John Bonham lives.

Reading through threads about the Beatles and Freddie Mercury I thought of John Bonham, drummer for Led Zeppelin. His death in the fall of 1980 caused the cancellation of an upcoming North American tour and resulted in Led Zeppelin disbanding shorty afterwords. What could have happened if John Bonham had lived into the 80s? What might have the 1981 tour been like? What creative direction might the band have taken? How would this have effected the legacy of Led Zeppelin?
 
Well, to be horribly honest, given what happened to the great 70s bands in the 80s (Aerosmith's cover songs and drug-induced disintegration, Steve Miller's foray into empty electronica, etc.) I'd be afraid for Zeppelin's sake to see them performing into the MTV age. The best hope is what happens a decade later when all the great 70s bands had their renaissance.
 

Tovarich

Banned
Geekis' has a point, Led Zep at LiveAid were appalling, so bad I can't bring myself to link to the footage!

A few years later though, I was at Knebworth in 1990 when they completely unexpectedly made an unannouced performance and, despite being old farts -ie, not quite so old as I am now! - they would've blown the roof off the place (had it had a roof).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=czShamG0z40
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GB3euvizC10&feature=related

Just goes to show what a bit of getting over ennui and a couple of hours actually rehearsing together first can achieve, eh?
 
The low points for many of the great bands of the 70s was in the early to mid 80s, due to excessive drug, alcohol use and changing styles. Most of these bands had a struggle just to stay relevant. It seems that moving into the 80s Led Zeppelin was starting to get a handle on the excess. (Page kicking heroin sometime in 1982-83) The video era would have been kinder to them than many of their contemporaries.(Kiss, Journey, Rush, Rolling Stones, Aerosmith, too many others to mention) Don't forget that with "The Song Remains the Same" they helped popularize the medium.

Note: "New power ballad from Aerosmith" possibly they most chilling words in the English language.
 
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According to Jimmy Page, the next Led Zepp album would have been a return to hard rock rather than all synthesizers and over-production.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Through_the_Out_Door

I think they definitely had at least a couple more albums in them, whoo know maybe they would have gone against the grain of 80s music and kept rock n roll alive through that dreary decade.

If Ozone Baby and Wearing and Tearing are any indicators, I think the next album would have featured both tracks and would have been a return to their roots type of album.

They recorded Ozone... and Wearing... during the ITOD sessions but for whatever reasons, they were kept off the album in favor of lesser tracks.

Which reminds me of one of Zep's most annoying habits: Keeping great tracks off albums they were recorded for, then releasing them later, often times on albums where they seem a bit out of place. (Or, in the case of Houses of The Holy...for God's Sake, IT WAS THE TITLE TRACK!!! HOW DO YOU KEEP THE TITLE TRACK OFF THE DAMN ALBUM?!))

The Rover and Houses of The Holy were recorded during the Houses of The Holy sessions...and were kept off the album in favor of tracks like The Crunge and D'yer Mak'er were put on instead, go figure...:rolleyes:

Traveling Riverside Blues: Recorded during the the period they were recording Led Zeppelin II...not used on that album, but that one I can see; it didn't even sound like Zeppelin III, let alone Zeppelin II.

Would have been a perfect fit on either [Insert Your Preferred Name for Zep's Fourth Album Here] or Houses... though.

You can make arguments for a lot of their songs that either never got released on the original albums (Hey, Hey, What Can I Do?, just another example) or were held off the albums they were recorded for.

Back to the topic at hand, I do like to think that Plant could have written In The Mood with Jimmy Page.

I mean, think about In The Mood and think about how great it would have sounded with Zep on the instruments.

Any rate, I take Page's word for it and say, harder Zep albums in the 80's, a few more albums and maybe semi-retirement by 1990 or so.
 
Weren't there rumors floating around of Cozy Powell possibly joining Led Zeppelin after Bonham's death? Might have been an interesting combination, even if it only lasted for some sort of farewell tour.
 
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