Lez Zeppelin @ Diesel, Pittsburgh

October 2nd, 2008 - by Niles Rockwell

Audio, Location, Pittsburgh, Reviews, Rock, Shows

Think about it.  It’s really quite simple.  What better way to nail those Robert Plant Led Zeppelin vocals but with a female vocalist?  Better yet, why not just get all chics to play in the band, too?

Sounds like a marketing formula for success, and Lez Zeppelin have it pegged.  Whether or not sexual orientation has anything to do with the name, these four ladies nevertheless strap on guitars and smack the skins to covers of the entire Led Zeppelin catalog.

I got to see them for the second time at Diesel in Pittsburgh on September 25, 2008 (eerily the 28^th anniversary of John Bonham’s death), although this time I got a lot closer and saw the whole set, unlike the four songs I got in last time.

And let’s face it:  they have their work cut out for them.  Not many bands/musicians will even consider trying to cover songs from arguably one of the best rock bands of all time.  At least I’ve never heard anybody nail a song.  But the ladies of Lez Zep do it a bit tongue-in-cheek, with a hefty dose of female swagger thrown in.

The live show kinda got off on the wrong foot for me.  They opened with Whole Lotta Love, but not with a whole lotta energy.  The guitar parts were pretty close and during the breakdown the guitarist did some cool spacey effects using a Theremin over the vocals.  But the ladies must’ve been feeling a little queer that night, because they just didn’t seem to be enjoying themselves up there.

And you could see it in the crowd, too.  There were the obligatory cat-calls from 40-something beer-swilling men in the crowd and 20-something bi-curious females, but there was a sense of malaise at times that made you wonder if you were really at a rock show.

The singer, Sarah McLellan, didn’t even acknowledge the crowd until the third song and there were a lot of pregnant pauses between songs. I think if they came running out and played the crap out of the songs fisting them down your throat, they would have been much better off.  Hell, they would have had me for the whole show!

One thing that could have helped McLellan immensely would have been some delay and reverb on her vocals to get that Zeppelin record sound.  They were just too dry to make it sound convincing.  And they need to be a lot less Cabaret and a lot more Rock ‘n Roll.  C’mon girl!  Give me some grit in those vocals!  I know you got it in you!

Technically speaking, the ladies aren’t virtuoso performers.  I found a lot of the guitar playing a tad sloppy and just not tight, though not horrible.  The dials on guitarist Steph Paynes’ Marshall half stack could use a bit of tweaking, too.  I had to turn away during one solo before my ears bled from treble overload.

But drummer Helen Destroy is the real deal and did her own brand of destruction that night.  She’s got some big shoes to fill in John Bonham, and she dared take a rather long drum solo halfway through the show.

There wasn’t a lot of flash or tons of well-executed monster rolls, but she put the sticks down and played with her bare hands at one point, crashing cymbals and playing her drums like they were bongos before grabbing the sticks again to join back with the band.  Pretty impressive feat–and she came out on top.

But let me get down off of my high horse for a minute because I’m totally missing the point here.  The bottom line is, this band is all about fun.  It’s all girls for goodness sake!  You can’t help but smile when you watch them rocking the balls off of old school classic rock gems, even if they miss a beat here or muff a solo there.

These ladies are smart by capitalizing on a gimmick and taking advantage of their novelty.  And the crowds eat it up!  The next couple of months will see them in Japan and Europe, having already headlined the opening night of Bonaroo 2008.

The only thing that could’ve put the show close to a 10 would have been more energy on stage from all of them.  At times they seemed a bit too self-aware instead of getting lost in the music and the moment.  There was a sense of discomfort in the singer’s disposition that made even me feel awkward.

But Lez Zeppelin saved the best for last with their set-ending version of Kashmir, which featured bass player Lisa Brigantino on synth, crushing out the string parts.  Everything came together with this song and for a moment I felt like I was really at a Led Zeppelin show.  Even the sound guy finally figured out how to add some delay to the vocals.

The ladies were finally warmed up and the crowd brought them back for their encore, Rock and Roll.  If there was a quintessential Lez Zeppelin moment, this was it.  By this point, the place was frenzied and I didn’t want to see them go.  It’s a shame it took them a whole set to get there, but I finally succumbed to the coolness that is Lez Zeppelin.

These ladies have some pretty big balls…er, ovaries…to tackle a band like Led Zeppelin.  But it’s not about trying to nail every Page solo, Plant scream, Jones bass line, or Bonham beat.  It’s really about rock ‘n roll and having a good time.  And at that, they won’t let you down.

[audio:http://www.52shows.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/whole-lotta-love.mp3]