Robert Plant and the Sensational Space Shifters ended their three-year tour in Chicago this past week. It was also FirstMerit Bank Pavilion’s final show of the summer season at Northerly Island, and it proved to be a memorable one.
At 67, Robert Plant still possesses a powerful and commanding presence. His voice has lasted through the years and he’s hitting notes with ease and regularity—notes that have made Robert Plant, well, Robert Plant. The Space Shifters are accurately named, effortlessly shifting from one sound to the next.
Plant has never been afraid to incorporate world music into his solo work, so it was interesting to see those influences appear in the Space Shifter’s reworkings of Led Zeppelin classics. The reinterpretations were, on a whole, skillful and savvy. The arrangements sounded more intricate, more eastern, and less straightforward rock ‘n’ roll, the results being Zeppelin Lite. Or maybe World Zeppelin. Not that that’s a bad thing. It’s not.
With the Space Shifters, Plant has once again morphed his sound while still playing reverence to his roots.
SETLIST:
Poor Howard
Trampled Under Foot
Turn It Up
Black Dog
Rainbow
Spoonful (Willie Dixon cover)
The Rain Song
No Place to Go / Dazed and Confused
The Lemon Song
Little Maggie (cover)
Win My Train Fare Home (If I Ever Get Lucky)
Whole Lotta Love / Mona
ENCORE:
Satan Your Kingdom Must Come Down / In My Time Of Dying
Rock and Roll