In 1976, my friend Ben, me and our two dates for the evening
jumped into my ‘68 Malibu and drove to Westwood to see The Song
Remains The Same. Without video tapes, DVDs, YouTube and all the
other resources of today brimming over with concert footage, few people knew
what to expect. I had seen Zeppelin at the Long Beach Arena the year before,
so I had an inkling of what we were about to see, but for many people in the
movie theater, this concert film was the next best thing to being there. Over
30 years later, the reissued DVD, newly remixed with remastered 5.1 Dolby
Digital surround sound, brings that feeling even closer to home.
The DVD and the soundtrack album have both been buffed out with extra tracks.
Whereas the CD retraces the actual concert with all 14 songs intact, which
includes six songs not on the original release — “Black Dog,”
“Over The Hills And Far Away,” “Misty Mountain Hop,” “Since
I’ve Been Loving You,” “The Ocean,” and “Heartbreaker”
— the DVD adds a second disc with the deleted performances, along with
rough news and interview footage and other enticements that add little value.
Nevertheless, in a year when the surviving members are reuniting, you gotta
throw in all the goodies you can find to keep the fans fat and happy. For
diehards, there’s a limited collector’s edition with a collectible vintage
T-shirt with original album artwork design, the soundtrack CD, lobby cards,
reproductions of original premiere invites, tour schedule, and other surprises.
At the heart of The Song Remains The Same is one July night
at the Madison Square Garden in 1973, not a particularly stellar performance,
but satisfying nonetheless as Zeppelin delivered a solid set that featured
“Dazed and Confused,” “Whole Lotta Love,” and “Stairway
To Heaven.” The film’s fantasy sequences revolve around the ideas
and lives of Messrs. Page, Plant, Jones and Bonham — ranging from castles
and wizards to dragsters and tractors. It’s arguable as to whether disrupting
the live footage with such illusions of grandeur gave the film legs, but it
certainly illustrated the band’s penchant for the opulence their success
brought while the song would always remain the same.
~ Shawn Perry
