1977 Led Zeppelin Concert Ticket (PICK ONE) Seattle Washington PSA

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Led Zeppelin North American Tour 1977
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North American Tour 1977
Concert
by
Led Zeppelin
Associated album
Presence
Start date
1 April 1977
End date
24 July 1977
Legs
3
No.
of shows
44 (52 scheduled)
Led Zeppelin
concert chronology
Earls Court 1975
North America 1977
Knebworth Festival 1979
Led Zeppelin
's
1977 North American Tour
was the eleventh and final
concert tour
of North America by the English
rock
band
. The tour was divided into three legs, with performances commencing on 1 April and concluding on 24 July 1977. The tour was originally intended to finish on 13 August, but was cut short following the death of
Robert Plant
's son.
Overview
[
edit
]
This was the first tour embarked on by the band following their enforced lay-off caused by Plant's car accident in Greece in 1975. During this sabbatical, the band had recorded their seventh studio album,
Presence
. Rehearsals for the tour eventually took place at Manticore Studios,
Fulham
in early 1977, where the band worked for two months on a new set list.
[1]
Led Zeppelin's manager
Peter Grant
conceived this series of concerts as an effort that would reassert Led Zeppelin as the dominant band of the decade.
[2]
Fifty one concerts were scheduled over a three-leg period, for 1.3 million ticket holders. It was Led Zeppelin's biggest ever tour, and tickets sold at a rate of 72,000 a day.
[3]
The tour was scheduled to commence on 27 February at
Fort Worth, Texas
, but Plant contracted
laryngitis
and the schedule was postponed for a month.
[4]
It eventually kicked off on 1 April, at the
Dallas Memorial Auditorium
in
Dallas
.
[5]
The delay reduced the amount of time the band had available to rehearse, since all their equipment had already been airlifted to America. As guitarist
Jimmy Page
explained:
We didn't have any instruments for a month. All the equipment was shipped over there five days before we were due to go. I didn't play a guitar for a month. I was terrified at the prospect of the first few shows.
[4]
Page (right) and Plant (left) on stage during the 1977 North American Tour at
Chicago Stadium
on April 10, 1977, performing "
Stairway to Heaven
".
Led Zeppelin's 1977 North American Tour was a massive financial success, as the band sold out large arenas and stadiums. On 30 April they performed to 76,229 people at the
Pontiac Silverdome
a new world record attendance for a solo indoor attraction, beating the 75,962 that
The Who
attracted there on 6 December 1975 for Opening Night, and grossed 2,361.50 (also a record breaker).
[4]
[6]
[7]
Lengthy stints were spent in New York City and Los Angeles, where the band performed six sold-out shows each at
Madison Square Garden
and the
Los Angeles Forum
. In New York, the band did not advertise the concerts, relying solely on street demand to sell out the shows; enough ticket applications were received to sell out a further two nights had time permitted.
Dave Lewis, an expert on the band, considers that this tour,
“
with its staggered itinerary and massive arena and stadium venues, became the blueprint for which the likes of
Bruce Springsteen
and
U2
would base their multimillion dollar tours during the Eighties and Nineties. Back then, though, Grant and Zeppelin were making their own rules as they went along. The unwieldy scale of just how big the Zeppelin experience had become was encapsulated over those forty-four 1977 shows.
[4]
”
For the tour, the band chartered
Caesar's Chariot
, a 45-seat
Boeing 707
owned by the
Caesars Palace
Hotel in
Las Vegas
, to shuttle them between cities. This plane should not be confused with the more famous
Starship
, which had been used by the band on its previous two concert stints in North America, but which was permanently grounded in 1977 due to engine problems.
[8]
For many of the concerts on this tour, Jimmy Page chose to wear a striking custom-made white silk dragon suit or as it was known as the "Poppy White Dragon Suit", as is captured in several famous photographs of the band. It was also on this tour that John Paul Jones introduced a custom triple-necked acoustic instrument which contained a
mandolin
,
twelve-string guitar
and
six-string guitar
. He used this instrument on "
Ten Years Gone
" and the acoustic portion of the setlist.
Problems experienced
[
edit
]
Though profitable financially, the tour was beset with difficulties. On 19 April, over 70 persons were arrested as about 1,000 ticketless fans tried to gatecrash
Cincinnati Riverfront Coliseum
for two sold out
festival seating
/
general admission
concerts while some gained entry by throwing rocks and bottles through glass entrance doors and some wall height, all-glass panes surrounding the outermost perimeter of the arena. On 3 June, after an
open-air concert
at
Tampa Stadium
was cut short because of a severe thunderstorm, a riot broke out amongst the audience, resulting in 19 arrests and 50 fans being injured.
[4]
Police ultimately resorted to
tear gas
to break up the crowd.
[9]
[10]
Guitarist
Jimmy Page
's ongoing heroin addiction also caused him to lose a noticeable amount of weight on this tour, and arguably began to hamper his on-stage playing performances.
[2]
[4]
[11]
During a performance in
Chicago
on 9 April, Page fell ill and needed to sit in a chair to play "
Ten Years Gone
" before leaving the stage with severe stomach cramps. The show was concluded after only sixty-five minutes, with Page's illness later being attributed to a case of
food poisoning
; shortly thereafter, a makeup concert was scheduled for 3 August on the final leg of the tour.
[11]
[12]
The Greensboro, North Carolina show began one hour late, with Plant stating, "Sorry, we left somebody in New York."
The tour also experienced some unsavory backstage problems, exacerbated by the hiring of London gangster
John Bindon
as Led Zeppelin's security coordinator. After a 23 July show
[13]
at the "
Day on the Green
" festival at
Oakland–Alameda County Coliseum
in
Oakland, California
, Bindon, band manager Peter Grant, tour manager Richard Cole, and band member John Bonham were arrested after a member of promoter
Bill Graham
's staff was beaten after the performance. Graham's security man Jim Matzorkis had assaulted Peter Grant's 11-year-old son Warren for allegedly taking a dressing room sign.
[14]
This was seen by Bonham, who then walked over and kicked the man. Later, when Grant heard about this, he went into the trailer, along with Bindon and assaulted the man with tour manager
Richard Cole
guarding the door. Bindon had stated he was provoked by members of Graham's crew prior to the incident.
[15]
Led Zeppelin's second Oakland show took place only after Bill Graham signed a letter of
indemnification
absolving Led Zeppelin from responsibility for the previous night's incident. However, Graham refused to honour the letter and assault charges were laid against Grant, Cole, Bindon, and Bonham when the band arrived back at their hotel. The four received bail, whereupon a suit was filed against them by Graham for million.
[3]
[16]
All four pleaded
nolo contendere
, receiving suspended sentences and fines.
[3]
The following day's second Oakland concert
[17]
would prove to be the band's final live appearance in the United States. After the performance, news came that Plant's five-year-old son, Karac, had died from a stomach virus. The rest of the tour (including the Chicago Stadium makeup show and seven additional concerts scheduled through August 13 at the
Louisiana Superdome
,
Rich Stadium
,
Buffalo Memorial Auditorium
,
Pittsburgh Civic Arena
and
John F. Kennedy Stadium
) was immediately cancelled.
[18]
In recent years, Plant has reflected on the negative dynamics which increasingly became evident as the 1977 tour progressed:
By 1977, I was 29, just prior to Karac's passing, and that sort of wild energy that was there in the beginning had come to the point where we were showboating a bit. Unfortunately, we had no choice. We were on tours where places were going ape-shit. There was no way of containing the energy in those buildings. It was insane. And we became more and more victims of our own success. And the whole deal about the goldfish bowl and living in it, that kicked in.
[19]
According to Jack Calmes, the head of
Showco
(the company that had provided lights, sound, staging, and logistics for the band's American tours since 1973):
There was an extraordinary amount of tension at the start of that tour ... It just got off to a negative start. It was definitely much darker than any [Led] Zeppelin tour ever before that time ... The kind of people they had around them had deepened into some really criminal types. I think Richard Cole and perhaps some of the band and everybody around the band was so far into drugs at that point, that the drugs turned on them. They still had their moments of greatness (but) some of the shows were grinding and not very inspired ... The Bindon brothers were the thugs that were friends of Peter Grant's and were on this whole tour as security guards. And they kind of brought an element of darkness into this thing.
[7]
Recordings
[
edit
]
At least three indoor concerts from this tour (at
Pontiac
on 30 April,
Houston
on 21 May and
Seattle
on 17 July) were professionally shot by the TV International company for the band and projected live on to a giant video screen.
[4]
None of these performances have been officially released, and to date, only the Seattle video and audio of the Houston show have been made available on unofficial
Led Zeppelin bootleg recordings
. Producer
Jimmy Page
was unable to locate multi-track sound recordings from any 1977 shows, and it is unknown if any exist. However, portions of the Seattle video (minus audio) were used to promote the
Led Zeppelin Remasters
release in 1990 and some were aired as part of the special
MTV
Led Zeppelin documentary. In addition, parts were included in the 1997 "
Whole Lotta Love
" promo.
[4]
Audio recordings from many of the tour's shows have been preserved on unofficial bootleg recordings. Notable bootlegs from this tour include
Destroyer
(the
soundboard recording
from Cleveland on 27 April),
Listen to This Eddie
(an audience recording from Los Angeles on 21 June) and
For Badgeholders Only
(an audience recording from Los Angeles on 23 June).
The second disc of the
Led Zeppelin DVD
contains semi-hidden bootleg footage from the show at the Los Angeles Forum (under the promos menu). The menu background audio features the complete opening number from the 21 June 1977 show ("
The Song Remains the Same
") with visuals bootlegged from various shows on the 1977 tour.
[20]
Tour set list
[
edit
]
The
set list
played on this tour included an acoustic section, which had originally been revived by the band at their
previous concerts
at
Earls Court Arena
in 1975 and was retained for the 1977 concerts due to the lingering effects of Plant's injuries. Technically, only two songs from their most recent album,
Presence
(1976), were performed: "
Nobody's Fault but Mine
" and "
Achilles Last Stand
", although parts of the solo from "
Tea for One
" would be incorporated by Page during the solo of "
Since I've Been Loving You
".
All track written by
Jimmy Page
and
Robert Plant
, except where noted.
The basic set list for the tour was:
"
The Song Remains the Same
"
"
The Rover
" (intro)/"
Sick Again
"
"
Nobody's Fault but Mine
"
"
In My Time of Dying
" (Page, Plant, Bonham, Jones) (Replaced with "
Over the Hills and Far Away
"* on 10 June 1977)
"
Since I've Been Loving You
" (Page, Plant,
Jones
)/ "
Tea for One
" (solo)
"
No Quarter
" (Page, Plant, Jones)
"
Ten Years Gone
"
"
The Battle of Evermore
" (With John Paul Jones on vocals, singing
Sandy Denny
's parts from the studio version. On some dates John Bonham also sang accompanying vocals along with Jones)
"
Going to California
"
"
Dancing Days
" (on 26 May and 27 June only)
"
Black Country Woman
" / "
Bron-Yr-Aur Stomp
" (Page, Plant, Jones)
"
White Summer
"/"
Black Mountain Side
" (Page)
"
Kashmir
" (
Bonham
, Page, Plant)
"
Out on the Tiles
" (intro)/"
Over the Top
"/"
Moby Dick
" (Page, Jones, Bonham)
"Guitar Solo" (Page) / "
Star Spangled Banner
"
"
Achilles Last Stand
"
"
Stairway to Heaven
"
Encores typical of the first leg of the tour:
"
Rock and Roll
" (Page, Plant, Jones, Bonham)
"
Trampled Under Foot
" (Page, Plant, Jones)
Encores typical of the second and third leg:
"
Whole Lotta Love
" (Introduction) (Bonham,
Dixon
, Jones, Page, Plant)
"
Rock and Roll
" (Page, Plant, Jones, Bonham)
Other encores played occasionally:
"
Heartbreaker
" (Bonham, Page, Plant) (Played on 10, 11, and 21 June)
"
Black Dog
" (Page, Plant, Jones) (Played on 13 April, 31 May, 13 June, and 23 and 24 July)
"
It'll Be Me
" (
Clement
) (Played on 22 May and 26 June)
"
Communication Breakdown
" (Bonham, Jones, Page) (Played on 25 June)
There were some set list substitutions, variations, and order switches during the tour: "
Trampled Under Foot
" and "
Heartbreaker
" were played as part of the main set on some occasions.
*The band performed "In My Time of Dying" during the 1st leg and the first half of the 2nd leg, while they switched to "Over the Hills and Far Away" for the second half of the 2nd leg and for the 3rd leg, although "In My Time of Dying" appeared a few times on the final shows of the 2nd leg.
Tour dates
[
edit
]
The original itenerary before Plant's laryngitis consisted of:
Date
City
Country
Venue
North America
27 February 1977
Fort Worth
United States
Tarrant County Arena
28 February 1977
Houston
The Summit
1 March 1977
Baton Rouge
LSU Assembly Center
3 March 1977
Oklahoma City
The Myriad
4 March 1977
Dallas
Dallas Memorial Auditorium
6 March 1977
Tempe
ASU Activity Center
8 March 1977
San Diego
San Diego Sports Arena
11 March 1977
Inglewood
The Forum
12 March 1977
13 March 1977
14 March 1977
15 March 1977
1 April 1977
Toronto
Canada
Maple Leaf Gardens
3 April 1977
Montreal
Montreal Forum
4 April 1977
6 April 1977
Chicago
United States
Chicago Stadium
7 April 1977
9 April 1977
10 April 1977
12 April 1977
Bloomington
Met Center
13 April 1977
St. Paul
St. Paul Civic Center
15 April 1977
St. Louis
St. Louis Arena
17 April 1977
Indianapolis
Market Square Arena
19 April 1977
Cincinnati
Riverfront Coliseum
20 April 1977
22 April 1977
Dayton
UD Arena
25 April 1977
Louisville
Freedom Hall
27 April 1977
Richfield
Richfield Coliseum
28 April 1977
30 April 1977
Pontiac
Pontiac Silverdome
20 May 1977
Birmingham
Jefferson Civic Center
21 May 1977
Atlanta
Omni Coliseum
23 May 1977
Greensboro
Greensboro Coliseum
25 May 1977
Landover
Capital Centre
26 May 1977
28 May 1977
30 May 1977
3 June 1977
Tampa
Tampa Stadium
7 June 1977
New York City
Madison Square Garden
8 June 1977
10 June 1977
11 June 1977
13 June 1977
14 June 1977
17 July 1977
Seattle
Seattle Kingdome
23 July 1977
Oakland
Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum
24 July 1977
30 July 1977
New Orleans
Louisiana Superdome
3 August 1977
Chicago
Chicago Stadium
6 August 1977
Orchard Park
Rich Stadium
8 August 1977
Buffalo
Buffalo Memorial Auditorium
9 August 1977
Pittsburgh
Civic Arena
10 August 1977
13 August 1977
Philadelphia
John F. Kennedy Stadium
While the final dates performed were:
Date
City
Country
Venue
North America
1 April 1977
Dallas
United States
Dallas Memorial Auditorium
3 April 1977
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
The Myriad
6 April 1977
Chicago
Chicago Stadium
7 April 1977
9 April 1977
10 April 1977
12 April 1977
Bloomington, Minnesota
Metropolitan Center
13 April 1977
St. Paul, Minnesota
Civic Center
15 April 1977
St. Louis, Missouri
St. Louis Arena
17 April 1977
Indianapolis
Market Square Arena
19 April 1977
Cincinnati
Riverfront Coliseum
20 April 1977
23 April 1977
Atlanta
The Omni
25 April 1977
Louisville, Kentucky
Freedom Hall
27 April 1977
Richfield, Ohio
Richfield Coliseum
28 April 1977
30 April 1977
Pontiac, Michigan
Silverdome
Attendance – 76,229
18 May 1977
Birmingham, Alabama
Birmingham–Jefferson Convention Complex
19 May 1977
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
LSU Assembly Center
21 May 1977
Houston, Texas
The Summit
22 May 1977
Fort Worth, Texas
Tarrant County Convention Center
25 May 1977
Landover, Maryland
Capital Centre
26 May 1977
28 May 1977
30 May 1977
31 May 1977
Greensboro, North Carolina
Greensboro Coliseum
3 June 1977
Tampa, Florida
Tampa Stadium
7 June 1977
New York City
Madison Square Garden
8 June 1977
10 June 1977
11 June 1977
13 June 1977
14 June 1977
19 June 1977
San Diego
San Diego Sports Arena
21 June 1977
Inglewood, California
The Forum
22 June 1977
23 June 1977
25 June 1977
26 June 1977
27 June 1977
17 July 1977
Seattle
Kingdome
20 July 1977
Tempe, Arizona
Arizona State University Activities Center
23 July 1977
Oakland, California
Oakland–Alameda County Coliseum
24 July 1977