and with those words. Until the time Led Zeppelin appeared on stage, there had been some opening acts with Bill Wyman’s Rhythm Kings and there was this quote by Ahmet Ertegün: “It’s a great life, this life of music”. That more or less became the theme for the entire evening. [Description of background for the Ertegün tribute omitted here]
BAAGØ: It was quite a long concert, was it not?
RITZ:
One might have feared that, being a charity/aid event, it could have turned into a “birthday cake show” where each band would deliver three songs and that would be it. [Description of Bill Wyman and guests omitted here]. However, there was a long forty-minute break between the opening acts and the time when Led Zeppelin came on stage at precisely 9:02 pm GMT.
They opened with Good Times, Bad Times, followed by Ramble On and Black Dog. After that, we had the first spoken words from the scene when Robert Plant cried out, “Good evening!” But he and the band had already made their presence felt with the three first songs and had welcomed the thousands in the O2 Arena in their own way.
BAAGØ: How did they play?
RITZ:
That’s exactly what was so great! Normally when “old” bands get together after many years, what you will see is that they will try to increase the tempo to cover up for the lack of muscle and lack of energy. What was so fine and so majestic was that Led Zeppelin kept exactly the same pace that we know from the records. There were no sped-up versions.
BAAGØ:
I imagine they played a lot of the songs that people were longing to hear, but were there any surprises?
RITZ:
Well, they did play a lot of those songs you might expect to hear but, in between, they played some of the more rare songs. It was not only their “greatest hits”, but all the great hits were there. But what I think was the best, was that they stayed loyal to the way in which they had performed the songs before.
In contrast to back in the 1970s when they all were in their colourful costumes, they did stay true to their age. They were more or less dressed in black. Jimmy Page started out with sunglasses on, wore a long black jacket and had his very white hair. The jacket disappeared after the first three songs, then the vest and he ended the concert in a white shirt and black trousers. The big screen in the back of the stage was, of course, very revealing of their age. You could see all the wrinkles on the old gentlemen, but the energy was exactly the same. They would not be able to deny that Jimmy Page is now 63, Robert Plant is 59, etc. – and they did not try to hide this fact.
BAAGØ:
Could you see? Did they seem to be happy to be together again? There are so many rumours of a possible tour. Did they look like they would only be together again for one time or…?
RITZ:
As the evening progressed and as the giant screen followed every expression on their faces, you could ascertain that they were smiling a lot. Jimmy Page, in particular, seemed to be enjoying himself. John Paul Jones seemed to be concentrating more in the beginning but, as the show went on, they seemed able to relax and smile a lot at each other. There seemed to be a very good rapport between the three “old” Led Zeppelin members and Jason Bonham. They would often gather around the drum set. You should remember that, as a four man band they did not take up more space in the O2 Arena than they did at the Egegård School in Gladsaxe. But they maintained very close contact among the four of them and often they would end up very close to the drum set.
BAAGØ:
Did you notice any other similarities between London in 2007 and Egegård School in Gladsaxe in 1968?
RITZ:
Yes! Actually, you may say that such a small band – only three instruments and one vocalist – has this tremendously big sound. That was as noticeable back then as it is now. It is incredible that only three instruments can create this big sound. It is, of course to a large extent based on the guitar playing of Jimmy Page. If someone were in doubt beforehand – now it is 27 years since they played a full concert together although they have played a few smaller gigs together since then, i.e., at the Live Aid benefit which was no big advertisement for them – they now proved that they are still up there in the lead.
BAAGØ: So you think they were as good yesterday as they were in Gladsaxe in 1968?
RITZ:
Absolutely. They were better! But it is also an entirely different set-up. Yesterday evening, twelve fresh, in tune guitars were handed to Jimmy Page after each song. This was definitely not the case in Gladsaxe. At that time, he would even have to carry his own amplifiers to the scene and unpack all the gear. Back then there were no extra services. So when I sat in the O2 Arena and I was thinking back some forty years, there was of course a lot of difference between these world celebrities and their performance at Gladsaxe Teen Club. But at the core, there is no difference. The music is the same. They are the same three people with a drummer who can well compete with his father.
BAAGØ:
Did you have a backstage pass? Could you go backstage and make a small agreement to have Led Zeppelin come back to the Egegård School in Gladsaxe in September 2008 to celebrate their 40th anniversary with a new concert?
RITZ:
No – unfortunately I did not. But rumours did actually spread that I had been present at their first- ever performance. We met a lot of people and there was a fantastic, warm ambiance. Everybody felt that they were part of a kind of club because they were among the lucky few to get the chance to buy a ticket for the event. I was even interviewed twice for foreign television stations to compare this event with when it all started back at the Egegård School in Gladsaxe.
BAAGØ: How did the concert end?
RITZ:
Well, they actually continued to play for more than two hours. And it was fantastic that they did not try to get away with only a few numbers. They ended the concert with Kashmir when they had been playing for one hour and 52 minutes. After that, there was five minutes of standing ovations. People were just completely crazy. Then they came back and performed Whole Lotta Love with an interlude that left room for improvising between Robert Plant and Jimmy Page. It was on the spot without rehearsals, so it was “alive”. As I said before, it was evident that they were seeking to recreate their style from before the break, but there was also this “nerve” that made it all so alive.
With Whole Lotta Love exactly two hours had passed and it was then 11.02 pm GMT. They left the scene again, only to come back and perform a fantastic version of Rock and Roll.
To sum it all up, it was a tremendous experience to be there. What made it special was also the fact that there were people of all ages – young people who were not born when Led Zeppelin played their first concert and young people who were not even born when they went their separate ways in 1980 when John Bonham died. It was such a mixed group of people and not only the old and grey who met to remember their youth again. It was not a nostalgic event as such. But everybody seemed to have their special moments and memories with Led Zeppelin. Memories that were exchanged also at our hotel bar after the concert
