Hey everybody welcome back again to Ken Tamplin Vocal Academy where the proof is
in the singing. I'm doing a series and the series is
called What Makes This Singer Great and next up is Robert Plant. Before we get
started if you wouldn't mind please like and subscribe to my channel that would
be awesome and don't forget to ring that bell so I
can keep more great videos coming your way and I have a singing course and the
course is called How to Sing Better Than Anyone Else, you can find it right here
at Ken Tamplin Vocal Academy.com where we discuss and negotiate all the
different techniques and styles on what it takes to make these guys a great
singer and hopes to help make you a great singer. So we're gonna take on
Robert Plant. Now what comes to my mind, what first comes to mind when I think of
Robert Plant. Well I think of timelessness you know, legendary rock
star. That's one thing. I think of high range and some really interesting great
distorted vocals. He has a lot of really cool distortion. I think of some of the
interesting kind of Celtic/Irish sounding ballad you know like you know
"Over The Hills And Far Away" and "Going To California" like all the acoustic
elements that were brought in to rock music back then, which wasn't that common.
I think of him as being kind of psychedelic, kind of seventies
psychedelic for sure. I think of him being mystical a.. very mystical,
Nordic mysticism songwriting you know that he enjoyed a lot. I think of him
as a belter, very powerful singer especially in his high range. Jimmy Page
comes to mind you know, it's hard to separate Robert Plant Jimmy Page. To me
they kind of go together as a package. What else. I think maybe one of the
greatest rock influences, vocal influences of all time right, think about
that. I think of songs "Stairway To Heaven", Going To California". By the way I've
covered "Going To California". I've covered some Zeppelin songs already and I'll put
those in the description tag so you can hear and I did, I've done some with my
students as well. So I'll put everything I have released to date, I'll put those
in the description so you could check out and see how we did, I did
singing Zeppelin stuff but I think of "Whole Lotta Love" you know I think of
the "Immigrant Song" I think of "Kashmir". I think of I don't know "Ramble On" which I did,
"Rock and Roll". So again I'll put all that the subject but I want you guys to tell
me and put in the comments sections what comes to your mind when
you think of Robert Plant and I'm gonna dive into some actual live music now. So
but it's a little difficult on some of this older stuff to get good quality
footage because I don't think it was the best representation of you know all of
Robert Plant. So we grabbed what we can and what YouTube will allow so the
publishing companies will allow us to use. Some some decent footage here but
with that said let's just kind of dive right in and chew on it.
He's also very nasally (sings). There was a lot of guys that used a lot of nasality especially back then.
Very psychedelic, kind of druggy right.
I think of the movie Song Remains The Same.
and something else I think of personally is I think of John Bonham. I think
without John Bonham I'm not sure the band would have had anywhere as near the
same groove and funk factor and feel with a lot of this stuff so he
contributed significantly and as did John Paul Jones. I think he's a very
underrated behind-the-scenes guy but he also contributed significantly to Led
Zeppelin. So again this it's just this package that came together. Now I know
Robert went on later and you know did some jazz stuff and whatnot which is
pretty cool. They called it Americana back then you
know with Diana Krall and some other people he worked with but um and that
was cool but my main staple for him is remembering him in Led Zeppelin and kind
of all the stuff he's done here so.
Drum.
Very signature sound.
Now for my singing friends out there, I want
to point out some things about Robert Plant okay. Now I just did, I've done some
Zeppelin stuff so check out you know my approach to it. I approached it more like
the way I would want to do it technically but he's a little deceiving
because I just did I don't know when I'm gonna release all this stuff so I'm not
sure that'll be out in time for you to check it out but it's coming out soon
but I did "Since I've Been Loving You" for example and a lot of that stuff is very
head voice driven, very falsetto driven and it sounds like he's pulling chest all
the way up into his head voice and he's really not. That's true for "Going To
California" and some other things like that where he's actually coming in from
using head voice and bringing head voice down to reinforced falsetto, down into his
upper belting range and it makes it sound like he's belting really high when
in fact he's actually not, he's using head voice reinforced falsetto with some
distortion, to make you think that you're hearing a again a pulled chest sound of
you know kind of pulling a lot of muscle mass and girth in the throat up really
high and that's not what's going on. It wouldn't be sustainable very long if in
fact he was doing that and so I just want to make that side note for my
singer friends out there. I cover that in my singing course so we can negotiate and
talk all about that in the course also I have a singing forums guys. If you want
to go to my Ken Tamplin Vocal Academy.com
I have a free singing forum, you can sign up for free and check out see you know all
the different people discussing the different topics and you know whatnot..
discussing not discushing here we go.
Now we all know this one.
He was kind of an effeminate dresser it
was kind of interesting back then, it didn't seem to fit his kind of manly
persona in that sense but he did nonetheless dress kind of effeminate you know
it was interesting.
Love that.
Now he's kind of locked up there so so now let me make that point. Okay so remember me saying about bringing the
head voice and bringing down, in this case he's not. So he's belting and a lot like
what happens with guys like you know I'm gonna use you know Brian Johnson as a good
example from AC/DC. You get to a point where the larynx gets
stuck and you can't release and relax and you can't go any higher so it's just
it ,it hits a ceiling and that's it and you just can't do it until you actually
you can, there's massaging techniques you can
actually take your fingers and you can go like this and massage and pull the
laryngeal position down. You can feel it's your Adam's apple. You can feel kind of
pull it down and then kind of shake it side to side real gently all the way
down the throat and it'll relax and release and you can go back and go up
and get some notes. I don't know if he knew to do that back then but I want to
back this up a little bit you can hear he can't sing the notes cause he gets
stuck in that laryngeal position and he can't sing any higher check it out.
And if you notice if he relaxes for a minute, he gets a little back
right. So anyway I point all this technical stuff out because all this
technical stuff is really important if you want to learn how to sing like this
or beyond that or different styles and genres. So again I'm doing the series
What Makes A Singer Great so if you've got a singer you'd like for me to cover
please put it in the comment section. If I missed something or there's something
else that reminds you of Led Zeppelin or particularly Robert Plant, please put
that in the comments section so makes it for a more well-rounded approach not
just Ken Tamplin's you know viewpoints and whatnot and stick around because I have
another cool video headed your way check it out.