Led Zeppelin

Review: Led Zeppelin Kneads Crowd to Silly Putty

Led Zeppelin doesn’t give concerts, they perform physical transformations. They kneaded the full-house crowd in Memorial Auditorium into silly putty Sunday night with two hours and 50 minutes of massive sensory massage.

The sheer enormity of the sound did it (though the full moon may have helped), an enormity that resonates into your paleolithic pith, the cry of the dinosaur summoning out that primitive quickening in the face of monstrosity.

Whatever isn’t touched by the earthquake rumble of John Paul Jones’ bass, John Bonham’s gunshot cracks on the drums or Robert Plant’s echoey heart-of-darkness voice is left quivering by the swooping electronic slices of guitarist Jimmy Page, especially his solo on the theremin.

Their relatively simple brooding themes are blown larger than life, like skyscraping office buildings, and they lay on thick embellishments and broad dramatic resolutions that mean more en masse than as individual items.

The four of them approached it all with unexpected good humor. John and Bonham lay back blithely amongst the folding backdrop of mirrors that run the length of the stage.

Page in black with a rhinestone-studded rose on his open jacket, prancing around like a cocky midlands soccer player in a pub, and Plant in tight jeans and a short jacket with rhinestones and puffed sleeves strutting back his curly blond mane.

The band took no breaks, despite the heat. Applause followed a few Page guitar solos but the youngish crowd didn’t really erupt until the start of Stairway to Heaven and again when the spinning mirrored ball went on as it closed.

The heavy drumbeat of Moby Dick brought a rush on the stage and most of the hall stayed on its feet for that last hour, including a long Bonham drum solo with special synthesizer effects.

An 8-minute ovation brought them back for an encore after their boogieing final number. “Thank you Buffalo,” Plant said when they finished. “Take care until we see you again.” (D. Anderson, Buffalo News / July 1973)