“If it wasn’t for my father’s passing, I think I would’ve been riding dirt bikes”: Jason Bonham says he never would have taken up drums if his Led Zeppelin member dad hadn’t died
Jason Bonham, son of late Led Zeppelin drummer John Bonham, says he never would have taken up drums if it hadn’t been for his father’s passing.
This month, Bonham, himself a prodigious musician, is going on tour with his band, Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Evening, to celebrate Physical Graffiti’s 50th anniversary. Speaking to Australian morning show Today Extra to promote the event, he said [via Blabbermouth]: “At a young age. I think, from being able to play from about five years old, I then heavily got into motocross when I was about nine.
“If it wasn’t for my father’s passing, I think I would’ve been riding dirt bikes. So, really, it was my dad’s passing that made me suddenly go, ‘I wanna [play drums]. I wanna follow in his footsteps.’”
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Physical Graffiti, released in 1975, was Led Zeppelin’s sixth studio album and was a commercial and critical hit, combining the band’s classic hard rock sound with elements of prog rock, blues, funk and Moroccan orchestra.
Upon its release, Rolling Stone described it as “the band’s Sgt. Pepper”. In 2003, the same magazine ranked it the 70th greatest album of all time.
Bonham explains that Physical Graffiti was always his favourite Led Zeppelin album and that the tour, which will feature seven shows across New Zealand and Australia, will also be a sort of history lesson on how the iconic album came to be.
“Well, my favourite album was Physical Graffiti, so I went back and did some research and realised that some of the songs were actually recorded for Led Zeppelin IV, some of them were recorded for Houses Of The Holy.
“I always say, why wasn’t ‘Houses Of The Holy’ on Houses Of The Holy? So, part of the show, it’s more than just us playing the music. I explain some of the things and what it was like being around them and growing up in the household of Bonham and getting to play with, of course, Robert [Plant], John [Paul Jones] and Jimmy [Page].”
John Bonham died on 25 September, 1980, aged just 32. He left behind two children: five-year-old Zoe and 14-year-old Jason.
Led Zeppelin disbanded after John’s death, telling the press: “We could not continue as we were.” But starting in 1988, Jason began performing with Robert Plant, John Paul Jones and Jimmy Page at sporadic reunion events, including the legendary 2007 Ahmet Ertegun Tribute Concert at the London O2 Arena.
In 2010, he founded Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Experience, a tribute to his father and his band, which later rebranded as Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Evening.
Bonham explained: “Here I am now coming up to my 60th birthday and paying tribute to the greatest music in the world, but also being able to play my father’s music. And it’s all from the heart.
“That’s the thing we do with the show. I’ve been doing this show now for 16 years, and the only reason we keep going – it’s because of the fans, but [also] because it’s still alive here in our hearts.”
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