Robert Plant - iTunes Festival, Roundhouse, London (2014) [WEBDL, 1080p]

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Robert Plant - iTunes Festival, Roundhouse, London (2014) [WEBDL, 1080p]

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The first time Robert Plant played the Roundhouse his band had just changed their name from The New Yardbirds to Led Zeppelin. It was November 1968 and the semi-derelict former railway shed was London’s main underground rock venue. The great bluesman John Lee Hooker supported them and the evening’s takings for the Zep foursome amounted to a grand £150.

Almost 46 years later, a fact he wryly acknowledged (“You’re not meant to do that, say how old you are”), Plant returned to an altered Roundhouse. Now a sleek modern venue, it’s hosting the iTunes festival, a starry series of free gigs played before competition winners. Cameras filming the show for internet streaming recorded Plant’s every move, such as the courtly bow he gave after a guitarist played a solo or the little flurry of dance moves during new track “Turn It Up”. Cue cheers, and an amused grin from the 66-year-old.

There was another significance to the location, which Plant chose not to mention. Led Zeppelin’s appearance there came the same day as his marriage to his first wife Maureen: the reception was held at the gig. Perhaps the memory weighed on him (they divorced in 1983). Or maybe it was the coincidence that his new album Lullaby and . . .  The Ceaseless Roar follows another failed relationship, to the US country musician Patty Griffin. At any rate it was a somewhat subdued Plant who found himself back at the Roundhouse.

Flanking him were his current backing band The Sensational Shape Shifters, an intriguing mix of musicians comprising a jazz drummer, a rock guitarist and a pair of Afro-rock fusionists. Opening number “Turn It Up” was crunchy blues-rock ambivalently set in the US, where Plant lived with Griffin until recently. Then came the first of the set’s Led Zeppelin tracks, their mellow love song “Thank You”, imbued tonight with a tone of nostalgic regret.

Another Zeppelin ballad, “Going to California”, saw Plant crooning gently about wooing a “queen” who “plays guitar and cries and sings”. The audience failed to join in lustily enough on the wails that punctuate the song. The singer, an immensely engaging onstage presence, gave a comical shake of the head: if all else fails play it for laughs.

He sings carefully himself these days, conserving his energies; there were echo effects on the vocals to fill them out. His new album, which is excellent, was downplayed, its tracks overshadowed by older material. But the mood lifted – first when Gambian musician Juldeh Camara, on the ritti, a one-stringed fiddle, turned a cover of Willie Dixon’s “Spoonful” into a mesmerising African jam; then during the Zeppelin kiss-off “Babe I’m Gonna Leave You” when Plant’s voice rediscovered some of its old charge. “It’s nice to be home again,” he said as he exited, trailed by new band and old ghosts.

By Ludovic Hunter-Tilney

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Robert Plant - iTunes Festival, Roundhouse, London (2014) [WEBDL, 1080p]

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Robert Plant - iTunes Festival, Roundhouse, London (2014) [WEBDL, 1080p]

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Robert Plant - iTunes Festival, Roundhouse, London (2014) [WEBDL, 1080p]

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Robert Plant - iTunes Festival, Roundhouse, London (2014) [WEBDL, 1080p]

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Robert Plant - iTunes Festival, Roundhouse, London (2014) [WEBDL, 1080p]

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Robert Plant - iTunes Festival, Roundhouse, London (2014) [WEBDL, 1080p]

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Robert Plant - iTunes Festival, Roundhouse, London (2014) [WEBDL, 1080p]

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