Alison Krauss: Paper Airplane

Robert Plant's singing muse from 2007-09 - Led Zeppelin's Yoko Ono (but I mean that in the nicest way)- Alison Krauss releases her first album since 2007's Raising Sand with Robert Plant on Tuesday.

Here's the video of the title track, Paper Airplane:

Alison Krauss Speaks to Rolling Stone

Last month, Robert Plant told Rolling Stone Magazine that a second album with Alison Krauss had been planned but, “The sound wasn’t there.”

He was referring to sessions on the follow up to their Grammy winning album, Raising Sand. Plant went on to record Band of Joy instead of continuing with the Krauss collaboration. Alison Krauss returned to her band, Union Station, and recorded their sixth studio album.

In a piece in Rolling Stone this week, Krauss agreed with Plant that the sound wasn’t there. However, she wants to be clear that’s not the fault of the  musicians they were working with:

I don’t want to make it sound like we’re saying that someone else’s performance wasn’t there -  the band was fantastic, the same as the first record.

They traded compliments in their Rolling Stone stories as well, Plant saying:

Alison’s the best. She’s one of my favourite people.

Krauss is more backhanded in her return compliment:

He’s a delightful person, and I’ll never meet another like him.

Krauss’ new album, Paper Airplane is available April 12th. It is their first album since 2004’s Lonely Runs Both Ways.

Alison Krauss Follows Up Rasing Sand

In 2009, Robert Plant and Alison Krauss returned to the studio to record the follow up to their Grammy winning album, Raising Sand. "The sound just wasn't there," Plant told Rolling Stone about those sessions.

Plant then called on the guitarist on the Raising Sand tour, Buddy Miller, who told Plant, "go back to Alison." They collaborated on Plant's new album, Band of Joy instead while Krauss turned back to her old band, Union Station.

Alison Krauss and Union Station's new album, Paper Airplane, will be released April 12th. It is her first album since Raising Sand was released in 2007, and her first with Union Station since 2004's Lonely Runs Both Ways.




Track list for Paper Airplane:

• Paper Airplane


• Dustbowl Children


• Lie Awake


• Lay My Burden Down


• My Love Follows You Where You Go


• Dimming Of The Day


• On The Outside Looking In


• Miles To Go


• Sinking Stone


• Bonita and Bill Butler

Robert Plant’s Same Tricks: The Rolling Stone Feature

“I see your still up to the same tricks,” John Bonham’s 81 year old mother Joan announced to Robert Plant backstage at a recent concert in Birmingham: “People who have written their story - they’ve got to the point where nothing moves. I don’t deal in that,” he later says about his musical contemporaries still playing the same songs.

Robert Plant is an enigma, a feature of the singer that comes through more than any other in a Rolling Stone magazine feature hitting newsstands Monday. Plant is at once talking about “the occasional tryst,” next telling Led Zeppelin fans the old Led Zeppelin groupie days are over:

Tell people the mud shark is dead and Buddy Miller’s got 86,000 songs on his laptop.

Plant talks about looking ahead when it comes to Led Zeppelin, but about Alison Krauss, “we’ll come back to it.” About travelling to Morocco, revisiting the famous trip he and Jimmy page took in 1973 (not 1978 as stated in the article), “I wanted to go back down that road.”

Frustratingly inconsistent as Robert Plant can be, make no mistake to his intent in this article: he has no intention of revisiting Led Zeppelin. And considering Jimmy Page, John Paul Jones and Jason Bonham recorded six or seven songs together in the aftermath of the 2007 reunion show, the most significant quote in the Rolling Stone article may be his one on writing:

I’ve kind of given up writing. All my writing is sort of meandering. The last time I lifted a pen was when Tony Blair became a Roman Catholic (Dec 2007)

The Rolling Stone article, Robert Plant’s Mystical Mountain Hop, has been getting a lot of press this week. It is, in reality, a disappointingly thin article, with almost all the quotes released in the articles pre-press, and the other 90% reviewing his recent career.

What you really want to know about Robert Plant circa 2011 is, he sees himself as a teacher, teaching music fans about old American music:

“You stay,” he tells the articles author Stephen Rodrick as he’s leaving the Cecil Sharp House, a repository for British folk music and dance. “Learn from this.”

And the Nominees Are

The Grammy Awards tonight announced their 2011 nominees during a televised concert. Led Zeppelin members record three nominations this year, two to Robert Plant, and one to John Paul Jones’ band Them Crooked Vultures.

Robert Plant:
Best Solo Rock Vocal Performance
(For a solo vocal performance. Singles or Tracks only)
Silver Rider
from: Band Of Joy

Best Americana Album
(Vocal or Instrumental)
Band Of Joy

John Paul Jones:

Best Hard Rock Performance
(For solo, duo, group or collaborative performances, with vocals.
Singles or Tracks only.)
New Fang
Them Crooked Vultures
from: Them Crooked Vultures

Plant won five Grammy’s in 2009, including album and record of the year, for his collaboration with Alison Krauss, Raising Sand.

Previously, he won a Grammy in 1998, with Jimmy Page, for the song Most High, from the Walking Into Clarksdale CD

As near as I can determine, this is John Paul Jones first Grammy nomination, although he has previously conducted a 20 piece orchestra that performed with the Foo Fighters in 2008.

The 53rd annual Grammy Awards will take place on February 13th.