Bob Dylan Slyly Insulted Led Zeppelin to Their Manager’s Face

TL;DR:

• Led Zeppelin’s Robert Plant and Jimmy Page have praised Bob Dylan.
• Bob Dylan gave a chilly response to Led Zeppelin’s manager when they met.
• Led Zeppelin has covered Bob Dylan’s work.

Bob Dylan has a reputation for being prickly but also having a way with words. The singer-songwriter has a Nobel Prize in Literature for a reason, after all. In the mid-1970s, Dylan was meeting Led Zeppelin’s manager for the first time, and he subtly insulted the band just moments into the conversation. In spite of Dylan’s dig, members of Led Zeppelin have publicly praised the American musician’s work.

Members of Led Zeppelin have praised Bob Dylan

Dylan had already established himself as a musician by the time Led Zeppelin formed. Band members Robert Plant and Jimmy Page have praised Dylan’s work. Plant noted that Dylan’s work was where he got his “social conscience.”

“Something happened when Dylan arrived. I had to grapple with what he was talking about,” Plant told The Guardian in 2007. “His music referenced Woody Guthrie, Richard and Mimi Farina, Reverend Gary Davis, Dave Van Ronk and all these great American artists I knew nothing about. He was absorbing the details of America and bringing it out without any reservation at all, and ignited a social conscience that is spectacular. In these Anglo-Saxon lands we could only gawp, because we didn’t know about the conditions he was singing about. Dylan was the first one to say: hello, reality.”

In an Instagram post, Page described the experience of seeing Dylan perform live as “life-changing.” 

“In May 1965 I experienced the genius of Bob at the Albert Hall,” he wrote in the caption. “He accompanied himself on acoustic guitar and cascaded images and words from such songs as It’s Alright, Ma (I’m Only Bleeding) and She Belongs To Me to a mesmerized audience. It was life changing.⁣”

Bob Dylan subtly insulted Led Zeppelin

When meeting Led Zeppelin’s manager, Peter Grant, in the mid-1970s, Dylan didn’t give the group even close to the amount of reverence that they gave him. Musician Ian McLagan was in the room when Dylan and Grant met for the first time.

“Hello, Bob. I’m Peter Grant, I manage Led Zeppelin,” he said to the “Like a Rolling Stone” singer, per Vulture.

McLagan watched as Dylan paused for a moment before responding in a way that snubbed both Led Zeppelin and Grant’s line of work.

“I don’t come to you with my problems,” Dylan simply said.

Led Zeppelin has covered some of the American musician’s songs

Evidently, the band didn’t take offense to Dylan’s chilly appraisal of them. Page described a 2013 Dylan concert as “intoxicating.” The group has also covered Dylan’s songs. He inspired the band’s 1975 song “In My Time of Dying.” Plant also covered Dylan’s 1976 song, “One More Cup of Coffee,” on his 2002 album Dreamland.