Previously unseen cine footage of Led Zeppelin has appeared on  YouTube . The silent footage was taken at the Sydney showground gig in Australia on Febraury 27th 1972. It features shots of the band on stage performing Immigrant Song, Dazed And Confused, Stairway To Heaven, Moby Dick, a piece from the acoustic set and Whole Lotta Love. Also included are shots of the band prior to coming onto the stage and shots of the audience. The film appears to come from three different cameras positioned around the stage and is often jumpy, but when it’s good it’s very  good. Some of this colour footage was used for the official promo of Immigrant Song released on the 2003 DVD box set. To see the film follow this link to www.youtube.com

Robert Plant hosted a listening session to top music biz folk at the Back Room, a former speakeasy in New York City’s Lower East Side last Thursday (June 24^th), in attendance was Patrick Doyle from Rolling Stone and Jim Allen from CMT.

Patrick Doyle said of the nights preceding; Resurrecting the Band of Joy, Plant picked out top-notch roots musicians and session players for the group: multi-instrumentalist Darrell Scott, guitarist and co-producer Buddy Miller, drummer Marco Giovino and bassist Byron House. “I’m working with arch-bishops of good taste,” Plant said.

The band first hit the studio last December, recording in the 10 days leading to Christmas, but Plant was a bit disappointed with the results. “It sounded like Moby Grape outtakes,” he said. “I was in absolute heaven. But I took it home and realized there was absolutely nothing that kicked up.” He called up Patty Griffin and asked her “to add her Shangri Las-type vocals,” Plant said. The singer gave the group the jolt Plant was seeking: “After Christmas, we went into overdrive.”

“People say to me, ‘How do we know what you’re going to do next?’ “he said. “And I have no idea what I will do. I just know that the first four hours when you meet musicians are the most crucial in your life with those guys. You know then whether there’s something really magical there or if you’re just churning it out. I don’t like to go anywhere near that latter condition.” After speaking about musical magic, he overheard King Khan and the Shrines’ “I Wanna Be a Girl” playing on the bar’s stereo and demanded to know the name of the garage-rock band.

“I’m happy to be in what seems to be a familiar condition,” he said. “I’m touring without a record. In this day and age, the Eagles can’t even do that.”

Jim Allen added “As the album began to play, the ultra-urban atmosphere was swiftly transformed by the greasy, rootsy music wafting from the speakers. With Miller’s dirty, tremolo-laden guitar twined around Plant’s smoky voice, the first comparison called to mind was the sort of swamp-ambient atmospheres Daniel Lanois created on Emmylou Harris’ 1995 Wrecking Ball album. That feeling intensified as country-gospel harmonies gave way to a deliriously dusty guitar solo on “House of Cards.” Things got scrappier on the country blues stomp “Central Two-O-Nine,” with banjo and acoustic guitar combining for an old-time string band vibe.
As Band of Joy moved along, one couldn’t help imagining Miller and Plant foraging through the musical underbrush of Americana for source material. Texas R&B singer Barbara Lynn’s “You Can’t Buy My Love” became a rockabilly shuffle propelled by muscular bass lines and backlit by swampy, psychedelic wah-wah guitar. The Kelly Brothers’ Chicago soul nugget “I’m Falling in Love Again” shimmered with steel guitar licks and doo-wop backing vocals. Even a little-known Austin country-rock band, Milton Mapes was represented, with Plant’s Don Williams-meets-Rod Stewart take on their tune “The Only Sound That Matters.”
Things got earthier still on the spare, banjo-laced, traditional folk ballad “Cindy I’ll Marry You Someday” and a haunted-house version of the old gospel number “Satan, Your Kingdom Must Come Down.” Oddly, a cover of Townes Van Zandt’s final composition, “Harm’s Swift Way” — a tune given to Plant by Van Zandt’s widow during the Raising Sand tour — was the closest-sounding thing to a contemporary country track, and it wasn’t difficult to imagine it becoming a hit for, say, Josh Turner, with a slightly less idiosyncratic arrangement.
After some luminous clouds of spacey guitar ended the closing track, “Even This Shall Pass Away,” the Rounder brass popped up for a few quick words. And then suddenly, rock royalty was in the room. Unassuming in T-shirt and jeans, Plant seemed slightly self-conscious about the circumstances and got a laugh from the crowd with his first words, “That was creepy.”
Plant, his head still framed by his trademark mane of long curls and his chin sporting some salt-and-pepper whiskers, joked that Band of Joy will keep him from “touring without a record,” adding “Even the Eagles can’t do that.” He observed that even though he recorded American music at the very beginning of his career, cutting a Young Rascals song (“You Better Run”) with the original Band of Joy, it took him four decades to figure out how to record with Americans.
After referring coyly to Zeppelin’s notorious 1970s exploits with American groupies, wryly quipping “but penicillin’s easily available now,” Plant enthusiastically extolled the virtues of his current collaborators. He described Miller as “a spectacular curator of great music,” noting that the guitarist helped lend a psychedelic tinge to the album because “underneath it all he’s a huge fan of Roky Erickson and the 13th Floor Elevators.” He talked of how they cut all the tracks in just 10 days in Nashville, but they “sounded like Moby Grape outtakes” until Miller brought in Griffin to lend her “Cocteau Twins/Shangri-Las-type vocals” to the project.
A moment later, just as quickly and unobtrusively as he had appeared, Plant stepped out of sight, leaving a speakeasy full of blasé bizzers just a little star-struck.

Band of Joy hits stores September 13th, but Plant and his Band of Joy will tour before that, hitting 12 Southern US cities in July.

Jimmy Page was spotted in Rio last week at a samba school. Internet reports showed pictures of Page with Ivo Meirelles and other drummers and dancers at the “world famous” samba school Recreativo Escola de Samba Mangueira. Ivo Meirelles drummer (and president of the school) said that Page is planning on returning to Rio in September to record an album with musicians at the samba school. Page declined to talk with local press and was also planning on visiting other samba schools. He was in town until Monday, June 28th.

Carlos Santana has announced a new album of classic rock covers, to be released in September. The yet to be titled album will include such FM favorites as Cream’s “Sunshine of Your Love,” Deep Purple’s “Smoke on the Water” and Led Zeppelin’s “Whole Lotta Love.”

For the new album, Santana is relying on the same formula that has brought him success since 1999’s Supernatural, pulling in an all-star team of vocalists to tackle the tracks. So far, Santana has recorded “Sunshine of Your Love” with “Smooth” partner Rob Thomas, Jimi Hendrix’s “Little Wing” with Joe Cocker, the Stones’ “Can’t You Hear Me Knocking” with Stone Temple Pilots Scott Weiland, Def Leppard’s “Photograph” with Chris Daughtry, “Whole Lotta Love” with Chris Cornell, “Smoke on the Water” with Papa Roach’s Jacoby Shaddix, AC/DC’s classic “Back in Black” with rapper Nas, and The Beatles’ “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” with india.arie and Yo-Yo Ma.

Bonham’s of London Auction House held their Entertainment and Memorabilia sale last week. Leading Zep item to be sold was an original Bath Festival 1970 poster that went for £1,800