Led Zeppelin - Rock And Roll - The Forum, Los Angeles CA 6-25-1972 Part 17

Led Zeppelin 2nd Night The Forum Los Angeles CA 6-25-1972 Welcome Back To How The West Was Won Part 2 A Night At The Heartbreak Hotel Rock And Roll The show start off with the drone and very tight versions of “Immigrant Song” and “Heartbreaker.” Afterwards Plant tells the audience “we finally saved the airfare to get back. We’d like to try a number off the new album. We haven’t decided what we’re gonna do at the end of it yet, so you’re gonna have to bear with us. It’s called ‘Over The Hills And Far Away,’ which is always a good place to be.” This is the second live attempt of the new piece, having debuted as an encore on June 19th in Seattle. It is a bit tentative with some hesitation at the breaks, but Plant’s high pitched voice is clear and powerful. It is one of the few times it has been performed close to the studio recording. “Stairway To Heaven” was conceived, according to Plant, “on a very enlightened evening. I think it was an alternative to going to London’s version of the Whiskey a Go Go, or staying in and writing a song, and I just couldn’t make that club.” In the year since it’s live debut the song has already progressed into a ferocious live number. There seems to be some commotion afterwards. While they’re getting ready for the acoustic set, he asks “the gestapo to cool it a bit. If we can … you really can’t sing songs like that when they’re carting people out with little flash cameras, can ya? Anyway, let’s not use it as an excuse to get fucking silly. Let’s just cool it all together.” With four numbers, these are the longest acoustic sets they would play and the audience becomes a bit restless. Before “Tangerine” Plant scolds someone in the audience, saying: “why don’t you stop shouting brother? We got a long time. We got a long long time to go yet …You ain’t gonna believe this, but the best vibes on this tour so far, I mean, have been in strange places, and we’ve been known to play for twelve and a half hours, and then after that we went to the gig, and, sorry about that.” Plant offers a strange image by describing the song as about “the beauty of unspoiled country and King Arthur riding across the glen. This is where Bonham runs across the stage on a broomstick.” After the folk-rock section of the show, they play one of the all-time best versions of “Dazed & Confused.” At close to a half hour, it is one of the longest versions of the tour. The transitions between the sections are also extremely tight, far from the disjointedness of other versions from the era. They include “Walter’s Walk” and “The Crunge” with Plant’s exhortation for the white people to dance. This version is so good that Page used it virtually complete for How The West Was Won. After “What Is And What Should Never Be,” they play the new song “Dancing Days” for the third time live. Plant jokes with the audience, telling them their next album “is not gonna be called Led Zeppelin V. It’s got every possibility of begin called Burn T