One of the biggest and most influential vocalists in the history of Rock - Robert Plant celebrates his birthday today !!!
(Photo: Michael Putland)
Here are 20 interesting facts about him:
1. It has a tenor voice with an extra wide range that allows him to sing in a large variety of music styles, without difficulty.
2. One of the great influences on him musically is Elvis Presley. Plant also tends to warm up his voice before performances with Elvis's songs.
3. He has a regular ritual to iron his clothes before performances. One of his odd demands in contracts is that he has an ironing board backstage.
4. He was not Jimmy Page's first choice when he started putting together what would later become "Led Zeppelin". Page thought of Steve Marriot from "Small Faces", Terry Reid, Donovan, and Stevie Winwood before he thought of Robert Plant.
5. Plant was the one who recommended John Bonham as the band's drummer to Jimmy Page.
6. Six of the nine songs on the debut album "Led Zeppelin" were written in collaboration with Plant, but he did not receive credit for them due to a contractual commitment to the previous record company.
7. The song "Babe I'm Gonna Leave You" won a cover version on Led Zeppelin's debut album following Page and Plant's love for Joan Baez's version of the song, from 1962.
8. The lyrics to the song "Black Dog" were written by Robert Plant about a dog that walked around near the recording studio during the recording of the album "Led Zeppelin".
9. He wrote the lyrics for "Immigrant Song" from the album "Led Zeppelin III" after Led Zeppelin visited Iceland, as the lyrics reveal: "We Came From the Land of Ice and Snow".
10. The song "Kashmir" was influenced by Robert Plant's visit to Morocco.
11. He recorded the album "Presence" in a wheelchair after having a car accident.
12. On July 26, 1977, his son Karac, then only 5 years old, died of a stomach virus. Planet experiences collapse due to the tragic event.
13. He dedicated the song "All My Love" from the album "In Through The Out Door" to his son Karac. It was not the only song. "I Believe" from his 1993 solo album "Fate of Nations" was also dedicated to him.
14. He recorded the album "In Through The Out Door" with "Led Zeppelin" in studios owned by "ABBA".
15. He donated $ 10,000 to a radio station in Oregon that promised they would no longer play "Stairway To Heaven" again.
16. In response to the Beastie Boys' samples of Led Zeppelin's songs on their debut album "Licensed to Ill", Plant thought of sampling Beastie Boys' tracks on his fourth album "Now And Zen". In the end, he sampled excerpts from the mother band "Led Zeppelin".
17. He deliberately released the album "Now And Zen" on February 29, 1988, a unique date that only returns once every four years, apparently because this is his fourth album.
18. Plant has no musical education. Despite this, Plant was ranked by VH1 in third place on the list of greatest rock singers of all time. They also ranked it 37th among the sexiest artists.
19. In 2006 "Hit Parader" magazine crowned Planet the best metal singer of all time, ahead of Rob Halford, Bruce Dickinson, Ronnie James Dio, David Coverdale, and Ian Gillan who celebrated his birthday yesterday.
20. In 2011, Rolling Stone magazine readers ranked Plant number one on the list of greatest singers of all time.