Robert Plant
Robert Plant told Absolute Radio's Ben Jones why Led Zeppelin won't be reforming, he talks about receiving his OBE, what it’s like having Obama as president and his new album with Alison Kraus.
He told Ben; "I think the thing about it is really, is that to visit old ground, it's a very incredibly delicate thing to do, and the disappointment that could be there once you commit to that and the comparisons to something that was basically fired by youth and a different kind of exuberance to now, its very hard to go back and meet that head on and do it justice.... the reason that it stopped was because we were incomplete, and we've been incomplete now for 28 years.
No matter what you do, you have to really guard the discretion of what you've done in the past and make sure that you have all the reasons in the right place to be able to do something with absolute, total conviction.
I mean, if my great award is to do this, then I don't want to do anything where we challenge what we did in the first place by just going back and visiting it without having a new, fresh makeover start."
On deserving his OBE and whether he would accept the award or turn it down:
Well I haven't got anything yet. I've got a tuna melt, I've got some sandwiches, but I haven't got any awards yet.... Here's the thing, you are given the opportunity, you know, you can tick a box that says yes or tick a box that says no, and I thought long and hard about it and it said the award, in inverted commas, is suggested for a contribution to British music and song writing, and I reckon that 42 years of making records, that that's a gong.
It's this time of life that the gongs start coming in, they're usually called lifetime achievement awards, but basically somebody helps you across the street if there's a lot of traffic. So I didn't figure… I mean, one way or another, you know, I said to somebody well maybe I should say no, I'll wait for the knighthood, for a laugh.
And Elton John called the other day, and I haven't spoken to him for years, talking about soccer and stuff, and the guy who passed me the phone said its Sir Elton, and I went oh, I never thought about it like that.
But over here in America, people like this old notoriety, the idea of being cuffed round the back of the head by royalty, it has a certain swing to it. I mean, as far as I can see, they've got the greatest royal on the planet at the moment.
Robert Plant:As far as I can see, [America's] got the greatest royal on the planet at the moment.
Alison Kraus: Well I imagine it will stick around for a while. It was a beautiful day, the day of the inauguration, everybody walked in and what a sense of peace and hope from everyone. I mean, the studio was a completely different day that day.
R: Oh yes.
A: What's wrong with these people.
R: Everybody was in tears, you know, and everybody has a story to tell about the day, but more importantly the next day, when he immediately started changing things. Once he'd got the other guy on the helicopter, it was time for some changes, and I guess it's a hell of a job he's got ahead of him, but his charisma and the people around him that he's accessing, it could be… it's going to be a hard, long struggle, like we all know about that, you know.
For me, well I don't have a career, I just have a bunch of great events in my life and a few dips and troughs. I don't think I've ever had a career. I think when Led Zeppelin… when we lost John in 1980, I was desperate to not reinstate but do something for myself, free from the kind of shackles of people's expectations.
And from that moment on, along the line, of course it would be great to get a reflection of your work, but career, it's not something I think about. I mean, if this works now, it's certainly worked up to now with Alison and with everybody around, its been a spectacular Technicolor adventure for me. I couldn't even have imagined this, its just really quite something very, very different and very challenging.
And she said to me about an hour ago, we were sitting and she said what's the matter with you, I said I'm frightened by the limitations that I've got in this environment, it's quite spectacular really. But career? Oh no, this is just a bonus.
Robert Plant and Alison Krauss confirmed that they're going back into the studio to record a second album together and the album will be called A Gated Community because their work "is like being in..."
RP: Well Alison's got a term for it, what did you call it?
A: I call it pre-production, a mysterious term.
R: Yes, we've got a whole bunch of songs and we're just going does that work and does that work. Yes, so we're trying it out again. Yes. It's absolutely right, yes. Last night's title for the next project was called A Gated Community, because it's like being in a looney bin.
Listen to Ben Jones on Absolute Radio weeknights from 8pm.