How The West Was Won

“How the West Was Won” by El Zeppelino was released by Atlantic Records May 2003 but these performances from the 1972 tour were preserved for us all by devoted bootleggers – we thank them- with beaucoup transmodulation of the two shows by Jimmy hisself years later when he borrowed the tapes.We’re talking Pro-Rodeo, defined. And these cowboys got a extraspecial reception whenever they played the Inglewood Forum LA to millions all the way till ’77, last ever shows in the US. And that’s what we’re talkingbout here, a Mack Rawhide Mid-Rise 18 wheeler live on the blacktop in ‘72 entirely at the Forum (mostly) and Long Beach on June 25/27 spliced up as one entire set.We’re talking munitions. We’re talking weaponry, bombardment, artillery, warfare. Storm Trooper Assault. We’re talking military grade rock musik built to combat specifications, high tensile and compressive strengths, hardness, and loudness of Thor. Tactical Military Academy Of Musik, lessons 1 thru 100.Mayhem begins with the LA Drone, and suddenly its Immigrant Song: time rewinds, we’re back in some kinda mezolithic slaughterhouse scenario. We’re talking the best ever signature hammer-motif since “Ride of The Valyrie” 2000 years previous.It’s immediately plain , Jimmy, JPJ and Lil Drummer Boy Demento Diablo go super nova, so yu just gotta wait for the guitar solo to find out that Jimmy’s on fire tonight, nails it, no fingers stuck in strings ce soir, he rips a solo of electrocuting voltage and penetration so now we know fersure, the whole band in a frenzy, primers in the C4.What was it with Jimmy that made him a panchromatic silver surfer astronaut guitarist of the entire universe? Just note this though: at Madison Square Gardens on February 12th 1975 during “Over The Hills And Far Away” Jimmy went and played a top 5 greatest ever electrik guitar solo in all of human history, like that was Jimmy’s destiny, to do that thing that night in NYC. Check it someplace.Anyway, back at the LA Forum, El Zeppolino kick up a wild cherokee mustang storm, tornado style, and reach the limits of human endurance. It’s a highspeed 43 vehicle expressway pile-up in powerchords, whiplash deluxe & non-stop axonal damage.Jimmy plays in Mode 9 throughout on a 25 stringed Dali guitar that bends time and scientists do say it proves the theory of relativity twice, 3 times if you count quickly and he executes six consecutive quark-hadron transitions, Fender style. Which can be represented mathematically as: G -> H -> ... -> SU(3) x SU(2) x U(1) -> SU(3) x U(1).Lil Johnny Demento hammers reee-lentlessly in devil-child kamikaze triplet grenades, mambo percussion juju-jojimbo, a neutron pulse pile-driver rhythm machine like 6 drummers with barracuda bass locked in tight. And Lancelot still had most of his screeching powers intact in 1972 so he sounds like one entire choir of screechers.Then you git “Dazed and Confused” – brief by later standards at a mere 25 minutes- and what can you say? – beaucoup boyz n girls tried to write theyselves a Dazed n Confused but nobody ever came close, this is perfected and extended rock music rodeo, mission statement, definitive.And it just goes on and on continuitously till they used up the entire Greater Los Angeles electricity supply 16 hours later. Blackout. Whole deal is a show of force, power, extreme prejudice. Once, in “Rock n Roll” Johnny Demento Diablo hits his drums so hard, you’d swear he’s cracked the space-time continuum permanent. Makes you sit bolt upright.We’re talking Solid Gold, Magna Cum Laudae - 1 of the 5 top supreme live Pro-Rodeo performances of all time. No simulations, no props, no CGI, no net, total commitment to the cause and they done it for real.Nobody else ever came close. Check it right now.

This 2003 release of archive material from two big arena concerts in California in 1972 contains probably the best available material of Zeppelin playing to a live audience in their heyday. The compilation was put together by Jimmy Page from material he discovered "...while searching through the archives for visual and audio material for the Led Zeppelin DVD". The gigs were at the LA Forum on 25th June & Long Beach Arena on 27th June, so several months before the `Houses of the Holy' album was released in March 1973 (though a few numbers from that release are performed here) and prior to any of the material for `Physical Graffiti' being composed or recorded.You get 3 separate CDs.The first disk is the real star of the show, with `Immigrant Song', `Heartbreaker', `Black Dog', `Over the Hills & Far Away' & `Since I've been loving You' (definite highpoint especially from a highly expressive Plant with beautiful lyrical phrasing) moving into the familiar 1970s Zeppelin acoustic set, which is truly sublime: `Stairway' is followed by `Goin' to California', `That's the Way' & `Bron-Yr-Aur Stomp' with phenomenal acoustic playing from Page's open-tuned 12-string & Jones on mandolin. It's here above all that the high quality of the recordings & mix shines, with perfect balance of sound doing justice to the exemplary playing & Plant in top form giving astounding vocal expression to these great numbers.Only on disk 2 do some of the notorious 1970s excesses of self-indulgence make their presence felt, with `What is & what should never be' & `Dancing Days' sandwiched between a 25-minute `Dazed & Confused' medley & Bonzo's overlong `Moby Dick', surely of interest only to rock drummers (but it gave the rest of the band a welcome break in mid-concert).Things pick up nicely again on disk 3, with the 23-minute `Whole Lotta Love' medley, a storming `Rock & Roll', new track `The Ocean' & 9-minute `Bring it on Home' as the closer.This really is the definitive live Zeppelin album. If you're of a later generation and don't understand why your parents' generation speak of Zeppelin with such reverence, then put Disk 1 into a big sound system, crank up the volume & listen. You'll start to get it, and might wish you'd been of an age to see & hear this great band live during the definitive & never-to-be-repeated golden era for rock music.