The 36-track “Jimmy Page & The Black Crowes: Live at the Greek,” restores 16 previously unreleased songs and offers a better window into a unique trans-Atlantic rock combination.
One of the more puzzling live albums of all time came out in 2000. It featured songs from a two-night stand with The Black Crowes and Led Zeppelin icon Jimmy Page. But fans hoping to hear “Hard to Handle” or “She Talks to Angels” were out of luck. Bizarrely, not a single Black Crowes song was on it.
Twenty-five years later, that misstep has been fixed. The 36-track “Jimmy Page & The Black Crowes: Live at the Greek,” restores 16 previously unreleased songs and offers a better window into a unique trans-Atlantic rock combination.
“The whole project was special, very electric for us, very something very alive,” says singer-songwriter Chris Robinson. “I think we were all — for lack of a better word — just abuzz with what we were doing as a band, as an outfit together.”
The live tracks were recorded at The Greek Theatre in Los Angeles over two nights in October 1999. It captured musicians who were cooking after previous stops at New York City’s Roseland Ballroom; the Centrum in Worcester, Massachusetts; and The Palace of Auburn Hills in Michigan.
“I think we really felt like it wasn’t the Black Crowes with Jimmy Page. It was one thing, it was one group,” says Chris Robinson. “We really felt connected and tied. I just think we just had a really high energy level, and we knew we were onto something that was powerful.”An album missing something
The album that came out had Zeppelin tunes like “Celebration Day,” “In My Time of Dying” and “Whole Lotta Love,” as well as old blues and R&B standards like “Woke Up This Morning,” “Sloppy Drunk,” “Mellow Down Easy” and “Shake Your Money Maker,” plus the Yardbirds′ “Shape of Things to Come” and Fleetwood Mac’s “Oh Well.
