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Led Zeppelin - Trampled Underfoot (1975)

Track listing:
  1. Rock And Roll 5:17
  2. Sick Again 5:46
  3. Over The Hills And Far Away 7:31
  4. In My Time Of Dying 11:09
  5. The Song Remains The Same 5:21
  6. The Rain Song 9:02
  7. Kashmir 8:40
  8. No Quarter 17:39
  9. Trampled Underfoot 7:53
  10. Moby Dick 26:34
  11. Dazed And Confused 27:51
  12. Stairway To Heaven 10:20
  13. Whole Lotta Love 1:06
  14. Black Dog 5:32
  15. Heartbreaker 7:19

Notes

Madison Square Garden
New York, NY

The show is 1975.02.07 MSG. It sounds like Cheech and Chong were taping the show. Throughout their entire recording the stoners are constantly talking about sparking a doobie. During Sick Again they start talking about sparking it up. At the beginning of OTHAFA: "Got a roach clip, man?" "Huh?" "Got a roach clip?" "Yeah." [cough] [cough] "Hey you're on fire man." etc. Throughout the show one asks the other repeatedly for matches.

After In My Time of Dying someone asks when the laser show will be. One stoner notes that it comes later on. As The Song Remains the Same begins the stoners are pleased. Then, just after Plant start singing, one says "This's much better, man." I guess they thought that straight vocals of the live performance improved the song over the high speed on the album. Later in The Rain Song it sounds like ushers come by to kick someone out of a nearby seat. At the end of Kashmir: "That was a wailer, boy."

At the beginning of No Quarter, a couple of folks arrive late and ushers want to check tickets to find where they should sit. The stoners are not pleased that someone is blocking their view. They also wonder who's engaging in all these journeys Plant keeps mentioning. Late in the instrumental portion of the song, one stoner asks the other to hold something, then asks where the matches are. A few moments later Plant returns and sings "Walking side by side with death" [cough] [cough] [cough] [cough] [cough] [cough] "The devil mocks their every step" [cough] [cough] [cough] [cough] [cough] etc. When Page screaches the theramin at the "dogs of doom" lyric, the stoners chime in with their own calls of "woooooooo-hoooo!" then one says "they're definitely gonna do Whole Lotta Love, aren't they?"

Trampled Underfoot meets with the approval of the stoners, but they loudly request Heartbreaker. Instead they hear Plant's introduction of Bonham. The stoners approve and go nuts. Yet, they again need more matches, and get ready for the other tape expecting to make the flip during the drum solo (I think it's around 7 minutes in). Others around the stoners realise that they are good source of matches. One stoners notes that he has to head off to the bathroom "Hey, I gotta take a piss. I'll be right back." The other stoner is irritated: "Yeah, announce it!" Then the recording jumps back a few minutes and plays the early part of the solo so the bathroom exchange can be heard again. Bonham receives a long ovation. One stoner pronounces of Bonham "The best, the best."

Lots of "Woohoo" calls meet the beginning of Dazed and Confused. Every wail on the wahwah pedal yields more calls of approval. A woman nearby asks the stoners "Did they play this one last time?" A stoner replies "What? Are you kidding man?" They also discuss how much they think their tickets would be worth. Then their source abrupty cuts off just before three and a half minutes into Dazed and Confused. I guess something went wrong with the tape. The bootleg then switches to the crappy recorded-a-bit-too-fast-so-plays-too-slow vinyl source.

I really missed the stoners. They became my friends. I longed to hear their thoughts on Stairway to Heaven, what they would have thought of only hearing a minute of Whole Lotta Love, their musings on Black Dog, and definitely what they thought of finally hearing Heartbreaker. Where oh where is the rest of their tape?