"It's nice to be here in Vienna. You've even got some good groupies!": Previously unseen Led Zeppelin footage finds Robert Plant in a playful mood

Led Zeppelin onstage in Vienna in 1973 — (Image credit: LedZepFilm)

It's already been an excellent year for Led Zeppelin fans, with previously unseen clips from 1975 shows in Ohio and Montreal, plus film from performances in Chicago and Pontiac in 1977, unexpectedly emerging online.

Now more footage has emerged, with a three-minute montage of footage from the band's March 16, 1973 show at the 16,000-capacity Wiener Stadthalle in Austria appearing on the YouTube account of Led Zeppelin archivists LedZepFilm.

The film was originally shot by Mead Eblan, who attended the American International School Vienna in Austria, while the footage was scanned by Nicki Coyle, a preservationist at The Negative Space in Littleton, CO. Colour work was completed by Nuff from another group of archivists, The Pink Floyd Research Group.

The footage is assembled from short clips, so the music is somewhat fragmented, but Robert Plant is clearly in a playful mood, pretending to break wind into the microphone and telling the audience that Vienna "even has good groupies". Meanwhile, John Paul Jones, who is suffering from colic, can be seen performing from a seated position.

"Robert Plant strode around with chest barred and hair flailing, thrusting his pelvic grind at the audience," reported a March 1973 Melody Maker review of the show, "while Jimmy Page, wearing his Les Paul low-strung, crushed out well-amplified chords."

Writer Dave Hopkins ended his piece by revealing that, "The opening bars of Stairway to Heaven were greeted with a huge roar, and when the band finally broke into Whole Lotta Love, that was the cue for a general stampede towards the front of the stage."

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Online Editor at Louder/Classic Rock magazine since 2014. 40 years in music industry, online for 27. Also bylines for: Metal Hammer, Prog Magazine, The Word Magazine, The Guardian, The New Statesman, Saga, Music365. Former Head of Music at Xfm Radio, A&R at Fiction Records, early blogger, ex-roadie, published author. Once appeared in a Cure video dressed as a cowboy, and thinks any situation can be improved by the introduction of cats. Favourite Serbian trumpeter: Dejan Petrović.