Technically, the title for this one is Live at the Forum, Inglewood CA, USA On the 27th June 1977, 6th Day. Not as catchy and memorable as Listen to this, Eddie, but at least it’s descriptive. This mammoth set is a 4 LP release by Iron Eagle Records. The jacket claims that the set is pressed in the USA and is a “fan club” release, but I know for sure this one comes out of Europe somewhere. When it comes to bootlegs/unofficial pressings, it’s safe to assume that if the packaging says it’s made in one place (the two most popular being the US or Japan), it’s almost certainly made somewhere else. Almost certainly somewhere in Europe. Anyhow…
This is not the first Iron Eagle release I have purchased, but it is the first one I have listened to. The other one I have in the “Listen to this, Indrid” pile is “Black Sabbath: Live at the Sommer Arena, Vienna, Austria on the 24th September 1989”. Another descriptively awesome title. This would have been Sabbath’s Headless Cross era with lead singer Tony Martin, which is of course a subject we’ll be talking about on this site soon. What I can say about both of these Iron Eagle record sets is that they are heavy, and they are ugly. The Zeppelin set looks a little better, and the official name for the color is apparently “avocado/black smoked”. The Sabbath one is some disgusting shade of brown, but we’ll save that analysis for another time.
The jacket itself for Live at the Forum is also interesting. It’s not quite a standard sleeve, but it’s not a gatefold either. The pocket opening is large enough to hold all four records, but there is also a foldout portion of the front cover which reveals some additional artwork. This is a numbered release, and the supposed breakdown is 300 copies in total: 100 each of black, avocado/black smoked, and clear/black smoked. Iron Eagle also does this thing for the first section of copies in a release (70 in this case) where they include a tin metal plate with some artwork on it. I have never seen one of these in person, but I’ve heard some people are into them. On average, it seems like it’s about an extra 25.00 USD for the plate if you can find a seller who’s willing to give you the option.
Overall, the package does look nice. The printing is high quality, and the vinyl itself is heavy and has nice labels. As usual, I gave my set a thorough cleaning on the VPI before listening to anything. The sound itself is very good in most places. This is not a soundboard recording, but it is a great audience recording. My copy definitely has some surface noise on most sides. Most annoyingly, the beginning of side 3 has some light scratches. These are hard to see on the weird, green colored vinyl, but they are definitely audible. They are not deep scratches by any means, and I can’t quite figure out why they are so loud, but they are. Maybe it was the particular mood I was in, but I found these to be obnoxious and extra annoying that day.
Audience Recording – Live At The Forum, Inglewood, CA, USA On The 27th June 1977, 6th Day
A1 The Song Remains The Same
A2 The Rover Intro / Sick Again
A3 Nobody’s Fault But Mine (Blind Willie Johnson Cover)
A4 Over The Hills And Far Away – Part 1
B1 Over The Hills And Far Away – Part 2
B2 Since I’ve Been Loving You
B3 No Quarter – Part 1
C1 No Quarter – Part 2
D1 Ten Years Gone
D2 The Battle Of Evermore
D3 Going To California
D4 Going Down South
E1 Black Country Woman
E2 Bron-Y-Aur Stomp
E3 Dancing Days
E4 White Summer / Black Mountain Side
F1 Kashmir
F2 Trampled Under Foot
F3 Out On Tiles / Moby Dick – Part 1
G1 Moby Dick – Part 2
G2 Guitar Solo (Edited)
G3 Achilles Last Stand – Part 1
H1 Achilles Last Stand – Part 2
H2 Stairway To Heaven
H3 Whole Lotta Love
H4 Rock And Roll
So, we’ve arrived at the part where I’ve got to talk a little bit about the music. Before I get into that, I need to say that I am quite a big Zeppelin fan. I am planning to talk quite a bit more about Zeppelin releases in the near future (and not all of them are standard “vinyl” releases, either). However, their very open and jam-like style in a lot of these shows isn’t really my favorite thing. Normally, I like to listen to live shows in their entirety. Zeppelin is one of the few bands, however, where I wish someone would edit a bit of it down. Not for every release of course, but in at least some cases. Overall, empty space and extended guitar noise are my chief complaints for this show.
To begin, you should know going in that this set has some “funny” edits, and to the publisher’s credit, this is mentioned on the back of the jacket. Essentially, many of the songs were just too long, and they needed to be cut and split between sides. Iron Eagle did find pretty good places to make these cuts, but it is something to be aware of. As I mentioned, I would have rather someone cut out the “fluff”, so to speak, but I also realize that for some reason, that’s exactly what the majority of people buying these records paid to hear in the first place. So, when you go to flip the sides, you’ll hear some dialogue repeats as the cut always seems to be a few seconds back. I don’t think this should be a deal breaker for most people, though.
The biggest question I have seen asked around is, “is this show as good as Listen to this, Eddie?”, which was recorded during the same run of shows. The short answer is no. This one is good, but there is a reason you have heard of the other one and not of this one. If you can only pick one, go with Listen to this, Eddie, even if you have to get it on CD or just a free, old-fashioned download. If you are a serious collector and huge Zeppelin fan, you’re going to enjoy this show too though, so you might as well pick it up if you can.
What can be said about the quality of the actual live performance? Well, Zeppelin was a band that seriously messed around a whole lot on stage. If the noise making and not so great guitar solo portions (not as much “solos” as just sections of making noise with the guitar, I would say) were cut out of this, a minimum of one side of an LP could have been saved. I know people aren’t going to be happy when I say that, but it’s just my opinion. If you listen to the crowd in this recording, you’ll be able to see that it was their opinion as well, though. During a lot of these extended “jams”, the crowd falls totally silent as they continue on and on with it. When Page detected he was losing the audience, he would finally start to play something recognizable, and everyone would go absolutely insane again. “Kashmir” is a great example of this.
As you can see, tons of the big Zeppelin hits are well represented in this set list, and the songs themselves really do sound great. If you are a Bohman fan, this version of Moby Dick is long and broken up, but is absolutely killer. Side H on its own, complete with “Stairway”, “Whole Lotta Love” and “Rock and Roll” is absolutely incredible, and just in itself is cool to have on vinyl. Obviously, the rest of the concert is generally great as well, but it was cool to hear them fire off these three numbers without much distraction in between.
In conclusion, I would say the show itself is probably a 7/10 for me. Listen to this, Eddie, in contrast, is easily a 9/10. The record set itself, I give a 7/10 as well. The main sticking points for me were my copy being scratched, surface noise, and the large, single slot storage for the records. This release came out a while ago, but the remaining copies seem to be making the rounds in the sales circles. If you want one, now is the time to seek out a copy. For the standard edition, you can expect to spend a minimum of 150.00 USD before shipping. If you want one with a “tin metal art plate”, you can expect to pay around 175.00 USD for that version.