Sonic Boom: The Impact of Led Zeppelin. Volume 1 - Break & Enter. Frank Reddon
Auditorium Zeppelin show that you’re interested in. KISN was an important voice for the underground musical events that were coming to Portland. They also played the music they were promoting: Hendrix, The Stones, Vanilla Fudge, etc.
REDDON:
I noticed on the advertisement that “Vanilla Fudge” is in big print because it’s the headline act. Underneath it says, “Plus special guests Led Zeppilen” - spelled incorrectly. This was also the case when the band was billed as “Len Zefflin” in the advertisement for the next night at the Kennedy Pavilion, at Gonzaga University in Spokane on December 30, 1968. The “Len Zefflin” spelling mistake is probably the most outrageous error in an advertisement on this First U.S. and Canadian Tour of 1968-69.
STALL:
I guess that goes to show that nobody really knew who Led Zeppelin was at that point, since nobody could even get their name right!
REDDON:
That’s true, and that was the case in several of the advertisements on that tour I’ve been fortunate enough to scare up. I also got a kick out of the ticket prices - $3.75, $4.50 and $ 5.00.
STALL:
I know. Kind of hard to believe you could get a front row seat to see Led Zeppelin for $5.00! Nobody knew back then.
REDDON:
Oh, I’ll say, what a mind-bender that is! I hadn’t seen the Led Zeppelin ad for the December 29, 1968 date before so it’s a great find to substantiate this performance.
STALL: Yeah, good going.
REDDON:
Sorry to digress a moment there. What did you think when Led Zeppelin took the stage at the Portland Civic Auditorium?
STALL:
My friends and I weren’t really sure what to expect. You could probably say that for the entire audience. Here’s this new band with a great guitarist from The Yardbirds and three guys playing with him we’d never heard of. Anything was possible. Good or bad!
We got to our seats and there was a lot of excitement in the air, like there is before any concert, really. The Portland Civic Auditorium is a good place to see concerts. The acoustics are great and it seats a few thousand people. But you never know until you hear any new band. Anyway, as I mentioned, Led Zeppelin was the warm-up band. I knew they were good, when they started to play.
They did versions of cover songs, mostly blues tunes. They also had some of their own material like How Many More Times. Zeppelin sounded very different than The Yardbirds. They had a very rough, metallic edge to everything they did. You got the impression everything they were playing was done with attack, especially by Page’s guitar work. You could tell their roots were the blues but they were making the songs their own, the way they were doing them.
Page was really, really fast on the guitar. What a player - and loud! Plant’s vocals were almost out of control and had a desperate quality to them that I hadn’t heard in any other singer, quite like that. Bonham and Jones looked and sounded like they knew what they were doing. Like I said before, we didn’t know who Jones, Bonham and Plant were. My friends were stunned at how Zeppelin played too. We were all impressed at how good they were. And they were only an opening act.
REDDON: What did you think of Page’s use of the violin bow on his guitar?
STALL:
Very, very cool and inventive. It was a highlight of the show when he used that. The different sounds and the way it presented him visually were a lot for the senses to handle! Nobody else was producing sounds like the bowing of the guitar produced.
My friends and the rest of the audience loved what Led Zeppelin was doing. You could say their music was out of the ordinary and very distinctive. Using the violin bow looked as cool as it sounded…you couldn’t forget it and it stood out in your mind. Especially in relation to what other bands were doing. Nothing like that.
REDDON:
Did you get the impression Page was doing the guitar star trip and just had backing musicians to showcase him? Or did you feel they played well in the sense that it was a group effort with everyone contributing?
STALL:
No, I got the impression it was a group effort. They played very well together as a four-piece. Of course, Page’s solos put him as the centre of attention most of the time but that’s the role of a lead guitarist after all, isn’t it?
REDDON: Yes, that’s right.
STALL:
I thought they played very well as a group and everybody had some talent. That’s the way it came across.
REDDON: Any other comments about this performance?
STALL:
The fact we went into the concert anticipating the performance of Vanilla Fudge. We were really surprised how good Led Zeppelin turned out to be and I really enjoyed what they had to offer musically that night. I felt they were a group that would be heard about quite a bit in the future. But who would have known how popular they would get eventually?
REDDON: A couple of more questions, if that’s okay?
STALL: Sure, what are they?
REDDON: What did you think of Vanilla Fudge?
STALL:
Vanilla Fudge was great and the reason we went in the first place. My friends and I were taken with their performance. They’ll always be one of the best bands, in my opinion.
REDDON:
I know! I would have loved to have seen Vanilla Fudge there, too. They’re a super band. And what did you think of the Led Zeppelin LP?
STALL:
I’ll never forget this. I bought my copy of Led Zeppelin at a gas station, not a record store! It’s kind of a strange place to buy a record and not one you would think of getting an album, especially these days. But that’s where I bought it and that memory stays in my mind.
As for the songs on Led Zeppelin? The whole record is amazing. So many great songs. Dazed and Confused, You Shook Me, Communication Breakdown, How Many More Times. When I listened to the album after I saw Zeppelin at the Portland Civic Auditorium, the Portland concert was right there, memory-wise. The Led Zeppelin album was excellent material to tour with. The songs all came off really well live. You could also tell Zeppelin threw in a lot of improvisations, from all four musicians at different times, when playing live.
The live versions of the blues tunes they did at the Portland Civic Auditorium, as well as their own material, were different than the cuts off the Led Zeppelin LP. There’s also a lot of depth to the recording. It’s like you’re right there in the studio, in the midst of them when they’re recording. That’s a very rare quality to be able to put into the grooves of a record, but they did it with Led Zeppelin. For these reasons, I think Led Zeppelin is very well recorded. Besides the great music that’s on it, this makes it one of those classic records.
REDDON: Thanks a lot for your time and this interview, Bob.
STALL: You’re welcome, Frank. And good luck.
REDDON:
One more thing…if you ever come across that ticket stub for this Portland, 1968 concert, could you let me know so I could get a photocopy of it?
STALL:
Yeah, sure, no problem!
MACK & JACK McCARTHY
HELP ENZEPPLOPEDIA OUT OF A WHOLE LOTTA LOVE FOR LED ZEPPELIN
Mack McCarthy contacted Enzepplopedia and volunteered to