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‘Becoming Led Zeppelin' Documentary Arrives On Netflix This Week
"Becoming Led Zeppelin" partial poster image featuring Robert Plant, John Paul Jones, Jimmy Page and ... More John Bonham.
Becoming Led Zeppelin — a rock documentary featuring Robert Plant, Jimmy Page, John Paul Jones and John Bonham — debuts on Netflix this week.
Directed by Bernard MacMahon and Allison McGourty, Becoming Led Zeppelin debuted on IMAX screens on Feb. 7 and expanded to regular theaters on Feb. 14 before pivoting to digital streaming on April 4. The official summary from the film's studio Sony Pictures Classics reads, 'Becoming Led Zeppelin explores the origins of this iconic group and their meteoric rise in just one year against all the odds.'
Led Zeppelin, featuring Plant on lead vocals, Page on guitar, Jones on bass and Bonham on drums, formed in 1968 and disbanded in 1980 following the tragic death of Bonham at age 32.
During Led Zeppelin's 12-year run, the band released eight albums of original material and in 1982, issued a final album, Coda, which consisted of unreleased rejected tracks, outtakes and live recordings.
The band released several classic songs from 1968-1980, including 'Black Dog,' 'Immigrant Song,' 'Rock and Roll,' 'Whole Lotta Love,' 'Stairway to Heaven,' 'The Ocean,' 'In the Evening,' 'Kashmir,' 'Ramble On' and 'Houses of the Holy.'
According to Netflix, Becoming Led Zeppelin will arrive on the streaming service on Saturday, June 7.
For viewers who don't subscribe to the platform, Netflix offers an ad-based package for $7.99 per month for two supported devices, an ad-free package for $17.99 per month for two supported devices and an ad-free package for $24.99 for four supported devices with 4K Ultra HD programming.
Becoming Led Zeppelin marks the first time a documentary about the classic rock group has been authorized by the band.
As such, Robert Plant, Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones granted all-new interviews to directors Bernard MacMahon and Allison McGourty, while the filmmakers tracked down never-before-heard and seen footage featuring John Bonham.
During an interview with Hey U Guys alongside MacMahon and McGourtry,' Page explained why he finally said yes to a documentary about the group.
'All the documentaries that I'd seen up to this up to this one were really, really very, very lightweight,' Page told HeyUGuys. 'They didn't actually give any sort of perspective on what was actually happening with the music and why the music was what it was, why there was improvisation every night and that made us very different to everybody else. No, they missed all of it.'
Page added that prior attempts by people attempting to document the career of Led Zeppelin 'could put in the figures of how many albums we sold, but it's like, 'Yeah, but you're forgetting why those albums are selling.''
'So, I didn't have very much uh patience with those sort of things,' Page explained to HeyUGuys. 'I had a lot of patience with Bernard and Allison when they were when they were presenting the idea of what they wanted to do because it was so in line with the way that I thought about it, too … I'm so thrilled to be here now that they manifested exactly what they said they would do.'
Becoming Led Zeppelin begins streaming on Saturday, June 7, on Netflix.
