Becoming Led Zeppelin

As a kid in England,

we were living in the shadows of the Second World War.

Your parents and your grandparents had been through two World Wars.

And at the end of the Second World War,

there was this great feeling of hope towards the future.

In London, there was lots of damaged buildings

and craters and...

I mean, it was an après-war zone.

There was rationing still.

I remember getting eggs and milk and butter and stuff

with a little book with coupons and...

People were recovering.

Outside of London, in the West Midlands,

it was a postwar, sort of semisuburban, quiet life.

So America was my dream

because it was a totally different world to the one that we were in.

I was listening to this marvelous rock 'n' roll

coming in from America.

And you're hearing all this electric guitar playing.

I mean, that was almost like it was coming from Mars,

even though it was coming from Memphis.

But here in Britain, we were stuck with these musicians

who were really safe,

until this force of nature called Lonnie Donegan arrived.

I was so mesmerized

by having seen Lonnie Donegan play.

It was like a portal.

It gave some access

to a sort of freedom that you hadn't witnessed in England.

Give it up, Jimmy!

So one day, I come to school and I see

this fellow standing up in the field with lots of people around him.

His name was Rod Wyatt,

and he's playing the Lonnie Donegan songs

on an acoustic guitar.

So I went up to him and said, "I've got one of those at home."

And he said, "Bring it along and I'll show you how to tune it up."

And then he showed me some chords as well.

I was absolutely inseparable from the guitar.

You know, I'd play it before breakfast and then play it on the way to school.

I'd go there and want to practice, but it would be confiscated

and given back at the end of the day.

My father was like,

"Well, I don't really understand all this guitar business,

but I'm with you on it,

providing you keep all your schoolwork up."

But my mum was really supportive to the idea

of me carrying on and starting a group,

and she really believed in me.

I mean, it was really a big deal.

My parents were in vaudeville.

My mum was the straight singer in the evening gown,

and my father was a comedian.

He would play the piano.

And so I used to travel around with them to all the bases,

where they'd entertain the troops.

And there would be just one international act after another.

Accordion players and banjo players...

And I took all this in.

So I was from that musical tradition.

And it was all the basis for everything I ever did afterwards.

I grew up in the West Midlands.

My father's bloodline is from there,

and my mother's side of the family are Romani Gypsy.

My childhood was very sheltered,

until my parents sent me to a big school in a big town.

Studied to be a chartered accountant.

I mean, I'd really dug a lot of what was going on at school,

but when Little Richard appeared, it was so provocative

and all-consuming and hypnotic

that it kind of knocked everything else out of the water.

I knew then that all I wanted to do was sing.

I mean, that was it.

The syringe was in the arm. Forever.

Oh, well, I'm John Bonham.

I always liked making drum sounds when I was a kid.

I got my first drum kit when I was 10.

And we went to see a film with Gene Krupa,

and it was just amazing.

- - Up here in the Midlands,

I used to buy completely different records, you know.

Johnny Kidd and the Pirates were a strong influence then.

You heard it on all the jukeboxes.

Of course, they've got those huge 15-inch speakers.

That's about all you could hear, was the bass.

I heard that, I thought,

"Pwooh, that's a sound I would really like to make."

When I told my father, he said,

"Bass guitar is a novelty instrument,

and in two years' time, it'll never be heard of again.

Get yourself a saxophone, you'll always work."

And so I said, "No. I want a bass guitar, Dad."

He heard me practicing and went, "Hmm, you're coming with me.

All you've gotta do is watch my left hand."

On the piano. So... I learnt all the standards from that.

I had a little band.

We were playing at the youth club.

And I got talking to their very go-ahead young priest.

He went, "We'd really like an organist."

I said, "Well, I could be an organist for you, if you like,"

not thinking anything of it. He went, "Yeah. Okay."

In church music, you have to improvise.

But as I wasn't very good at playing from music anyway,

I just improvised everything.

And... I learnt the hymns. I could figure out what the hymns were.

I'm not particularly religious, but it was a good gig.

All right? And he was a really cool priest.

And so I became organist and choirmaster at 14.

Which paid me the princely sum of £25 a year,

which bought me a Fender bass.

I used to go and jam on Thursday night

at the Marquee Club.

And after a period of doing this,

this band called Carter-Lewis and the Southerners

came up to me and asked me if I'd like to play on their record.

I said, "Yeah, sure. That sounds really good."

So I went along with my kit.

The DeArmond foot pedal and the amplifier

and my brand-new Gibson Les Paul.

And the band would say,

"Well, just make something up for the solo."

By the second run-through, I've already got a part for it.

And the buzz must have gone around

about this young guitarist,

because I started to get calls for more studio dates.

When I got into this session world,

I was like seven years younger than anybody else.