Led Zeppelin 'considering world tour'
By Sophie Borland and Richard Alleyne
Last Updated:
1:10pm GMT 28/01/2008
Led Zeppelin have given the strongest hint yet that they are planning a world tour, likely to be the biggest in the history of rock music, following the success of their one-off concert last year.
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Lead guitarist Jimmy Page has said that the band are ready to reunite and prepare for a series of events as soon as they have tied-up their individual projects.
The tour would not take place until next Autumn at the earliestSince the group performed a hugely successful reunion concert in front of 22,000 fans at London’s O2 centre in December, speculation has been mounting that an announcement of a series of world dates is imminent.
Page, who is now 64, described the event as “exhilarating” and fantastic” and said that it proved that the band are ready to perform more live events.
He did add that it would not be happening until next Autumn at the earliest as singer Robert Plant is touring with the US country and western singer Alison Krauss.
Speaking to promote the band’s Mothership Greatest Hits album in Japan, he said: “We did the show and it was great.”
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“It was exhilarating, fantastic, every week was a week to look forward to.
“I can assure you the amount of work that we put into the O2, for ourselves rehearsing and the staging of it, was probably what you put into a world tour.”
“Robert Plant also had a parallel project running and he’s really busy with that project, certainly until September, so I can’t give you any news.”
Chris Goodman, from The Outside Organisation, who look after the band’s PR, said: “Jimmy has said that the band will be meeting up in August to talk about it.
“The band meet all the time.
“There is something in it but I can’t give you any more news at the moment.”
Last week Robert Plant suggested that a tour was on the cards by saying “you never know what’s round the corner” when asked about a possible reunion at a basketball match.
The group, who’s original members included Page, Plant, bass guitarist John Paul Jones and drummer John Bonham, formed in 1968 and became arguably the world’s biggest rock groups.
Their fourth album, released in 1971, included their most famous song, “Stairway to Heaven”, while the band has sold an estimated 300 million albums worldwide.
But when Bonham died suddenly following a drinking binge in September 1980 the remaining members decided the band had died with him and they went their separate ways.
Until last year the trio’s only other reunions had been a disappointing performance at the 1985 Live Aid concert and their 1995 induction into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame.
More than 22,000 fans watched their performance at the O2 concert on December 10 in which the three remaining band members unite within Bonham’s son Jason on the drums.
Since the O2 concert on December 10, sales of the group’s best of album Mothership have soared and it is now on course to become one of the biggest albums of all time.