and interesting.

And then the wonder starts as we are introduced to the early careers of these super-talented musicians who found each other, clicked and worked really hard in a professional and focused way to create music that has lasted decades and changed the music scene. Living in New Zealand is a huge disadvantage when it comes to access to international entertainment but back then we could at least be guided by AM and then FM radio which exposed us to the best in each genre.

World events intersected with what the band was working on: First Moon Landing, Nixon, Vietnam for example. Robert Plant remembers being on stage performing in Britain and looking up at the Moon in 1969 knowing that right at that moment there was a man on it. Surreal.  And then there's the nod to Tolkien in Ramble On.

What stood in my mind: the talent and dedication of each band member, the creative and magnificent basslines delivered with such focused nonchalance by bassist John Paul Jones, the blissful absence of cellphones at concerts, how fashion back then was so much more than the cheap and nasty stuff we import from Asia these days. Young people made a sartorial effort and in Jimmy Page's case his costumes became statements and works of art as Elvis's had been.

The film abruptly stops, following the release of Led Zeppelin II in 1970. I cast my mind back to what else was happening in the music scene then - The Beatles had already done their rooftop performance the previous year but were in the legal process of breaking up and releasing Let it Be, their final album. Over the movie's same time frame Deep Purple, another British rock band were forming and developing into an amazing heavy rock group, but they would never achieve quite the heights of Led Zeppelin.

And myself at the time? I was playing violin (doing exams), acting, studying classical ballet (more exams), singing, and a member of the school photography group while trying to pass School Certificate.

I think it would be fair to say that most of the audience would have been disappointed that the movie stopped after only two years of Led Zeppelin and I wonder if there will be a part two. That would be more difficult. This movie didn't need to be sanitised as much as a movie covering the drug-addled performances (especially Jimmy on heroin), under-aged sex with girls (especially Jimmy), the alcoholism (especially John Bonham) and over-all debauchery and classic rock-God existences that each member lead would need. It would have to cover Robert's serious car accident and the later death of his son while Robert was on tour and John Bonham's pointless death. So, I'm not convinced the remaining band members will be interested in exposing all that again. 

The three surviving members still have very successful careers. Robert seems to have given up smoking and looked after his voice and although his range is reduced it's still impressive. John Paul Jones continues to be an allround nice and super-talented guy, Jimmy keeps busy with his girlfriend who is MUCH younger than his daughter, and John Bonham's son is a talented drummer, like his Dad.

I told my daughter I had invited her to the screening to maybe experience a bit of that 68-70 era like a time machine and to hear combined talent we would probably never see again. As the film credits scrolled I knew I had been right.

Photos: My first LZ album obtained mid 70s and myself in 1970 wearing my first pair of Wrangler jeans and first T Shirt I bought by myself from my summer holiday job at Woolworths Department store on High St, Christchurch.