History Lesson: Knebworth 1979

When Led Zeppelin had long since faded away as the best rock band in the world, Fred Bannister, a promoter, had asked Zeppelin to do two shows at Knebworth, both of which could hardly be filled. The first show only saw roughly 200,000 people, and a week later, at the next show, under 40,000 people attended. (Mick Wall, 2008)

My point for sharing this history lesson and these pictures is two facts about the programs you may not have known:

The sky was superimposed from Texas.

The sky was cloudy at Knebworth, so promoters took a Texas sky and superimposed it to make it seem more jolly.

They're looking at a naked girl.

Ever wonder what they're looking at in the distance? It wasn't the camera crew. It was a naked 16 year old girl; promoters knew Zeppelin had been edgy since Robert's son, Karac's, death, so to make it more comfortable for the band, they brought in a naked girl to loosen them up.

The Song Remains the Same

The next morning I woke in Jimmy's tight embrace near the fire. I was the first one awake, unable to breathe from sleeping on the floor so near the fireplace. Evening that day had come swiftly, and with it came work. Joe Massot, a man who I was told had filmed the boys' performances at Madison Square Garden in New York in the summer for a full feature-length movie to be released in years to come, had arrived shortly after three with a full camera crew, doubly as unprofessional as he seemed. Though I had my doubts as to his photography prowess, I forced myself to say nothing and sat in the foreground as he, Peter, and Jimmy discussed what they were going to do, John Paul hanging around to polish off some tea.

They were to shoot Jimmy's "dream-scene," as Joe described it. "I don't know exactly what you want to do for your scene, you need to map it out for us."

"Well," Jimmy began in his soft-spoken voice, "I figure when darkness hits, which, around here, is six, I want to go off and climb that hill backing my house and reach for a hermit standing over the edge using just the full moon as light."

"We may have some troubles with that," Joe pondered aloud. "I don't want to climb that hill to film you; it's icy and I've got a family."

"We've all got a family," I snapped. "But we all do our jobs."

Joe glared toward me and replied evenly, "I'm sure your boss loves that you're taking time off to diddle around with a band you're not even part of, miss."

"Hey," Jimmy interjected, pointing toward Joe. 

"I'm sure your boss loves that you're not willing to do your job because you're afraid to climb a little mountain." I crossed my arms and legs in contempt.

"I am my own boss," he hissed.

"Likewise." I looked around at Peter and said to him, implying to Joe, "Why would you even hire someone who doesn't want to do their job?"

"Lets stop this," John Paul muttered softly, his tea clamped between his freezing hands. "Joe, just do the shoot. Jenni, go out and look for some wood with Robert and Bon, will you? Richard just left for a Todd Rundgren tour and we're down on hands for wood."

I frowned and shot Jimmy a cross look before getting up without a word and leaving. I rolled my eyes and stormed into the living room where my boots roasted beside the fire. I grabbed them and slipped them on, surprised and welcomed by the heat, before stomping outside to labor for no reason other than that the guys were mad at me for speaking the truth.

♫♪♫♪♫♪♫♪♫♪♫

"You know he's going to go back to ignoring you when we get back to Henderson Collige," Robert warned as he dug for wood on the mountainside beside the house. "Charlotte'll be out and he'll go back to Bianca."

"No, not Jimmy," I reassured myself. More to Robert, "He'll tell Bianca how he feels, I know he will. Why would you lie? Why would he act like he likes me now if he's just going back to Bia?"

"He's a lady-killer, Jen," Robert concluded. "It'll have to end now or Bianca will find out and move."

"I can't live at Henderson Collige without Bianca! We've been friends since secondary school!"

"My point," Robert nodded. "Bon!"

"Yeah?" Bonzo's voice called from the near distance.

"What's your bet on the whole Jimmy-Jenni-Bianca schpeil?"

There was a pause as the whole sentence carried across the distance. "Team Pam!" he shouted back. 

Robert laughed and explained, "Miss Pam from LA. No, Bon, not an option!"

"He'll leave them all! Lady-killing bastard!"

Robert cocked his head toward me and I pursed my lips in a far-away manner, offset by the possibility that Jimmy's compassion could very well be boredom.  No, it couldn't be boredom, Jimmy loved me, I was sure of it. If not love, he really felt passionately for me. Sure, my brain knew better, saying that everything was just going too quickly for reality, but I wanted to follow my heart. How was it going to be, going back to Henderson Collige? 

Sympathy for the Devil

We arrived at Boleskine House a quarter to eight the next day after a seemingly relentless seven hour drive, having been drawn back due to extremely slick roads. The snow had been falling so thickly that it was impossible to tell the horizon from the sky. Miraculously, Richard had gotten them to the house safely, even as he came down from his high. The house itself was long and atrociously decorated, but I said nothing. Out back was a solidified pool in the center of the courtyard, only visible in the snow because of the height difference.

The hall that lead to the living room had red plaid walls and plaid carpeting, almost taking my mind away from the fact that the house had no heating. Jimmy quickly lit the fireplace in the front room, sending Richard, John, and some producer out to go get some wood in the blanketed forest. The view from the house was grand, at least, overlooking the partially frozen Loch Ness. Tons of small saplings had been planted before the house on the slope, making the snow uneven.

Robert, Bonzo, and Peter all collected around the feeble fire hungrily, their breath flying away in clouds as they all but sat in the fireplace. Jimmy's nose was beet red, as I expected mine to be, and the bags under his eyes were green. As I waited my turn for the fire, he took my hand and led me to the kitchen. He hopped on to the counter and smiled down at me with his lovable face. I stepped toward him and placed a hand on his thigh, laughing as he flinched.

"Now, why would you flinch?" I laughed with minute sarcasm. "Afraid I'm going to rib your bollocks off?"

"Well, when you put it like that," he joked sensuously. I placed my hand on his thigh a second time and he didn't flinch. "Better?"

"Oh shut up," I teased. "I'm cold and tired, I'm not in the mood for jokes. This house is weird."

"Funny you would say that," he observed. "Don't go in the dining room." He hopped off the counter and started for the door, looking back and winking.

"Why?" I asked.

"It was an alter."

"For a wedding? Please tell me for a wedding." Jimmy shook his head and I felt my heart stop for a second. "A demon alter?"

"You could call it that. That seems to be all Aleister Crowley was able to summon. Just don't go in there, I don't want you to get hurt."

"That's not funny, Jimmy. Don't scare me."

He sauntered back to me and shoved his hands back into his coat pockets. "I'm not joking, Jen." He kissed me on the forehead and left the kitchen, and, more importantly, me.

I looked across the hall at the dining room, darkened by closed blinds and no ceiling light. A large farmhouse table was nestled in the middle of the room surrounded by chairs, all quirky in some way. One chair had been flipped upside down and placed on the table while a majority of them were turned in different directions around the table. One lay on its side under the table and another sat atop an overturned one. My heart racing, I shuffled toward the room, my heart in my throat. Jimmy said not to go in there, I thought, so, therefore, I have to go in there. He's just trying to scare me. There's not really a- uh.

I stopped dead in my tracks at the mouth of the room as a loud bang came from down the hall. I wasn't prepared to go see what it was lest I turn my back on this supposedly cursed room. I slowly shuffled in. The room was illuminated in a brilliant blue where it wasn't pitch black and my anxiety began to get the best of me. Is my brain making up things or were those red eyes in the corner? Was that chair there before? Did the table just move?

Before I could slink any deeper into the room, something from behind me grabbed my coat and shouted, "Rah!"

I jumped and fell back on the ground, prepared to crab walk backwards away from whatever had touched me. Smirking down at me was Bonzo, a beam of pride in his face. I propped myself up on my elbow and frowned at him, my adrenaline pumping so hard that I wanted to cry, run, and laugh all at the same time.

Laughing harder that I had ever seen him laugh, Bonzo extended a kind and calloused hand toward me, which I slapped away without another thought. Between fits of laughter he said, "Sorry, Jen, Jimmy told me to."

I rolled my eyes and got up. I could take a joke, but after telling Jimmy I wasn't in the mood for laughing, I was fit to be tied.

5000 Views!

Oh my God! I've made 5000 views! I never thought I'd reach 5000 FREAKING VIEWS! Thank you, all! Here is your "doozy" of a rare picture compilation. You know the new goal, ladies and gents, carry on! 

Happy Fourth of July! (Happy birthday Mark Slaughter, and happy birthday America!)

Red Blog

Yeah, I gave the blog a bit of a facelift. My apologies if you don't like it, and feel free to comment what you think of it, but I felt that the previous design was a bit childish.

Jimmy's Pendant 1977

First of all, enjoy these pictures of Jimmy's performances at the LA Forum during the 1977 North American Tour. Second, would you kindly turn your attention to the necklace in all of these pictures.

Does anyone know anything about this necklace and pendant that Jimmy wore during the 1977 tour, specifically during-- but not exclusive to-- the six dates at the LA Forum? I really want to learn more about this pendant and I want to buy it. If anyone has any information at all on the necklace, please feel free to tell me all that you know! It would be much appreciated!

It's a silver-inlaid tear-drop stone that looks like (possibly) Turquoise, maybe Seraphina like the necklace I have now, maybe limestone (though they don't make pendants out of that, I'm just exercising my options here), I'm not sure. Help me out, Zeppelinites! 

I Can't Get No Satisfaction

Mad rapping on our door erupted at a quarter to three the next morning, the actual morning of Christmas, and I rolled out of bed, pulling my shirt down low over the front of my panties. Opening the door, I noticed a coked-up Bonzo and Ricardo buzzing around. Both eyed me but said nothing.

"We know whose on the fourteenth!" Bon shouted and I shushed him, glancing back at the sleeping Jimmy. "It's the!-- it's the Stones. Keith 'n--"

"Jagger and Ronnie," Ricardo supplied, "and Fuckface on drums. They've got dog bags for guests of smack-- here." He handed me a sandwich bag of what appeared to be-- but I knew all too well not to be-- flour.

"No, really, I--" I began.

"You have to go up there," Richard insisted. "I told Keith about you and he wants to meet you!"

I grinned. "Does he really?" The two nodded fiercely and I hesitated. "Let me get dressed, two minutes." I closed the door and navigated through the dark to my overnight bag, feeling around for my brown Corduroy pants and tan tunic. I tossed the drug bag into the bed absent-mindedly.

Jimmy moaned, then grumbled, "What's going on?"

"Shh shh shh," I cooed, "quiet Tiny Dancer, you've had a busy day today."

With another moan Jimmy faded back to sleep and I pulled on my pants and shirt, my heart racing. I slipped on some mod heels, pulled my hair into a tail, and rubbed the makeup from under my eyes. I swiftly went back to the door and swung it open, but Ricardo and John were gone. My heart still soaring, I shuffled toward the elevator. Once inside, I pressed fourteen, happy the adviser was home for the night. Tapping my foot to the ruckus upstairs, my heart once again took a plunge. Was I really going to meet Mick Jagger!?

The elevator opened to quite a sight. A man I didn't know was racing down the hall on a motorcycle, jumping off in time for the motor cycle to crash through a window and fall to the street below. I gasped and exited the elevator, walking wide-eyed through the hall lined with groupies. Ricardo's head popped out from a doorway, signalling for one of the nearest groupies to join him. Upon seeing me, he pointed to a room across from him and mouthed "Keith Richards!"

I smiled and adjusted my clothes before strutting into the room, ignoring the disapproving shouts from the groupies in line. Inside, the room was painted yellow but ruined so much that it was almost impossible to tell what else the room may have looked like. A shattered table lie on the floor between six seated people, two of which were Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, girls in their laps.

"Excuse me?" I shouted over the music blasting in the corner. Keith and Mick looked my way but neither seemed to care. I walked up to Keith and whispered in his ear, "Richard Cole sent me, my name is Jenni Carsons."

He looked over his shoulder and grinned at her. "Don't you see I'm sort of busy? Go wait in line." To the girl in his lap be added, "No, not you, Sugar, stay there."

I growled and left, looking for Ricardo. Anxiously, expecting far worse, I glanced into the room he had disappeared into and was relieved when I saw that he was just making out with the girl he had invited in beside several other men I had never seen before bar Robert, who had just joined the party. "Ricardo?" I snapped.

He pulled away and looked at me with drunken grogginess. "What?"

"I thought you said Keith wanted to meet me!" I crossed my arms in frustration. Richard broke out in hysterical laughter, pulling at his hair before studying his own hand. "Nevermind." Seeing that I was obviously not welcome, I stomped out of the room and back down the hall toward the elevator.

When I got back into the room with Jimmy, he woke up long enough to inquire, "Where did you go?"

"The Lu," I lied in immense frustration. I had had a wasted morning when all I really wanted to do was sleep.