Jason Bonham's Led Zeppelin Experience - Live in St. Charles, IL - February 2, 2013

[Photos in this post by yours truly... kindly seek my permission before appropriating them for your own use.  All rights reserved.  Thank you.]

My wife Laura and I traveled to the Arcada Theatre in St. Charles, Illinois from Chicago on Saturday night to see Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Experience.  I had a pretty good idea what to expect, since there had been only one lineup change since I had last seen the band in October 2010; Dorian Heartsong has replaced Michael Devin as bassist.  JBLZE typically plays renditions of Zeppelin songs that hew fairly closely to the studio album versions, with some embellishments from well-known live performances.  No wigs, costumes, or other gimmicks are employed – they are not that sort of tribute band.  The focus is on conveying as much of the power, delivery, and overall feel of the music of the original Hammer of the Gods.  The band sounded great from the very beginning, starting the show the way that all Led Zeppelin shows began during the 1973 and 1975 tours – with the drum introduction of Little Richard’s “Keep a Knockin’” that John Bonham commandeered one day at Headley Grange to launch Rock and Roll.

James Dylan, Jason Bonham, and Tony Catania

Tony Catania doesn’t wear any black dragon or white poppy suits, but he did come out wearing one of Jimmy Page’s favorite fashion accessories both onstage and off – a scarf.  Sartorial notes aside, Catania has had plenty of experience capturing the Page playing style, going back at least to 1996, when he was a member of the Jason Bonham Band that recorded In The Name of My Father – The Zepset at Electric Ladyland Studios.  When I reviewed the Merrillville, Indiana show in 2010, I was fairly complimentary of Tony’s playing, but not quite glowing.  Well, let me be glowing here – the guitar tone Catania achieved all night was beautifully fat, crunchy, and delicate in all the right places.  With all the JBLZE dates under his belt over the last two-plus years, he has become more fluid and dexterous on even the most challenging Page compositions that the band performed, and to my ears there has been noticeable improvement since that Indiana show roughly 27 months ago.  His appreciation for the songs and his exultation in playing them so well came across to the crowd clearly, and they reciprocated with amazement, tremendous enthusiasm, and positive energy. 

More photos here:
http://tinyurl.com/JBLZE2013-02-02IL

Tony Catania

James Dylan gained fame among Ledheads ‘in the know’ as the vocalist for Virtual Zeppelin (a collaboration of musicians from Japan, Canada, and the United States whose individual recordings were edited and mixed by the members and then posted to YouTube beginning in 2008).  Saturday night, Jason slyly alluded to his discovery of Dylan via the internet, saying “see – there are other things on it as well...”  The crowd laughed knowingly.  Singing in the comfort of one’s home with ability to cut multiple takes is one thing, but singing in front of large crowds while performing as a dynamic frontman of a rock band is quite another, especially when one is filling the role of Robert Plant.  However, that scenario presents no problems for James Dylan.  It isn’t just that he manages to hit the notes that Plant was hitting in his vocal prime of 1968-1971, which would be impressive in its own right; Dylan also manages to recreate Plant’s disparate phrasing, intonation, and delivery from a wide array of songs in a way that is often downright eerie.  My first “goosebumps moment” of the evening came during Sick Again.  I blurted out a dumbfounded “whoa” when I heard how well he made the transition from the high and clear vocals of Rock and Roll (1971) and Celebration Day (1970) to the rough, raw, and gravelly vocals of Physical Graffiti’s final track.

James Dylan

Positioned where I was, it wasn’t always easy to see the guys at stage right... Dorian Heartsong played well and fit perfectly with the rest of the band, never hitting a bum note as far as I could tell.  He played Jonesy’s signature lines in songs like What Is and What Should Never Be with fluency, and in the best tribute to JPJ, he seemed to be listening intently to what his bandmates at all times. Heartsong looked to have a good rapport with Dylan and Catania as they converged in front of the drum riser many times during the night and locked into a groove.

Dorian Heartsong

Stephen LeBlanc – a man after my own heart in his Big Lebowski shirt – handled everything that was required of him (which was a lot), and was also observed to be a careful listener.  When he wasn’t providing essential instrumentation on keyboards, LeBlanc was able to switch to lap steel and rhythm guitar in order to augment the group’s sound with sonic textures that the audience might have known from the studio albums, but that would have been missing from a regular guitar/bass/drums lineup (like the escalating slide on Babe I’m Gonna Leave You), even one that had John Paul Jones playing bass pedals with his feet while he played keyboards, mandolin, or a triple-necked guitar…

Stephen LeBlanc

Jason Bonham was in good spirits on the night, appreciative of the response that he and his band were eliciting from the sold-out theater crowd.  The sound from his drums was excellent – deep, punchy, and powerful.  It can be difficult to explain these types of things, but Jason is drumming with more “swing” than ever these days, playing in a more patient style in places where he may have rushed through in the more distant past.  This is especially apparent when it comes the fills in a number like The Song Remains The Same.  He is able to throw in a nice little flurry and get back on beat without seeming like he is worried or hurrying to return.  He is a more relaxed and confident player these days, and after receiving such acclaim in the wake of the massively successful launch of Celebration Day, there’s no reason why that wouldn’t be the case.  The Led Zeppelin Experience show is still a very emotional journey for him, even when the show is presented several times in a week.  The adulation from the grateful audience shows just how much they not only miss Jason’s father, but also how much they love Jason for caring about the music and baring his soul for them in the stories he tells and his reaction to the home movie clips that are played on the giant screen behind him.  

Jason Bonham

Some things were less enjoyable, but they had little to do with what was transpiring on the stage…some guys directly behind us really wanted to hear Nobody’s Fault But Mine and decided to ask for it – very loudly – during every break between songs, whether or not Jason or James happened to be speaking at that moment.  During many of the songs, one of the gentlemen had the extremely annoying habit of singing the lyrics in anticipation – almost a full second ahead of the correct timing; apparently he thought he needed to prove that he knew them all.  During the intermission, he kept insisting to his friend that Zeppelin almost certainly had to have toured with a fifth member to cover all the parts being played.  That was too much for me; I turned around and informed him otherwise.  He took a moment to expectorate a large glob of tobacco juice into his clear plastic cup and then thanked me with a wide-eyed and earnest expression of gratitude and awe.  I grimaced slightly, nodded, and turned back around.  Other people in our row and just ahead seemed to be having a great time, but not good enough to refrain from making numerous trips to buy more beer in the middle of songs.  It’s not the worst thing in the world, but it’s disruptive and takes you out of the moment.  Laura said she had never seen as many women with hairstyles stuck in the 1985-1990 era gathered in one place before, and one lady in particular was rocking a combination of big hair and an outfit that Laura claimed she herself (with the aid of a wig) had once passed off as a 1980s-chick Halloween costume.

Laura also reported an interesting anecdote from a discussion in the ladies’ room, where there was a minor argument going on between a few women who had seen the Chicago-based “Led Zeppelin 2 – The Live Experience” tribute band at the House of Blues on a recent weekend as to which band, that one or JBLZE, were in fact the better act.  One lady insisted that since she was “more of a visual person” that LZ2 had the edge, based on their hair and movements.  Another woman agreed with her, but a third was aghast that they seemed to be missing the point, which was surely the quality of the music being played.  At that point, my wife admirably waded into the debate and sided with the third woman, declaring that she too had seen LZ2 once, but that this show from JBLZE was clearly superior and that there was really no contest.  One has to wonder if some people are actually listening to the music or if they just want something loud and semi-melodic in the background while they get wasted. 

Jason Bonham's Led Zeppelin Experience ascending the Stairway:
LeBlanc, Heartsong, Bonham, Dylan, Catania

When Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Experience is at its best, the band is very good indeed, and the peak of the show for me was Since I’ve Been Loving You.  James Dylan introduced it as the very first song that Jason Bonham played with Tony Catania.  They’ve really perfected this song to the point where you almost expect to hear the squeaky drum pedal from the version on the third album.  Dylan’s spine-chilling vocals carry every bit of the aching agony that this wailing blues requires, while Heartsong lays down the steady bass line and LeBlanc synths the Hammond organ, Bonham’s machine-gun drum fills simulate the jilted lover’s heart being shot to shreds while Catania alternately wrings single notes for all they’re worth and then solos rapidly like a boxer at a speed-bag.  The band was consistent across the entire set, but the elusive “fifth element” (or sixth, in this case) was found during this song.  I was reminded of something Robert Plant said about the track on a bootleg recording I listened to again recently – on May 13, 1973 in Mobile, Alabama he referred to SIBLY as “something off the third album, which we always will play as long as we're in existence. It's one of those things that we get off on a lot, you know?”

There were several other highlights.  Laura noted Your Time Is Gonna Come, Thank You, and Over The Hills and Far Away as songs she particularly enjoyed, and it's true that they were all played exceptionally well.  I would add Sick Again and The Song Remains The Same (despite a broken string), but really the band was performing at a consistently high level all night.  All in all, a very enjoyable evening.

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Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Experience is:

Jason Bonham – Drums

Tony Catania – Guitars

James Dylan – Vocals & Guitar

Dorian Heartsong – Bass

Stephen LeBlanc – Keyboards & Lap Steel & Guitar

&

Gary Hood – Harmonica (for You Shook Me and When The Levee Breaks)

Gary Hood

Setlist included:

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Rock and Roll / Celebration Day / Sick Again / Babe I’m Gonna Leave You / Your Time Is Gonna Come / You Shook Me / What Is and What Should Never Be / Thank You / Immigrant Song / Moby Dick / [Intermission] / The Ocean / Over The Hills and Far Away / Since I’ve Been Loving You / The Song Remains The Same / When The Levee Breaks / Kashmir / Stairway To Heaven / Whole Lotta Love