Anonymous wrote:

10:18 AM, Jan 28, 2003 |

Date of Concert: 9/2/2002 | Location: Cleveland, OH

My slightly longwinded review follows. I also sent it to tblweb.com, but it will probably be edited down there. I would like confirmation about my BCOH hypothesis if anyone was there. My last couple messages to FBO have not gotten through, and I'm not sure why. But here's another try... I missed Robert's gigs with the Who partially because I was broke most of the summer, but mostly because I'm not a big Who fan and was disappointed with Robert being merely an opening act to a band who hasn't put anything new out in years. Bill Curbishley may be making out famously on the pairing, but to me it's a mistake for Plant. Anyway, so being in the southwestern portion of New York State and about 9 hours away from New York City, Cleveland was my big chance to see Robert and company this year. Last year, I was able to catch three of the seven SS shows (Boston, Philadelphia, and Toronto) in North America and certainly didn't want to miss out this time around. I saw several people who looked familiar to me from Zepfest 2000 in Cleveland - Grant Burgess among them. I neglected to tell Grant that I enjoy his posts on FBO. I also saw the same security guard that had worked the JPJ/King Crimson show on Nov. 30, 2001. I didn't think he would remember me though, so I didn't say anything. I bought tickets online, but was able to upgrade from mezzanine seats to seats on the floor about 20 rows back from a guy outside the theater (who was actually not scalping and sold them at face value!). First of all, opening act was moe., who I'd seen on two previous occasions playing on their own. moe. is a "jam-band" in the tradition of perhaps The Grateful Dead, Phish, and even more recently, Widespread Panic. I'm sure there are other good examples. moe. typically play 3-4 hour shows (no exaggeration there) with a short intermission. They play their own material and occasionally covers of older bands (Led Zeppelin among those ranks - "Ramble On" for sure, as well as Aerosmith - "Sweet Emotion"). Long songs with few words and lots of instrumental prowess displayed. In Cleveland, they played maybe 4-5 songs with no covers that I was aware of. Good sound, good band. moe. will be with Plant for the rest of his US tour. There was a break of 30-35 minutes between moe.'s set and then no quiet intro in the dark as had been the case with the other SS gigs I saw - they blasted straight into Love's "7+7 Is". I like this song, and Plant must have warmed up well in the soundcheck and had some tea, because his voice was right on from the start. The crowd, which had mostly been sitting but applauding appreciatively for moe. (with the exception of a few quite spastic dancers scattered throughout the venue), was standing in anticipation when the lights went down and then exploded when the band appeared and then went up a notch when the first note was played. A great welcome for Plant. Robert wore a white button-down, short-sleeved shirt and stone-washed jeans. His beverages ranged from water to something in a mug (tea, presumably), to bottled beer for the encores. The next song was "Four Sticks" and the crowd was even more into it for this song. Plant was pleased with the reaction and greeted us with a "Good Evening, Ohio!" He introduced the next song, "Morning Dew" as being off his new album, and some people did sit down, but I would say the majority of those on the floor remained standing. "Morning Dew" was sort of halfway between last year's Strange Sensation version and the Dreamland version as far as tempo goes. Fair applause for this, while "Hey Joe" was more appreciated. The mix was not what I would call great, and the sound was muddled at various times - notably in the frenzied portions of "Hey Joe", "Tall Cool One", and I think "Calling To You" as well. People sat down for "Going To California" through tremendous applause and singing along with Plant. The crowd's accompaniment was not as dramatic as the Liverpool show that I recently heard. Plantations through the evening included continued references to Kylie, as well as mentions of "the girl from Australia with the nice ass" and various other females. I didn't catch all the names, but Kylie seemed to be brought up 4 or 5 times. I guess I'm out of the loop, but I don't know who Kylie is... "Hey, Hey, What Can I Do" was kind of a surprise and pretty well done with Justin Adams on mandolin and Skin on acoustic guitar (same set-up as GTC). The next song, however, was a bit of a shock. It was "In The Mood" off Plant's Principle of Moments. I had purposely not read the more recent setlists from TBL in hopes of catching a few surprises at the show. As you know, Plant didn't perform any solo tunes at the SS shows in 2001, and their addition to the set makes the whole show stronger in my opinion. Now, I could be very mistaken here, but after the first part of "In The Mood" when Plant's bands in the early 80's went into an extended instrumental improvisation, on Monday night it seemed to me that there was a deliberate break into a melody that seemed very familiar to me, but it took my mind a few songs to place it. I kept going through Zeppelin albums song by song and saying, "no, that's not it" until I realized that "Baby, Come On Home" off the "Whole Lotta Love" single released in 1997 or so was what I was thinking of. I am not certain that BCOH was what I heard. Robert didn't sing any lyrics and just went with various "mama, mama"s and "oh yeah"s through this portion until the basic melody from "In The Mood" resumed and the next verse was sung. Perhaps someone can either back me up or correct me on this. Or maybe we'll just have to wait for the bootleg...(incidentally, my email address is zepcowboy@hotmail.com...) "Calling To You" was introduced as "a Grammy nomination from 1993. I really like the Strange Sensation take on this song. Obviously, the song had Arabic/Middle-Eastern leanings originally, but the addition of Justin Adams on guitar has only furthered the composition's reach in that direction. "Tall Cool One" was dedicated to Elvis with a little background about his job driving a truck in Tennessee in 1953. Very upbeat and the crowd loved it. A lot of singing along for this song. "Fixin' To Die" was good, and I like Plant's take on this song, but it seemed like his heart wasn't quite into the song tonight. A bit lackluster. I would say the rest of the band, especially Charlie Jones made up for Plant's apparent lack of enthusiasm on the number. I'll limit my "I miss Jimmy Page" pleading for "Babe I'm Gonna Leave You", where his acoustic solo was sorely missed. Skin fills in for Porl Thompson quite well for the most part, but I would say his playing on this song could be improved upon. During this song, the security guards had a tough time with a couple people and notably one woman who was protesting vigorously both physically and verbally about being brought from her spot near the stage up the aisle. She was held down and restrained after the second time she ventured back down the stage. This was the closing song before the encores. Plant came back out less than five minutes of sustained applause later to another thunderous ovation. Plant warned the crowd that the next song was a bit slow, but that after that, we could go fast again. He said it was a bit like "makin' it", where of course you can't go fast ALL of the time. A fantastic version of "Song To The Siren" followed, with Robert holding one note for quite a while to the delight of the audience. Finally, it was "back to the Delta" for "Whole Lotta Love". Robert let us sing the "Woman, waaaaaay down inside" portion before him, which served to mimic the original album version where you can hear him in the background before the vocals are echoed in the foreground. A complete version of the song, unlike on VH1's Storytellers, where the song was cut short after the spacey midsection. No "every inch of my love" or "backdoor man" lyrics, though. Overall a stunning show. Despite the problems with the mix, I would say that Plant may have had a better voice Monday than last year's SS shows, at least consistently throughout the night. Robert seemed to be in high spirits and glad to be back in the headlining slot with enough time to present a complete show. The entire Strange Sensation crew took three bows with Plant at the end of the concert and were subjected to a great ovation. Great show! -Wyatt Brake Falconer, NY