It seems that in the music industry there are Rock ‘n Roll bands and there are legends, and while some bands like The Clash fall in that hazy middle-ground, there are some that absolutely stand out from the rest, who both redefine and transcend the genre. Led Zeppelin unequivocally stands as one of those bands. Uniquely private yet startlingly popular, this was a band that somehow managed to avoid the usual hoopla of interviews and press tours while at the same time managing to outsell The Rolling Stones. Down the Tracks traces the various influences on this incredible band from its love of American Blues and Rock n’ Roll to Robert Plant’s fascination with Welsh mythology and the works of J.R.R. Tolkien, but somehow manages to forget about Zeppelin in the process.
The DVD begins with a recount of the historic meeting between Robert Plant and Jimmy Page, how they each brought records to listen to and used each other’s taste in music to gauge how they felt about the other. Then it moves into a detailed history of Delta and Texas Blues, chronicling the careers of Son House, Blind Lemon Jefferson, and Charlie Patton and how they influenced later Bluesmen like Howlin’ Wolf and Muddy Waters. It’s a fascinating history of one of the few American music forms, but the reason that I wanted to watch this documentary—Led Zeppelin—was almost entirely missing through this section. There were a few moments when a historian would make a passing comment on how you could see the influence of so-and-so on Plant’s singing or Page’s playing, but those were pretty much throwaways, making this an unbalanced documentary.
This imbalance runs through the entire DVD. It could essentially be divided into two uneven parts: the Blues influence on Zeppelin and the mystical influence on Zeppelin, and the Blues definitely wins out in both the time and attention given to it. In fact, I’m not quite sure why a documentary labeled “The Music That Inspired Led Zeppelin” would include this non-musical element at all. It’s not that I didn’t find it fascinating, but I was a bit frustrated that more time wasn’t spent on that aspect.
I think this would have worked better as a small trilogy of documentaries with the first disk concentrating solely on the Blues, the second on myth and Tolkien, and the third examining how those two very distinct influences came together in Zeppelin’s music.
What we have here is a great documentary about the Blues and a poor one on Led Zeppelin, and while parts of it were a bit frustrating in that respect, there is enough here to still make this an interesting watch.
The documentary was shown in 16:9 format with Dolby Digital Stereo for audio. There were no problems with either the audio or video even in the archival footage.
I wouldn’t recommend this for people more interested in Zeppelin than the Blues. However, for those who want to know more about the Blues, or just music in general, this isn’t a bad starting place. As unbalanced as it was, this documentary still held quite a bit of good information. Mildly recommended.
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Eagle Media presents Down the Tracks: The Music That Influenced Led Zeppelin. Directed by Steve Gammond. Running time: 93 minutes. Rated NR. Released on DVD: November 18, 2008. Available at Amazon.
