The new all-access documentary to the formation of one of the greatest rock bands of all time, BECOMING LED ZEPPELIN left my ears content and a smile on my face.
How can you not smile when you have four dudes this pleasant, successful and transparent about their path to fame?
See it in IMAX or with the best sound system you can find and turn up the bass. It's an avalanche of classic riffs and the perfect wails of Robert Plant.
Damn, talk about taking you back.
Current interviews with the three surviving members of the band open the film. Plant is the trailblazing lead singer. He's so self effacing about his early days that he's a pleasure to watch and Director Bernard MacMahon delivers the interviews as if they are conversations with a friend. You never see the questions, just the boys giving their remembrances of history. Often, they are seeing remastered, crisp video of events in the sixties and seventies for the first time since they happened, as they speak.
The film is loaded with pristine digital versions of even the earliest of days.
Jimmy Page is lead guitarist and the architect of the band's creation. He also wrote many of the early songs before Plant's creative songwriting kicked in on the second album.
Base player John Paul Jones is perhaps the most quiet member of the band, sharing many stories from the perspective of someone whose thrilled to be there. His talent and contribution is palpable.
Late and LEGENDARY drummer John Bonham plays a large part in the film, thanks to an interview heard here for the first time, that took place just before his death in 1980. He's hilarious, delivering a joyful perspective on his experience with the boys.
The film's structure is superb. Entertaining graphics and film clips capture the band members from their childhoods, even delivering snippets of performances from their high school days.
But what MacMahon really nails is the way delivers the music. You hear moments in the studio, the discovery of riffs, but when he actually presents a Led Zeppelin song, the first one is 45 minutes in, it's the WHOLE song, featured in beautifully clean digital versions of original film footage. You feel the entire musical flow and see the guys in all their power. Plant is almost ethereal, seemingly about 7 feet tall. He and Page wear historically great, massive hair that pulls you back to the sixties and seventies without hesitation.
You also see the actual audience reactions and at first, they are wildly unpredictable. I loved Zeppelin's first big, live performance as Zeppelin at a festival with some families in attendance. Mom's faces turn sour and kids plug their ears as Page's incredible riffs tear through the speakers, Plant's full tilt voice assaulting their ears.
It's hilarious.
Watching their story unfold is entertaining as hell.
Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones played on many of the greatest movie soundtracks of the 1960's! They're both featured in the best Bond title song of all time, "Goldfinger". Seeing them playing behind Shirley Bassey's jaw dropping performance of that track is an absolute blast.
I had no idea that they recorded their second album, appropriately titled LED ZEPPELIN II during their US tour. Released in 1969, just 9 months after their debut album, it knocked the Beatles Abbey Road out of the top spot on the charts.
"Whole Lotta Love" and "Livin', Lovin' Maid (She's Just a Woman)" still blow your mind.
I loved watching the band talk about their influences and then watching how the American blues artists and even Tolkien influenced their songs.
If you sat down with these guys at a bar with some pints, you couldn't coax a more insightful, enjoyable conversation out of them. Layered with their music and actual footage, it firmly establishes their place in rock history.
My only complaint is that it ends too soon and for me, and a little abruptly, only detailing their story through the massive success of their second album.
What about Led Zeppelin III and the classic "Immigrant Song"?
Come on, what about their fourth album in 1971, featuring "Black Dog" and "Stairway to Heaven"?
How about 1975's Physical Graffiti album and "Kashmir".
There must be another movie's worth of tales about the 1970's all the way through their 1979 final studio album, "In Through the Out Door" during which they were so fractured that they didn't even all record in the studio at the same time.
Here's hoping MacMahon releases a sequel, let's call it "Surviving Led Zeppelin" to cover all that fertile territory.
As for BECOMING LED ZEPPELIN, it's a fascinating, educational joy to listen to and powerfully drives its beats all the way to an A.
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