Zep’s TV debut – but not as “Led Zeppelin”
In case you didn’t know yet, Led Zeppelin’s name wasn’t as cool as it is now. They were once called “The Yardbirds” and Jimmy Page was just a session guitarist for them. They also don’t rehearse as much back then. And when you are called to perform on international television, you gotta put in the hours to make a good impression.
In 1969, The Yardbirds met up with Jimmy Page in Denmark for a perfomance at Denmarks Studios for a show called “TV Byen” on Denmark TV. With just 15 hours of rehearsal, they performed some early favorite hits including Communication Breakdown, Dazed and Confused, Babe I’m Gonna Leave You and How Many More Times.
The Yardbirds didn’t do so well with the reviews, with one reviewer stating
“They were so loud it almost hurt. Sometimes playing loud has an important role in pop, but here it was just superficial effect.”
Ouch! Bet that reviewer has been eating her words ever since The Yardbirds became Led Zeppelin, one of the most iconic rock bands in music history.
“If someone came out of a group and started a new one, they were keen to know what they were doing. So there was quite a reputation that had built up with the Yardbirds. And I was trying a lot of new ideas in the Yardbirds that hadn’t actually been done by Eric or Jeff. The colors were starting to show in the palette.” – Jimmy Page
The crowd probably didn’t know what hit them and we guarantee they would have responded differently if they knew that one day, that band was going to be the biggest rock group to ever walk the earth and their classic hits would make them immortals in the rock ‘n roll universe.