Detroit 1972 2 Source Mix (No Label)
Cobo Hall, Detroit, MI, USA – June 6, 1972
Disc 1 (39:07) Black Dog, Stairway To Heaven, That’s The Way, Tangerine, Bron-Y-Aur Stomp, Dazed And Confused
Disc 2 (47:02) What Is And What Should Never Be, Moby Dick, Whole Lotta Love, Rock And Roll
Several months back The Dogs Of Doom released Volume 11 of their series featuring a second source for Led Zeppelin’s June 6, 1972 concert at Detroit’s famed Cobo Hall. It had been nearly two years since source 1 appeared featuring the last 77 minutes of the concert. Sadly the second source is merely a 30 minute fragment and while there is 21 minutes of overlap between the two, there is a bit of never heard performances on it, snippets really of Black Dog, Stairway To Heaven, That’s The Way and Tangerine. The story goes that the taper forgot to turn the tape over thus only catching a small portion of the performance.
That being said, what is here is very enjoyable. First off is sound quality, the second source falls into the good range, it is clear with all instruments and vocals clearly heard yet is distant from the stage, albeit closer than the first source. The sound is a bit thin sounding focusing on the upper frequencies. There is a bit of distortion during loud parts and a bit of tape hiss as well, but all in all a very listenable recording. For this new release both tape sources are used hence the title 2 source mix. Source 2 begins with 1:16 of the ending of Black Dog, the last 4:48 of Stairway To Heaven beginning as Robert sings “And it makes me wonder”, the last 1:19 of That’s The Way, a minute of Tangerine plus some audience cheer and Robert’s intro to Bron-Y-Aur Stomp. There is a 20 second patch from source 1 with a bit of Robert’s dialog just before the song. Surprisingly the only complete song of source 2 is Bron-Y-Aur Stomp and it’s fantastic, the audience is quite enthused. There are two patches of source 1 as the band preps for Dazed totaling about 50 seconds. Source 2 is used for the first 5:45 of Dazed, source 1 fills a 15 second gap and again from 13:06 to 13:39 and takes over at the 16:11 mark for the rest of the show. The transitions between sources is well done as is the overall mastering of this set. While fragmentary in nature, it is summer 1972 Zep so what is here features fantastic playing, tight but just a little loose.
The packaging is great, the inserts feature pictures from the concert, very intimate shots taken from the side of the stage, two of these pictures are also used on the CD’s and numbered sticker. As nice as this release is, it is definitely geared to the more completist collector as there is truly only 10 minutes that have never been heard before and that portion is fragmented. That being said, the second source is in much better sound than source 1 and I have very much enjoyed this set, but it will certainly not garner many repeated listens.
