Best. Band. Ever.
On This Date, July 7th in 1980: Led Zeppelin performed their last concert with their original lineup at the Eissporthalle in West Berlin, Germany. Coincidentally, twelve years earlier on his very date, Jimmy Page’s former band, The Yardbirds, broke up, which paved the way for Page to form Zeppelin. I am going to load some Led Zeppelin tunes onto my iPod right now! Led Zeppelin!
On This Day, May 9th, in 1998: Jimmy Page appeared on Saturday Night Live with Sean “Puffy” Combs to perform “Come With Me,” (from the soundtrack of the movie, Godzilla) which sampled the guitar riff from Led Zeppelin’s “Kashmir.” I remember it was a mortifying horrorshow during which I plugged my ears and hid my eyes with a pillow until it was over. How Page could willingly enable P-Doodle-Dandy to ruin a great Led Zeppelin song still mystifies me. Surely he did not need the money.
Led Zeppelin!!
Wow, I’m glad I didn’t sleep through this one. Today, guitarist Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin – the greatest hard rock band ever in the Universe of all time and second only in my heart to The Beatles – turns 65, having been born on January 9th in 1944! Jimmy, I want to let you know that you still rock and I forgive you for letting P Diddy do that awful, horrifying thing he did to your song, “Kashmir” on Saturday Night Live that time, because I understand now that it probably seemed like a good idea at the time. Or maybe you needed the money. I remember when I interviewed your former band mate John Paul Jones several years ago. I asked him how “Rock & Roll” came to be licensed to a Cadillac car commercial and he was like, “Well, they didn’t get it for free!” It’s okay, Jimmy; I’m over it.