GFR blew Led Zeppelin off the stage, which is why Peter Grant physically threatened GFR’s manager and forced them off the tour with them.
Wow, never knew that.
One thing I always appreciated about GFR is they were anti-drug and were called upon to do several anti-drug ad spots.
Was it '71 or'72 that they were the hottest group in America; you may remember they sold out Shea stadium faster than the Beatles!
“GFR blew Led Zeppelin off the stage, which is why Peter Grant physically threatened GFR’s manager and forced them off the tour with them.”
I remember that account. I saw GFR several times. They were an intense enjoyable high energy band. But I can see why Grant would want someone else for an opener. Just like the Monkees did not have Hendrix as an opener for very long. Openers can’t steal too much thunder from the headliners you know. :-)
I also never found LZ to be that great a band live. Their magic lay in Page’s ability to write and layer guitars in the studio. It was hard to perform that stuff live and Page was loaded and sloppy with way too much ego to live up to. The LZ 2007 reunion concert was pretty good. They were all sober.
Having said that we know how those bands have fared over the decades. LZ is well regarded and GFR is almost forgotten which is a bit of a shame.
Closer to Home was a well written song. I always enjoyed that one. The rest of their songs were great live but less exciting to listen via the original recordings.