Heartbreaker

“Led Zeppelin won’t,” declares Robert Plant in his first interview with the press for a number of years. “The statement that we put out was never meant to be ambiguous - ‘as we were’ was as a team. When you have a four-piece band it’s not a four-piece anymore, there’s no way it can become one again. All the rumours were nonsence, they were aggravating and upset everyone. It was natural speculation, but something that works that well and that tight you don’t start shuffling around.”

That’s enough Zeppelin banter for the time being. Robert’s not sitting in the London offices of Atlantic Records to indulge in idle chat about the past. He’s here to talk present-day matters, more specifically the impending release of his debut solo album ‘Pictures At Eleven.’

But before launching head-first into conversation, there’s a chance to catch a sneak preview of the record - and a bloody good one it is too. It’s set for release at the end of the month and even after one spin I defy any Zeppelin addict not to go out and buy a copy immediately. ‘Pictures At Eleven’ stands as one helluva rock album, not to be dismissed lightly. Robert has come up trumps. Sod the cynics who are bound to despise it - but then again, you never know, they might even like it if they bother giving it turntable space...

On hearing the news that the LP was nearing completion (courtesy of Cozy Powell) a couple of months ago. I wondered what the material was like. “Zeppelin!” Powell told me, and certainly hints of the band do shine through, though there’s a good deal of diversity on the two sides of vinyl. ‘Burning Down One Side’ and ‘Mystery Title’ are amongst the heavier tunes, but at the same time there are more delicate items such as ‘Moonlight In Samosa’ and even the odd hint of raggae on ‘Pledge Pin’. A more detailed review will appear upon the acquisition of a finished copy.

Robert has assembled some fine musicians to accompany him, the nucleus of his ‘band’ being bassist Paul Martinez, keyboard player Jezz Woodruffe and ace guitarist Robbie Blunt. Cozy plays on two numbers and the rest of the skinbeating is left to Phil Collins.

STEVE: When was it recorded?

ROBERT: “We did it in fits and starts to avoid having a real glut of studio time, which can often have an adverse effect. The first stuff we did was with Cozy and that was around last September/October. The tracks he played on were ‘Slower Dancer’ and ‘Just Like I’ve Never Been Gone’. We also did ‘Fat Lip’ which has no drums on it at all around that period.”

STEVE: Does the material stretch back over a fairly long period?

ROBERT: “Not really. Robbie and I had been playing in The Honeydrippers for quite a while, playing out our ‘fantasies’ with rhythm’n’blues and blues with a horn section. It was enjoyable and we went around the country appearing in small clubs. But gradually we began to realise the possible limitations as things got a bit repetitous. It wasn’t a serious thing, but we didn’t really want to play twelve-bars for ever and ever.”

STEVE: “How did the idea of The Honeydrippers arise?”

ROBERT: “Well, a guy called Andy Sylvester, who used to be with Chicken Shack, Savoy Brown and Fleetwood Mac in the early days, lives quite close to us and he’s involved in a lot of pick-up blues bands. He said ‘Well how do you fancy doing a gig locally, just having a blow’ and I told him that I wasn’t too sure about going back on stage. But then everyone was saying ‘Oh, come on, it’s just a laugh’ and we did it and it was great.”

STEVE: “When exactly was this?”

ROBERT: “That would probably have been about February ‘81. We played a few gigs and we gradually got a line-up together. We had a drummer, who’s got a great voice, and several local people. It started off as a bit of a giggle but then we found we could get gigs without saying ‘Hey, look who’s here’ and that sort of thing, though I supposed there was a little word of mouthing going on. Some great stuff went down - we were covering material by people like Otis Rush and Albert King.”

STEVE: “Basically your roots?”

ROBERT: “Well, one aspect and one facet of them, but it was just great fun to go out and do it without any of the usual pressures. Slowly but surely, however, Robbie and I began to look at each other and realise that it wasn’t going to be serious, so inbetween gigs we started sitting down with a little four-track tape machine and writing bits and pieces.”

STEVE: “How did you hook up with Robbie?”

ROBERT: “Just as a matter of convenience really. He and Andy had both been with Steve Gibbons for a while and after that situation expired he wasn’t doing anything. In the past we’d played around with the four-track, doing lots of semi-serious home recording at my place, but then because he didn’t go to work in the day he was able to spare a bit of time inbetween the bowling green and the snooker table! We got together and it was good because he’s a very leisurely, relaxed character and I’m completely the opposite. I’m usually spinning around and flying off walls, so he kind of set the tempo for the amount of work we did. With someone else I might have worked all the time but then on certain days he’d go ‘Oh, we’ll do it tomorrow - I want to go fishing.’

“Then I bumped into Jezz, the keyboard player, in a music shop. His technical ability is phenomenal, though I think he’s a little allergic to musicians. He’s had some experiences in the past that have left him with a bit of a question mark over working with contemporary rock’n’rollers, or whatever you want to call them. Loonies!”

STEVE: “Do you consider yourself to be a loon?”

ROBERT: “With a capital ‘L’. When you play and sing and work and move around you have a different approach to life. And Jezz is far more practical than we are.”

STEVE: “Have you managed to change him?”

ROBERT: “Oh yeah (he grins) - he’s a complete crackpot now! What he had to offer came about gradually. The whole thing started gently and continued to snowball. Everybody has played a pretty important part. Paul, the bass player, has been great because, although I didn’t know Jezz beforehand, I had a lot of time to get to know him, but Paul just came in out of the blue. He’s been a great influence, though, because he’s a very off-the-wall character, both in his playing and his sense of humour. He added to it all and in the end things were very relaxed from a writing and a social point of view.”

STEVE: “Have you been treating the LP as a solo project or a band venture?”

ROBERT: “As a band really - there’s a lot more security in that. I’ve been used to working in a close-knit environment with a lot of warmth for a long time and that makes you feel very secure. So obviously my first thought was to give everybody the same opportunity I’d got.”

STEVE: “The easy, and possibly expected approach, would have been for you to get the cream of the session musicians to play with you.”

ROBERT: “I was thinking about that on the way down here, thinking about meeting you and you saying that. The idea of taking everybody out of a big band who didn’t have a job and calling it Australasia or Africa or some other continent! But for me, that’s far too obvious. It’s been a pleasure to work with people who initially had no idea how far you could take it. Initially, nobody expected anything at all. No-one expected that there was going to be an album, although at the back of everyone’s mind there was always the thought that it might just get good enough to warrant doing one. It was very hard for me to see that because of what I’d been involved with before in Zep. There was so much quality about it that I could never really see myself going ‘Yeah, that’s good enough’ or ‘That might be good enough’ because I loved what I did before so much. It was a case of things happening slowly but surely.”

Gradually, Robert became aware that things were happening, but when it came to going in to record the album he still lacked one vital band member - the drummer. Consequently he asked Cozy and Phil Collins to help out, both of whom were only too happy to oblige.

“I didn’t really choose them, I timidly asked them if they’d mind helping me out and their response was great. It was extremely hard for me to even consider working with other people. I know that might sound corny but it really was. I mean, I didn’t want to to play with anyone initially and then The Honeydrippers sort of got me at it again. And then to approach someone like Cozy, who’s already got a working situation, and for him to agree was like clearing the first hurdle.”

Somehow one can’t imagine him refusing the offer.

“Well it depends on how you look at things,” states Robert. “I mean, I don’t overestimate where I stand. Things with Cozy worked out really well. He came down and gave it a lot of ‘woomph’, that classic foot back and kick, which was just what the doctor ordered. The rest of us had been sort of jogging along, taking everything really steady and suddenly Cozy came in like a typhoon. Everyone suddenly realised that we were playing rock’n’roll - we’d forgotten about that. We were writing these lovely little chord sequences and suddenly it all had some bearing. He came in at the middle of it all and let fly.

“The reason he only did the two tracks was because he had so many commitments - he was really a tower of strength. Cozy, if you’re reading this, you know what I’m talking about!”

“Phil Collins was amazing too. He possesses boundless energy and has the ability to latch on very quickly. With him there we did six backing tracks in three days, which is incredible. He can take rhythms and move them to his own style but he’s very adaptable and his dynamics were great. A lot of people have heard the tracks and didn’t believe it was Phil. It shows that he’s got a lot more strings to his bow,”

‘Pictures At Eleven’ was recorded in five weeks, including the mix, and comprises eight songs.

Despite the emergence of vinyl product, Plant fans will probably have to wait quite a long time before seeing him perform his new material on stage.

ROBERT: “I’d like to be able to go on stage and do a complete set of material that features this album and the next one as well. That would give me about two hours of material, and until I’ve got that there’s no point in going out on the road. I don’t want to play half the show with songs that people have never heard before - it’s not worth it.”

When Robert does go on the road there’ll doubtless be a lot of people coming along in the hopes of hearing a Zeppelin tune. They look set to be disappointed. “I love the numbers, but I ain’t gonna play Zeppelin songs without Zeppelin.”

On Foreigner’s recent tour of Europe, they were joined for an impromptu jam in Munich by Robert and Jimmy Page. This was the first time that the Zeppelin had appeared together since their own continental trek during the summer of 1980. How did this arise?

“Basically, Jimmy and I just fancied going somewhere to have a break. He’d been working really hard on the ‘Death Wish’ album and I’d been busy with mine. I also wanted to see the record company people out there to check if they were awake - and they were good. The sound was a lot better than when I saw them in Birmingham.”

What was the reaction when you and Pagey came on stage?

“I can’t remember,” answers Robert. “I was petrified! I hadn’t walked on a stage that big for ages, but it didn’t take me more than a couple of seconds to remember what to do. It’s an amazing experience to go out there and soak it up for about four or five minutes. And then as you walk off somebody taps you on the back and goes ‘jolly good show’ and all you can do is feel your feet swivelling round at the bottom of your legs trying to lead you back out there again!”

Do you see much of Jimmy nowadays?

“Yeah, quite a lot - at least as much as I can inbetween whatever we’re doing separately. We keep in touch a lot.”

Have you done any work together?

“Musically? No, not yet.”

Do you think you might?

“Well... I don’t know... but time does amazing things. Anything’s possible at some time or another, but there’s no point in you printing ‘yeah, we may work again’ and all that because it would just be adding to the speculation. We’re good friends, we’ve always been very close and we’ve worked together for a long time. It’s a great team, but right now I’m very enthusiastic about what I’ve just done. I’ve sweated over this and I haven’t had the usual people to lean on. It’s very important to me.”

What is Jimmy up to at the moment?

"He’s got a project, or he’s been talking with a great deal of affection about one, that would involve alternative musicians - nobody we know. In England or America. It’s a project he’s had in the back of his mind for a long, long time, but there’s no point in going into it unless it really takes off. It’s quite a wholesome thing, though, and it sounds extremely interesting.”

And howsabout John Paul Jones?

“I don’t know what he’s up to - have you seen him? He’s moved down to Devon and when I saw him not too long ago he was enthusing about something he’s got up his sleeve, but there wasn’t really time for him to elaborate. He’s the kind of bloke who can sit down at the piano and play for hours, and as long as he can do that and extend it when he feels like it, he’s happy. That’s not to say he won’t do anything, but he’s more likely to take his time over what he does.”

Robert Plant, who’s looking extremely healthy, strikes me as being a spasmodically impatient character. He agrees: