When Phil Collins performed with Led Zeppelin in 1985 for Live Aid, the drummer certainly didn't think that one of the greatest band's of the '70s were going to tank so horribly.
The performance, the band's first since losing original beatkeeper John Bonham in 1980, lasted only 20 minutes — just enough time for the group to claw its way through "Rock and Roll," "Whole Lotta Love" and "Stairway to Heaven," Blabbermouth reports.
"It was a disaster, really. Robert wasn't match-fit with his voice and Jimmy was out of it, dribbling," Collins told Q magazine recently. "It wasn't my fault it was crap. If I could have walked off, I would have. But then we'd all be talking about why Phil Collins walked off Live Aid — so I just stuck it out."
Collins had worked previously with Robert Plant on solo records Pictures at Eleven and The Principle of Moments in 1982 and 1983, respectively, but the drummer wasn't too sure how guitarist Jimmy Page felt about his presence at the reunion gig.
"I thought it was just going to be low-key and we'd all get together and have a play," Collins said. "But something happened between that conversation and the day — it became a Led Zeppelin reunion. I turned up and I was a square peg in a round hole. Robert was happy to see me, but Jimmy wasn't."
Plant blamed his shortcomings for being hoarse on having three previous gigs, he told Rolling Stone in 1988. Page remembered there just not being enough rehearsal time. "My main memories, really, were of total panic. John Paul Jones arrived virtually the same day as the show and we had about an hour's rehearsal before we did it. And that sounds like a bit of a kamikaze stunt, really, when you think of how well everyone else was rehearsed," he said.
Check out the horror below.
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