Led Zeppelin superstars share their story in the rock band's first fully authorised documentary

Becoming Led Zeppelin charts the iconic band's early years. (Supplied: Madman Entertainment)

By Luke Goodsell

They were one of history's biggest bands, in every sense of the word — commercially, sonically and mythically monumental, the patron dark saints to generations of suburban wastoids, fantasy nerds and guitar-shop enthusiasts the world over.

Watching Led Zeppelin give their first English performance at London's Playhouse Theatre in March 1969, however, their super-stardom hardly seems preordained.

As the band tears into the seismic 'Communication Breakdown', the camera captures shots of audience members plugging their ears, chatting awkwardly and wondering just what to make of all this hammer-of-the-gods racket. A few people can be seen tapping their feet. Polite applause follows. To paraphrase Marty McFly, their kids were gonna love it.

The moment is writ large in the engrossing new documentary Becoming Led Zeppelin, in which vocalist Robert Plant, bassist John Paul Jones, and musical magus Jimmy Page — together with late drummer John Bonham, appearing via a never-before-heard audio interview — convene to trace their paths from post-war English kids to rock 'n' roll titans.

As the band's first official, fully authorised documentary, it skews family-friendly — there's no mention of groupies, jailbait girlfriends or communion with the dark lord, and the movie ends before the band's notorious 70s excesses. At the same time, and unlike so many fame-obsessed rock docs, there's a dedicated focus on the music itself — as exclusively recounted by the people who made it.

An almost tender sense of reverie grips Page, his snow-white hair pulled back into a guru ponytail, as he views a clip of himself as a clean-cut adolescent performing on the BBC in 1958.

Already something of a guitar virtuoso, he would go on to become a valued session player across scores of recordings in the 60s, including tracks from The Rolling Stones, The Who and on Shirley Bassey's 'Goldfinger'. The classic Bond theme's orchestra also featured Jones, a former teenage church organist who would cross paths with Page in studio sessions. No wonder the band's musical palette was so rich.

Meanwhile, Bonham and Plant — who was considering a career in chartered accountancy, of all things — connected through the local band scene up north. It was a meeting that would prove fateful when Zeppelin, morphing from Page's version of The Yardbirds, was recruiting a vocalist in 1968.

"I was expecting some soul singer," says Jones of first meeting singer Robert Plant, "and here was this screaming maniac."

Director Bernard MacMahon, a specialist in documentaries on American folk and blues, is keenly attuned to Zeppelin's musical lineage, taking time to highlight the band's sonic influences — particularly the way they borrowed, and re-sculpted, the sounds of their Black heroes.

"The beginnings of stories are the most informative to the young audience, the most helpful and the most inspiring,"
director Bernard MacMahon told IMAX about focusing the documentary on the band's early years.   
(Supplied: Madman Entertainment)

Page recalls the American rock'n'roll of his childhood as seeming like "electricity coming from Mars", while Plant says hearing Little Richard was akin to "the syringe in the arm, forever". On recording Zeppelin's 'Whole Lotta Love', which famously swipes a Willie Dixon verse, he says: "I was finding the best bits of Black music and putting them through the wringer."

For Bonham, it was the rhythm section of James Brown's band. "I'm gonna get that sound," he says. Later, Jones recounts a moment in which the Godfather of Soul's drummers were astonished during a festival sound check as 'Bonzo' warmed up the kit.

While there likely won't be any revelations for the hardcore Zeppelin fan, the documentary is punchy and formally striking, a combination of vividly restored archival footage and contemporary media clips that approaches the sensory experience of Bowie’s Moorage Daydream.

Watching Page summon lightning from his guitar with a violin bow, during a performance of 'Dazed and Confused', is an almost supernatural experience — especially in cavernous, full-tilt IMAX.

Elsewhere, MacMahon and editor Dan Gitlin craft explosive montages that capture Zeppelin's rise as the 60s' dreams of peace and love were going up in a puff of pot smoke. If not exactly the catalyst for the demise of the decade, the band were certainly its soundtrack — the irresistible sound of doom as the dark armies rode for Mordor.

Whatever was in the air, it must have irritated rock critics, who were notoriously hostile to Zeppelin.

Reviewing the band's debut record, Rolling Stone deemed Page, "a very limited producer and a writer of weak, unimaginative songs" and dismissed Plant's singing, "strained and unconvincing shouting".

Watching the documentary it's hard to imagine what critics were thinking, though no doubt gripes about authenticity — and the long, ignominious tradition of white rockers swiping blues riffs — played a hand in their rancour.

Whatever the case, the band has long been enshrined in the classic rock firmament. And in conversation, Page, Plant and Jones are surely three of the most genteel, well-adjusted geezers to ever have mainlined the seamier side of 70s rock excess — though Page remains fond of the occasional orphic aside.

"This is a guitar that takes a full journey," he says of the instrument passed on to him by Jeff Beck, "Like Excalibur, the mythical sword."

First published at ABC News, February 11, 2025