The Infamous Story Of The Sharks And Led Zeppelin

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A Shark And A Girl – That’s A Lovestory You’ve Never Heard.


The hotel in Seattle where rock legends gathered – The Edgewater hotel that is located on a pier over Elliott Bay. The hotel is the only current one in Seattle that sits over-water. During the 60s’ the Edgewater became a famous destination for rock legends. Such bands to visit were the Beatles in 1964, the Rolling Stones, Frank Zappa, and Led Zeppelin. The Edgewater is unique because it once allowed visitors to fish from their rooms on the north elevation.

But one intriguing moment happened on July 27, 1969, when Led Zeppelin performed at the Seattle Pop Festival and stayed at the Edgewater. The band, of course, were famous in throwing wild parties. and was often joined by groupies.  According to Zeppelin’s road manager Richard Cole, during one incident, things between a fish and a sexy redhead woman got intense. It was undoubtedly unusual, the road manager was in his room fishing with John Bonham when women entered their room to join them. Cole and Bonham managed to catch a large collection of sharks, and they left them in the closet hanged with stuck coat hangers through the gills, their room was also scattered with different types of smaller fish.

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The party did go on, but one thing led to another when people began losing their clothes. A woman included in the crowd was a red hair found herself with Cole. She then made an unusual request, asking for a fish, that started all this story. Cole was later quoted: “Let’s see how your red snapper likes this red snapper.” The nose of the fish went on to the girl, and the red hair woman liked it.

It was neither harmful or malicious so Mark Stein of Vanilla Fudge filmed the whole thing. The story was published by the media and it started a large collection of rumors that began to circulate, of course, it’s the media, so a lot of things about the story were exaggerated. Led Zeppelin received bad press reputation which led them to stopped talking about the event.

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In 1973, Led Zeppelin attempted to enter the Edgewater and the band was officially banned from the hotel after it was reportedly discovered that they managed to caught some 30 mud sharks and left them under beds, in closets, elevators, hallways, bathtubs, and all over their rooms. But that’s not all, it’s not only about the sharks, or fishes. They completely trashed the place by throwing stuff out the windows into Elliott Bay, such as beds, TVs, mattresses, lamps, drapes, and glassware.

After those bad things happened, Robert Plant has been welcomed back to the Edgewater.

The incident regarding the mud shark became one of the most popular rock stories, and Led Zeppelin surely did Rock N’ Roll the place.