Stairway To Heaven by Richard Cole Read Free Book Online

other people’s money!” he complained to friends. “I’d rather be the one making the money!”
    Without any regrets, Robert shifted his full attention back to music. As before, he jumped from one band to another, ending up with a group called the Band of Joy. Like Robert’s earlier musical ventures, however, this one had only minimal success. The gigs came much too infrequently, and most of them played to half-empty houses. As if Robert wasn’t feeling bad enough, he was constantly at odds with the band’s manager.
    â€œDo you know what the problem is, Robert?” the band’s manager asked him one day. “I don’t think you sing very well! You might think seriously about leaving the band.”
    Robert left in a rage with his ego bruised. Yes, his voice was a bit wild, but he felt there was something unique about it, too. He tried to deflect the criticism, not let it grate upon him, but it was hard. He was determined to keep on going, even though his voice wasn’t making him any money. He held onto the group’s name, and the Band of Joy soon re-formed in a second—and then eventually a third—generation that went off in a number of unexpected directions. The last incarnation featured a zany, long-haired, mustachioed drummer named John Bonham, who was never fully content with the enormous power and fury he used to bring to his performing. To create even more gusto, Bonham would line his drums with aluminum foil to give them more of a crackling, explosive sound—and hopefully to attract more public attention to the group.
    But, in fact, the Band of Joy had to resort to much more to win the hearts of its audiences. The members of the band sometimes performed with painted faces. They wore long tailcoats. They staged miniwars with one another, using toy machine guns. The overweight bass player, attired in a caftan and bell-bottom pants, would swan dive from the stage into the crowd, creating terror on the faces of its members, who must have thought the Hindenburg (or was it the Zeppelin? ) was crashing upon them. If there was a message he was trying to communicate, no one could quite figure out what it was.
    One night as the Band of Joy performed at Victoria Hall in Selkirk, an inebriated member of the audience heaved a pie at Plant. Since Robert was a constantly moving target, the pie splattered harmlessly a few feet from him.
    â€œThe Band of Joy played about two gigs a week, but we weren’t making much money,” recalled Robert a few years later. “If I hadn’t been married by then, and my wife, Maureen, didn’t have a job, I wouldn’t have eaten. It was that simple. I would have been in the welfare lines.”
    In a sense, Maureen was Robert’s savior, and he knew it. Without her financial support—not to mention her emotional support—he might have given up long before anyone had ever heard of Led Zeppelin. He had met her at a Georgie Fame concert, and they began living together shortly thereafter and eventually got married. When Robert wasn’t bringing home any money, she made sure they still had a roof over their heads. When his self-confidence wavered, she helped stabilize it. He often said that if it hadn’t been for Maureen, he might have gone nuts.
    The Band of Joy continued to struggle. They worked their way up to about seventy quid a night, played songs by Sonny Boy Williamson and the Grateful Dead and even recorded a few demos at the Regent Sound studios. But much to their frustration, they never landed a recording contract. Finally, disheartened that the band wasn’t going anywhere, Robert decided that the battle wasn’t worth fighting anymore. The Band of Joy disbanded.
    Once again, Robert was faced with making some hard decisions about his future. In early 1967, he did some construction work, pouring asphalt along West Bromwich High Street and using his earnings (six shillings tup-pence an hour)