In the final days of the spring 1970 North American tour, all of us were exhausted. Too much traveling, too little sleep, too much alcohol, too many drugs.
More than anyone, Robert seemed on the brink of collapse at times. He had been plagued by a cold for days, and his voice had taken a beating. It had become so ragged and hoarse that he could barely speak, much less sing. Professional pride would get him onto the stage each night, where he would push his voice as far as it would go. “Something’s got to give,” he said in a gravelly voice in Salt Lake City, with frustration written all over his face. “My voice is really shot; I don’t know how much longer I can last.”
We had humidifers operating around the clock in Robert’s hotel room to try to soothe and preserve his voice. But nothing seemed to help. Each night, he had to struggle a little more than the previous night to get through the show.
In mid-April, we were in Phoenix, staying at the Biltmore Hotel. “Maybe if I relax a little—get out of the hotel for a few hours—I’ll feel better,” he said. He asked me to schedule an afternoon of horseback riding.
Within an hour, he and a promotion man from Atlantic Records named Mario were out on a nearby trail with a couple of rented horses. Robert felt wonderful being out in the clean air. Ten minutes into the ride, however, it came to an abrupt end. Mario was thrown from his horse into a cactus. It took a doctor nearly half an hour to pull out all the thorns.
Later, Robert joked, “Actually, I did feel much better knowing it was Mario and not me who had to go through that ordeal.”
A physician in Phoenix examined Robert and didn’t like what he saw. He was worried about long-term damage and insisted that we cancel the final concert on the tour, planned for the next night at the Las Vegas Convention Center. But Robert was reluctant. “Let me try it,” he said. “It’s just one more gig. What a shame to let down the fans.”
Like the rest of the band, Robert was troubled by the thought of disappointing an audience. In a voice that was barely audible, he said, “I’ll try drinking a lot of hot tea tonight, and maybe my voice will be good enough for one last performance.”
The next morning, however, Robert’s voice was no better. Peter stepped in and took control of the situation. “That’s it, Robert,” he said. “There will be no show tonight. You’ve sung twenty-nine concerts in thirty-one days. The doctor says that if you sing without a long rest, you could ruin your voice permanently. You’re not going to risk destroying your career for one concert. I’ve already made the decision. We’re going home.”
We flew directly from Phoenix to New York and then on to London. Following doctor’s orders, Robert barely uttered a word on the trip home.
Back in England, Robert couldn’t sit still. For a guy who often complained that the band didn’t take enough time off, he was getting antsy just a week after returning home.
Robert told us he had been fighting with Maureen. Yes, life on the road was hectic, but at home, it was hell, at least for the moment. He thought maybe if he and Maureen got away—and took Jimmy with them on a working vacation—it could take the edge off their marital conflicts.
So barely more than a week after arriving back in England, Robert called Jimmy: “I’m ready to go back to work. Let’s write some songs.”
In the year and a half since Led Zeppelin had been created, Robert’s talents seemed to have evolved more dramatically than the others. He not only sang with more confidence, but he began to believe in himself as a song-writer. No, he didn’t picture himself yet on a par with Jimmy—but he was on his way. He certainly didn’t feel intimidated or insecure, even though he was writing with one of the best.
Jimmy and Robert began to see what they could put together. Accompanied by Robert’s family and Charlotte Martin, they drove to South Wales, staying in a mountain cottage called Bron-Yr-Aur, which means “Golden Breast” in Welsh (“Bring back a couple of those golden breasts for me,” I told them).
Located near the River Dovey, Bron-Yr-Aur was a primitive setting—there was no electricity, so the lighting was provided by gaslight. Robert and Jimmy found some time for relaxation, including jeep rides through the hills. But they primarily were there to begin writing songs for Zeppelin’s third album: “Out On the Tiles”…“Celebration Day”…“Bron-Y-Aur Stomp.” They would take a portable tape recorder and sometimes a guitar with them on walks and would come back with both words and melody. On one of those hikes, they sat down in a small valley, Jimmy began picking out a tune, and Robert immediately improvised a verse. Fortunately, the tape recorder was running. The song quickly evolved into “That’s the Way.”
Robert took the lead in some of the songs for the album. His fascination with Celtic legends became the creative force behind “Immigrant Song.” His dog, Strider, was the inspiration for “Bron-Y-Aur Stomp.” The songs came quickly.
By mid-May, Led Zeppelin was ready to record. No one, however, was particularly interested in returning to the formality of a recording studio. “What other options do we have?” Bonzo asked.
“Let’s rent a retreat somewhere and bring in a mobile studio,” Jimmy suggested. No one argued with him.
Carol Browne, our secretary, made some calls and found a large country house called Headley Grange, located about forty miles from London, that we could rent. I helped the band get settled there, opening an account at the local market and bringing back the first batch of groceries and liquor. While the band was recording, I sometimes would take roadies Mick Hinton and Clive Coulson into town to a bar that would gladly serve us booze for hours.
The band’s third album showed a more versatile Led Zeppelin—the same Zeppelin energy that had already brought Europe and America to their knees, but also a more romantic and softer sound at times. Jimmy played the banjo for the first time on “Gallows Pole,” an old folk tune that Page and Plant arranged. The banjo belonged to John Paul. Jimmy saw it propped in a corner, picked it up, and started fooling around with it. “I love the sound,” he told John Paul, and he kept returning to it at every break. Finally, he began looking for a song where he could use it. “Gallows Pole” fit the bill.
On “That’s the Way,” the first few renditions they recorded were electrical. “Something’s not right,” Jimmy kept saying. “It’s just not there yet.” He finally suggested that they try it with acoustic guitars. Bull’s-eye. The song quickly came together.
“Tangerine” was a song dating back to Jimmy’s Yardbirds’ days. Robert accompanied his own singing with double-track lead vocals. Then Pagey contributed an incredible pedal steel guitar line. It was a song that jelled right from the beginning. On “Bron-Y-Aur Stomp,” Jimmy did some of his best picking. At the same time, Bonzo was looking for a change of pace from his perch behind the drums and began turning whatever he could get his hands on into musical instruments, even making spoons part of the cut.
“Friends” was enhanced by the addition of strings. John Paul was broadening his own horizons in the studio, and he suggested that he write an arrangement for strings, which turned out to be magnificent. Maybe the prospect of being accompanied by violins inspired Robert; he hit high notes on that song that could have shattered glass, stretching the limits of his own voice a little more with each take. There was some debate on how to begin and end “Friends.” Eventually, a bit of studio small talk was inserted at the start of the cut, and a Moog synthesizer was used at the very end.
Everyone felt that the third album was the way a record should be put together; it was a much more relaxed venture than the second, which had been written and recorded on the road with pressures that do not necessarily lend themselves to creativity. “This is the way we have to do it from now on,” Pagey insisted one evening as we sat around the fireplace. “I feel energized with this kind of pace.” He was worried that unless the band worked in a more leisurely environment, they were all going to burn out.