Becoming Led Zeppelin

I love the music of Led Zeppelin, and have been in awe of their power and musicianship since I was a kid, spending countless pre-teen hours learning Jimmy Page’s guitar licks. It gets harder and harder to separate art from artist with Zep, though, as time marches on. For all of their musical excellence, their story is full of abusive behavior towards women (including a journalist), terrifying violence, and seemingly guilt free plagiarism.

2025’s Becoming Led Zeppelin is, at its core, a puff piece; one which goes to great lengths to avoid controversial legend and - perhaps most offensively - brush off just how seriously their song theft was in their early days. It’s a puff piece, but it’s also a damn exciting one, full of otherworldly performances. Two points mention their lifts; first where Jimmy Page refers to ‘Dazed And Confused’ as having been ‘influenced’ by Jake Holmes, and second when Robert Plant mentions ‘using’ Willie Dixon’s lyrics on ‘Whole Lotta Love’. Sigh. Nope. The reality of both of those songs (and several others in their catalog) is that they were lifted so obviously and listed as a Jimmy Page composition (‘Dazed And Confused’) and a group composition (‘Whole Lotta Love’)

Cover songs are cool! We get to hear what artists like and have been influenced by, through their creative filter. However, when the actual writer isn’t credited (as Zep did far too many times), it’s not only lame, but unlawful. Zeppelin have been sued several times, and most of the copyright lawsuits against them have been found in favor of the original songwriters (including Jake Holmes and Willie Dixon). Page and Plant had the chance to come clean here, but they didn’t. It’s a truly unfortunate coda to their legacy.

I also found it weird that the film does its best to portray John Bonham and (manager) Peter Grant as big cuddly teddy bears. Grant was one of the most notoriously brutish and violent managers in rock history, even going so far as to enlist British organized crime thugs in to the crew. Grant had a long history of violence, which culminated in a hideous collaboration with Bonham and other members of their crew in Oakland, 1977.

The other lurid details of their career can be read about in numerous places, and I don’t care to get into them here.

In all fairness, John Paul Jones comes off very humble, thankful, and down to earth in his interview segments. Not a surprise, as he was the one member of the group that avoided controversy. Page and Plant share a whole lotta insight as well, and it’s mostly fascinating. There’s also no denying how the chemistry between the four of them produced some of the most exciting rock n roll music in history.

I don’t want to cancel Led Zeppelin; my only wish was that they would have come clean and taken this widely seen opportunity to come clean. At this point in their lives, would it be too much of a hassle to address these issues? A simple ‘we made some mistakes’ confession could have gone a long way in helping repair the karma of their legacy.