What a blast writing this one. Listening to Led Zeppelin I while writing, I got brought right back in time.
[Photo credit: Stefano Toma]
On this extremely fateful night nearly 50 years ago, in 1969, I was 19-years-old and visiting Boston from Hampton Beach, New Hampshire where I grew up. I went to see my neighborhood friend Jack Hebert (RIP) who was living on the 11th floor at the Boston University West Campus high rise dorms on Babcock Street.
The moment I arrived Jack gave me a hit of acid and said, "Good timing, eat this, we're hittin’ a concert!” I said, "Where and who we gonna see?" He said, "Tea Party. Led Zeppelin." I said, "Who are they?" He said, "Don't worry about it, they're great." We then talked about The Yardbirds. Instantly, I was clued. Previously, I’d seen the movie Blow-Up, already was a Jimmie Page fan and got dialed in good on what was to come.
Without even knowing it, I was on my way to the show that would change my life completely--lol!
After listening to some Zeppelin tunes, we eventually collected ourselves and elevated down to the Green Line in front of T Anthony's. We missed the train but ran hard to catch it at the next stop. The running must have caused the acid to kick in. Once on the train the riders with their heads moving side to side, including the burly subway driver, began getting stranger and stranger. The tunnel was defining, I could hear everything and I was now in sharp contrast with my rolling reality. It had become an out of body/inner train experience--lol!
We got off at Arlington Station, meandered down Berkeley Street, marveled a bit at the Goodwill Store and then took our place in the Tea Party’s psychedelic human line (we were relatively early!). Lots of very hip people, then more affectionately called "freaks," moved up and down the line selling hash, grass, acid, speed, you name it -- everything imaginable was offered! Meanwhile, the tingle of excitement increased as I clicked my boot heels on the pavement and noticed how each person I saw got more and more interesting.
Something was in the air, it was a sweet green smell and we were about to enter a church of a very different kind. Finally the door was opened. We got in and since half of the main seats were taken we settled into the center front row balcony -- not a bad spot for any concert.
It was an instant change moment when Zeppelin started. I said “I’m getting closer!” and bolted to the front. It turned out no seat in the house was good enough. Everyone stood in wild frenzy. Wherever someone started out, they abandoned that spot and rushed the stage. It got to a point where nobody had seats anymore.
Now near the stage and watching both the restless crowd and the band, I was lucky to get a glimpse of ushers coming at everyone, trying to get people to take seats again. Seeing them coming my way, I wiggled my way in front of a second row aisle seat about 15 feet away from Page. As the ushers struggled, the show was stopped and everyone was forced to take seats wherever they were. I sat down and found myself sitting next to JJ Jackson of 'WBCN. The acid in me was now prime time and joints were passed back and forth, row to row. The show was paused again this time to stop the smoking, but that didn’t stop the joints--lol!
I saw The Greatest Show on Earth! My memory hold is so strong, so great and so magnificent it will go with me to my grave and well into Edge City!
When Led Zeppelin I finally came to a halt, the band left the stage and wandered deep into the audience as strobe lights flashed and flashed and flashed and flashed ... and flashed. Page walked closely right by me, Plant was nearby and people surrounded both of them. I easily could have begun a conversation. But I couldn't move as I was standing motionless and frozen in the flash and flash and flash of continuing strobe lights.
When the room near emptied, my friends found me and pulled me back onto the street. Beyond asking, “where’d you end up?” we were each speechless on the way back to the dorm. Turned out I made out best of all. Two of my friends remained in the balcony and another ended up shifted off to the side of the room. (In the above photo, I was to the left of Page.)
The concert changed my life forever! I eventually ended up managing hard rock bands and became part of the Kenmore Square Rat scene in my mid-twenties. In my thirties I taught myself how to play guitar eventually becoming a backbench folksinger until my sixties when I concluded I had missed my teenage calling, so I put my first rock n’ roll band together at age 62. I’ve now got a band called Climate Change!
The hold of music became so strong after serving two terms in New Hampshire’s legislature I gave up being a state rep so I could become a Harvard Square street musician and I ended up throwing the greatest live music parties in the history of Cambridge throughout the ‘90s. Today, I organize The Rat Beach Party, an annual Rat reunion fundraising event and monthly concert series which brings back elements of the old Rat bands. None of this would have happened had I not gone to this concert!
