Remember about the countdown on Led Zeppelin’s facebook page and all the hype as people were hoping for a reunion tour? Let's be clear, Led Zeppelin, like the Smiths, will never tour again, this will never happen, at least this is what they have repeated again during a press conference at the New York Museum of Modern Art, last Tuesday.
But the countdown was for the release of ‘Celebration Day’, the concert film that captured their reunion performance at the O2 Arena in London in 2007, and the movie will be in theater for one day only on Wednesday October 17, before being released as an album-DVD-Blu-ray on November 19.
According to Entertainment Weekly, 68-year-old Jimmy Page has cleared up any speculation by declaring ‘It’s disappointing for people when the answer is no. But that’s what it is now.’
Unfortunately for the legendary band, the film did not received the unanimity of the critics; this is what EW wrote about it:
‘As for the movie, it’s a mess. The 18,000 people who were at that tribute show for late Atlantic Records founder Ahmet Ertegun will tell you it was the best concert in rock history, but Celebration Day is not a good concert film. It’s little more than two hours of shots of the band playing, presented without narrative or context. If you had no idea what Led Zeppelin was (or even who Ahmet Ertegun was) there’s no way it would be at all meaningful. Plant’s voice sounds exceptionally rough in places, and the set list too often chooses Phish-y jamming over Jurassic thud’.
The New York Times is quite neutral but not very enthusiastic:
‘The film is a no-frills record of the band’s two-hour performance on Dec. 10, 2007, in honor of Ahmet Ertegun, the Atlantic Records founder. That camera captures the concert from start to finish, bringing the viewer close to the musicians, with very few shots of the audience and no backstage scenes.
The director, Dick Carruthers, who used more than a dozen cameras to film the concert, chose to stress closeups of the band members in action, giving fans an intimate look at their playing techniques, their nods and nonverbal cues to each other, and their boyish grins when the music came together. The film includes no interviews, nor backstory segments, nor archival footage of the group in the 1970s.’
But the Boston Globe and the Telegraph loved it. Anyway, you now know what to expect and can visit Led Zeppelin’s website to find show times at a theater near you, or just wait till November 19.
Another thing, John Bonham’s son Jason was replacing his late father on drums for this concert, may be the closest thing to the original, but still a little awkward for a 'reunion'. Here is the trailer: