As telegraphed by its title, the recently-released Led Zeppelin documentary Becoming Led Zeppelin only charts the band's early, formative years, ending with the quartet's now-legendary performance at London's Royal Albert Hall on January 9, 1970. Bernard MacMahon's film only enhances Zeppelin's reputation as one of the greatest live rock bands in history... and fortunately cuts off long before the group's lacklustre, at times shambolic, reunion show at 1985's Live Aid concert confused those of us who were seeing the hard rock icons perform for the very first time.
At this point, we should insert a very obvious and important caveat: Led Zeppelin ended with the death of drummer John Bonham, aged just 32, on September 25, 1980. And while Robert Plant, Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones have shared stages since losing their friend and bandmate, they have always been at pains to stress that, without Bonham, the band's heartbeat, there could never again be a truly authentic Led Zeppelin live performance.
Given his long-standing friendship and professional relationship with Robert Plant, Phil Collins would have known this, and therefore would have been fully aware that he was on a hiding to nothing when he accepted an invitation to be a part of Zeppelin's 'reunion' performance at Live Aid. Even so, it appears that Collins was unprepared for the sheer scale and fury of the criticism which followed in the wake of their 22 minutes onstage at Philadelphia's John F. Kennedy Stadium on July 13, 1985.
Queen's standing as one of rock's greatest ever live bands may have been amplified by their superb early evening performance at London's Wembley Stadium, but it's fair to say that, on the other side of the Atlantic, the mythology around Jimmy Page's golden gods would be tarnished rather than enhanced by their participation. The members of Led Zeppelin knew it too, and blocked footage of the gig being released, which is why you won't find any trace of their performance on the official ten hour four-disc DVD set later issued to document 'The Day The Music Changed The World'. Unfortunately for all involved, deleting every upload of the gig on YouTube isn't quite so easy. If you've never seen it before, it's quite the eye-opener: if you have, it's even worse than you remembered.
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When interviewed by MTV's Alan Hunter immediately after coming off-stage in Philadelphia, Robert Plant admitted that he'd been 'struggling with the monitor mix", but rather pointedly added "the three of us know what we're doing, and everybody that helped us did their very, very best", a barbed comment rather accentuated by John Paul Jones pointing to Collins, sitting alongside him. In subsequent comments about the gig, Jimmy Page was even less subtle: "We had two hours’ rehearsal, not even that, and the drummer just could not get the beginning of Rock and Roll," he told The Times in 2021. “We were in real trouble so that was not very clever." In another interview, Page referred to Collins as "bashing away cluelessly and grinning" when playing Whole Lotta Love.
Collins, however, has absolutely refused to be scapegoated.
"I know the wheels are falling off from early on in the set," he wrote in his 2016 autobiography Not Dead Yet. I can’t hear Robert clearly from where I’m sat, but I can hear enough to know that he’s not on top of his game. Ditto Jimmy." Admitting that he felt "very uncomfortable" throughout the performance, Collins added, if I could have left that stage, I would have left, halfway through Stairway... if not earlier. But imagine the coverage of that? Walking off during The Second Coming? Who the fuck does Collins think he is? [Bob] Geldof really would have had something to swear about."
That same year, he told The Telegraph, “I felt I had been made the scapegoat for what happened at Live Aid and so it was a chance to set the record straight.”
He then proceeded to do so again, in a pretty brutal manner.
“It wasn’t pleasant," he acknowledged. "If you watch the video, you can see Jimmy dribbling onstage, Robert not hitting the notes, and you can see me miming, playing the air, just to get out of the way.... When Zeppelin get together, something happens. Bad karma."
"Here’s how it is," Collins concluded. "Robert on his own: a lovely bloke. Robert and anything to do with Zeppelin: a strange chemistry happens. It’s like a nasty strain of alchemy. Everything becomes very dark – sulphurous even."
Ahead of Zeppelin's Live Aid 'turn', it was actually Collins who introduced Plant, Page and Jones, describing the three musicians as "some friends of mine." We're going to go out on a limb and suggest that he might not use the word "friend" in conjunction with at least one of the trio today.
