Robert Plant Calls ‘Stairway To Heaven’ A Remarkable Milestone For Him

With the 50th anniversary of Led Zeppelin's untitled fourth album, better known as Led Zeppelin IV, inching up next month, frontman Robert Plant looked back at the album — both his work on it and what it's come to mean over the decades.

Plant, who's always shied away from delving too deeply into the meanings of his Zeppelin tunes, admitted to Mojo: “My naivety about lyrics came from the fact that it takes a long time to grow up when you're on the move so quick. Not many people can look back 50 years and see themselves coming straight at them. Whereas I can see the 22-year-old Robert Plant careening towards ne. But at the same time, it all seemed to fit together naturally.”

He touched upon his legendary songwriting partnership with the great, Jimmy Page, admitting, “I have never experienced and probably never will, being in the presence of such a great, eloquent player.”

Plant was asked why he became so emotional at Heart's rendition of “Stairway To Heaven” with Jason Bonham at the band's 2012 Kennedy Center Honors: “I wept because I was seeing the song in a different light. I'd been carrying the passing of John (Bonham), the passing of my son (Karac) and the whole '70s whirlwind and where I'd ended up on a personal level. It was a rush. . . The bottom line is that song has been a remarkable milestone in my life. It was an achievement.”

Robert Plant recently chatted with Australia's The Project TV show and recalled how Led Zeppelin's massively framed six-foot-five-inch late-manager Peter Grant actually held up cue cards for him: “It’s a long song (laughter), okay? And I also know that I have a little bit of trouble remembering lyrics — this was back in ’72, ’73. So, our manager, who was quite a formidable personality, he’d come to the front of the stage in the middle of it all and he’d have the lyrics, just going — like that Bob Dylan thing (during the promo for 'Subterranean Homesick Blues.') Anyway, it was very funny. I can’t remember what verse goes where. I know there’s something about ‘bustle in the hedgerow’ and then all that stuff. . . The conjecture around that song is hysterical.”