The “Phoenix” Led Zeppelin Album That Robert Plant Sang From a Wheelchair

A mythological band in both legacy and lyric, Led Zeppelin embodied two beings of lore in the summer of 1975: Icarus, as they came crashing down from their height of fame following the release of Physical Graffiti, and the phoenix, as the band reconvened after the fall, releasing an album that vocalist Robert Plant had to sing from a wheelchair.

Commercially speaking, the album was one of the band’s worst. However, the obstacles Led Zeppelin overcame to create the record overshadowed poor sales records, speaking to the power and fortitude of the group as a unit.

From a Grecian Holiday to a Hospital Stay

Following the successful release and tour of their 1975 album Physical Graffiti, Led Zeppelin took a short break over the summer before embarking on a U.S. tour at the end of August. Robert Plant opted to go to Greece with his wife, Maureen, and their two children, Karac and Carmen. On the afternoon of Monday, August 4, 1975, Plant was driving his family in a rental car when he lost control and spun off the road.

Everyone in the car survived but suffered serious injuries. Robert Plant had fractures in his ankle, foot, and elbow. His wife had several concussions, a broken leg, four fractures in her pelvis, and facial lacerations. Karac broke his leg; Carmen, her wrist, and both children had multiple cuts and bruises. After the initial shock of the accident wore off, there was another pressing matter to attend to: what was going to happen to the Led Zeppelin tour?

Unsurprisingly, the band canceled the tour. With the crash happening just days before rehearsals were set to begin, there was no way Plant—whose injuries confined him to a wheelchair—would be able to heal in time to perform. After making the difficult decision to cancel their highly anticipated tour, Led Zeppelin turned to the next best thing: the studio.

The “Phoenix” Album Robert Plant Sung From A Wheelchair

Robert Plant and Jimmy Page began co-writing an album to present the rest of the band while Plant rested in Jersey and, later, Malibu, California. After the musicians finished writing, Led Zeppelin set off for Münich, Germany’s Musicland Studio in November, three months after Plant’s car crash. The musician was still in a wheelchair, and the studio (and band) had to plan their recording sessions and instrumentation accordingly.

Led Zeppelin would eventually call their impromptu record Presence—a reference to the gratitude, camaraderie, and, appropriately, presence the band felt with one another as they made the best out of a bad situation. Despite being the band’s least commercially successful album, Presence does feature some popular Led Zeppelin tracks, including “Nobody’s Fault but Mine” and the massive 10-minute opener, “Achilles Last Stand.”

“Presence was our phoenix,” Plant later recalled to Far Out Magazine. “When you sit in a wheelchair and sing the whole album, the very fact that you’ve sung it is fantastic. We got together in such a short space of time under such odds, not knowing what the outcome was going to be—not of the album but of the future of the band.”

Plant said the doctors were never able to tell him how inactive he might be following the accident. “So, we were just kicking it from the very depths of our determination.”

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