Heart Brings Robert Plant to tears and Poetry Corner with M. Jagger

A single song can settle a decade-long debate, and Ann Wilson’s Stairway to Heaven at the 2012 Kennedy Center did exactly that. We revisit the performance that made Robert Plant cry and explain why it wasn’t just a tribute—it was a coronation. From Nancy Wilson’s arrangement to Jason Bonham’s heartbeat on the kit, we trace how a classic can be reborn in front of its creators and what that says about power, presence, and the kind of voice that earns a crown.

Transcript

Opening And Show Plug

Regent Merced Intro 0:00

Hello again. It's time for the Blade Podcast. And remember, all Blade content is found on bobtheblade.com. Check out the newest content called The Brutalist. Here is Blade.

Blade 0:13

You know, it was uh Walton, Bob Walton. Friend of mine for a thousand years.

Naming The Queen Of Rock

Blade 0:20

We were talking about uh last week on uh the podcast, we were talking about, okay, we talk about the king of rock and roll, but who's the queen of rock and roll? And he says, oh, without a doubt, without a shred of a doubt, it's Ann Wilson.

Ann Wilson’s Stairway And Zeppelin

Blade 0:35

You know, if you had seen the version that she did of uh Stairway to Heaven at the Kennedy Center back in 2012, it was actually Hart that was doing it, but it was John or uh Jason Bonham, John Bonham's son, doing the drums on it, which was great. He did a show of The Switch in Raleigh, Jason Bonham. And we went to the one Denny's afterwards that we had in Raleigh at the time when I lived there and he came in with about seven people and he raised so much hell in that place. He drove the place, I mean, he started his own party at Denny's. Jason Bonham did. But at any rate, Zeppelin in attendance, and Ann Wilson is doing the singing, and Nancy Wilson is doing the playing in front of Robert Plant himself, no less. And he's crying.

Jason Bonham’s Wild Denny’s Night

Blade 2:12 Blade 2:12

Wow.

Blade 2:19

Yeah, that Kennedy Center is maybe it's now the Trump Kennedy Center. I don't know. Who cares?

Health Brag And Smoking Logic

Blade 2:32 Blade 2:32

You know, zero percent blockage in my hearts and my arteries and my veins at my age. That's an A plus win. I was explaining last week, now I can go smoke. If my vein I mean it. If my veins, you know, are sending as much oxygen as possible into my brain, I can go smoke. That's just how I think. If I got a bunch of money, I spend it, why? Because I have it. You know, if I have clear veins, you know, I can smoke. Why? Because I can. I haven't smoked in years. Now I can. Without having a heart attack. I'm serious, I'm so close to doing that.

Audience Age And Music Era Pride

Blade 3:15 Blade 3:15

I was just looking at my demographics here, take a look. It's too funny. Because uh, you know, it's all 65 plus people. Just being me, you know, and nobody can relate to me that's not 65 or so. Couple of 45s in there, you know, one twenty five, you know, and a couple of youngers in there who are probably daughters of the 65 plusers, right? We're all the same age, grew up together in the greatest age ever for music.

Snowbird Season Frustrations

Blade 3:45 Blade 3:45

This is a snowbirds episode. I've just fed up. I've had it. I've got a buddy, and I sometimes would take his dad to the grocery store. Now, my buddy's my age, but his dad is like, you know, 80. You know, 85, maybe, I don't know. Take him to the grocery store sometime, and I took him the other day. First of all, they fill up the grocery store and empty the shelves. You know, they all come here because we have plenty of RV lots. And they stay where I live in the Sonoran desert because I'm between Phoenix and Tucson. And so they can go to both and take their tee times up. You can forget ours. Always spot a snowbird, always, because they have suntans. You know, we don't get suntans because basically we stay inside in the summer. Right? They get suntans because they come down here in the wintertime, use us for our temperatures, go play golf and get suntans. Look, I'm driving the old man back to his home, you know, and and and and this is what I see. Cars everywhere, many times stopped. My roads that have never looked

Desert Life And Golf Tensions

Blade 5:05

this way in the summertime. And I am watching these cars go by, and I'm going, screw you, screw you, screw you, screw you, and you and you and you, screw you all, screw you, screw you, screw you. And my buddy's father, again, who's 85, looks at me and says, "Man, do you sound like an old man!" I said, that doesn't bother you, and he says, No.

Traffic Rants And Local Etiquette

Blade 5:40 Blade 5:40

If you're smart as a local, and you can always tell a local because they're not polite, they keep to themselves and they never talk to anyone, that's local. Now, the snowbirds are local or they are not local, and you can tell that because they're polite. They talk to people and they smile at you. Nobody here smiles at anyone. And it's too hot to smile. But if you were smart and you go to the grocery store and it's mobbed like this, show you another

Beating The Lines With Self‑Checkout

Blade 6:10

one. I got a million of them.

Blade 6:13

You use checkout lanes 11 and 18 because they're self-checkout lanes. And they look like real lanes, but they don't have checker outer ladies. You do it by yourself. You scan it, boop, and it goes down a conveyor belt into the end, and then you put it in the end if you have someone with you in your plastic bag and you walk out. Nobody uses these, the snowbirds don't, because they don't know how to use them. So if you just happen to be in a traffic jam in the grocery store with the snowbirds, you use 11 and an 18, you can get out of there in a massively shorter amount of time.

Aging Apps And Vanity Jokes

Blade 6:53 Blade 6:53

I got this aging app because I I had a bad dream the other night. I dreamed that I put myself in the aging app, and it's a did and and you put your picture in, and then the aging app makes you look older, and they're really good at it. AI makes you look older how you're gonna look in 20 years, and they're really good at it. And I had this bad dream where I inserted my picture into an aging app, and the result came out NA, not applicable. In 20 years, I guess I maxed it out. I look as old as you can look in the aging app. No, but seriously, I found one that would take me. I applied at an aging app, and then they would take me, and they did, and I wees that look anything like me, how how how I'll look and you know in 15 years when I'm 80? No. I'm not gonna have a beard, first of all. Plus he looks good too good for someone 15 years from now. He doesn't look like me, but the most beautiful woman

Beauty Then And Now

Blade 8:10

in the world, it kills me. Because when I was 30, the most beautiful woman in the world was Rebecca Romaine. Because she's gorgeous then. Now I'm 65, and the most beautiful woman in the world is Deborah Norville, because she's one year older than me. I put her in the aging machine. Is it possible she can look any older? Is it possible? That's her eighty. That woman, she's amazing. I stalk her too.

Blade 8:56

Stalking's different now because you look up all videos of these people. You know, I was stalking Grace Slick because she's my queen of rock and roll.

Harmless Stalking And Nostalgia

Blade 9:06

Sixty-six-year-old stalker. Put him in jail. Oldest stalker in the world. I started buying airplane tickets, finding out their residences, and flying out there to where they live. Smoking.

Blade 9:43

And now, the amazing poet,

Poetry Corner: M. Jagger

Blade 9:45

and he never gets enough credit for being able to write as well as he does, M. Jagger.

Reciter 9:50

I welcome you to Poetry Corner. And today's poetic piece was submitted by the famed and acclaimed author and poet M. Jagger. Please allow me to read to you a composition entitled Monkey Man. Verse 1. I'm a flea bit peanut monkey, and all my friends are junkies. That's not really true. I'm a cold Italian pizza. I could use a lemon squeezer. What you do? But I've been bit and I've been tossed around by every she rat in this town. But I, I am just a monkey man. And I am glad you are a monkey woman too. Monkey.

Blade 11:26

Courtesy of

Closing Thanks

Blade 11:28

M. Jagger. Thank you for joining us. And we will see you next time. That is all.