In February 2019, Robert Plant booked a trio of shows at tiny, off-the-radar theaters across England with a new band he dubbed Saving Grace. Each night they played an eclectic mix of covers like Donovan’s “Season of the Witch,” Townes Van Zandt’s “Nothin,’” Patti Griffin’s “Standing,” and even a couple of Led Zeppelin songs largely utilizing acoustic instruments, including banjo and accordion.
“I did this basically to keep me away from the tedium between projects,” Plant tells Rolling Stone while chilling in a hotel room between shows in Lucca, Italy, and Juan-les-Pins, France. “I just liked the idea of getting out and playing these tiny weenie little shows, and just showing up with no expectations, nothing at all. It was a totally different way of enjoying myself without having any kind of professional ambition beyond just enjoying the evening.”
It didn’t take long for Plant to discover an undeniable musical chemistry between himself, drummer Oli Jefferson, guitarist Tony Kelsey, banjo and string player Matt Worley, cellist Barney Morse-Brown, and vocalist Suzi Dian. When space cleared up in all their schedules, more Saving Grace shows were booked with very little advanced notice. They also started laying the groundwork for a studio album, though progress was slow due to the pandemic, the second Plant/Krauss album, 2021’s Raise the Roof, and a tour that kept the duo on the road for three years.
When the Plant/Krauss tour wrapped up in the fall of 2024, Plant was finally able to focus all of his energy on the Saving Grace studio LP they started back in 2019. The self-titled album is coming out September 26, and leadoff single “Everybody’s Song” can be heard right now. A U.S. tour kicks off October 30 in Wheeling, West Virginia.
We phoned up Plant to discuss the formation of Saving Grace, recording the album, tour plans, his time on the Outlaw Tour last year with Bob Dylan and Willie Nelson, and why he’ll never write a memoir or sign off on an official biopic.
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Go back a few years and tell me how you met Suzi Dian and formed Saving Grace.
Well, it’s a little bit more profound than that. I reside and live in the same area that I have been most of my life, with a few sojourns in Morocco, and I spent some time enjoying the wonders of Austin, Texas. But I always come back to the Welsh Borders and to the Shire as I call it, the beautiful green. That’s always been a very important part of my being. But I always found it really difficult to transfer my enthusiasm and lock into the music of the area where I came from.
Around 1980 or 1981, after the passing of my dear friend, John Bonham, I retreated back again to the Shire and started to rebuild and look around for musicians who were nearer to me so that I could just push musical ideas around without any great shapes or ambition or promise.
The first three solo albums that I made following the demise of Led Zepp were in the company of local people. And then I never moved back again into that throng of people. And in truth, I don’t think I was ever around long enough to find, if you like, the lost chord.
More recently, I did strike up a relationship with Matt Worley. He had been raised on some of the similar idioms and great nuances of English and Irish folk music. We had an affinity and we had common ground, and that’s really how the whole thing began. I found somebody who I could connect with where I didn’t get a vague blank expression if I started enthusing about the artists that really inspired me. And through my adventures with Matt and Tony Kelsey, we started amassing a bunch of songs.
Tell me about singing with Suzi Dian.
In recent years, I’ve worked with both Alison Krauss and Patty Griffin. It was such a departure for me to come out of [my band] Strange Sensation into this world of sharing vocals and working around another singer, adapting to someone else’s vocal style. And so I wanted to try and see whether or not there was another voice for me.
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I was introduced to Suzi and to her husband, the drummer, Oli Jefferson, and I just really enjoyed her plaintive style and the freshness of her and enthusiasm of her approach to the songs I presented. It was almost like something I couldn’t have even imagined for such a long time. There it was. And there it is. And there you have it.
Tell me more about what impressed you about her.
I know that sounds a bit inane, but she was coming from a different angle. She’s a contemporary singer in a world of song that I’ve not experienced. So she obviously had to modify what she was doing, and I had to take in some of her nuance. It just worked. It feels like it’s another one of those combinations that feels really natural.
The shows started very gradually in early 2019. How did they evolve from there?
We do a show here, a show there. Now currently we’re playing 10 shows in Europe, but in very pleasing circumstances without putting any onus on anything at all, except for just enjoying the evening.
Did the pandemic blunt some of the group’s momentum?
Well, I didn’t even see that way. It wasn’t momentum. It was just like, “Shall we do this? Are you free? Are you available to do this show?” Or, “How do you fancy going down to South Wales and doing this?” There was no sort of trajectory. It’s similar now to how it was pre-Covid. It’s just a very charming and quite exciting combination of personality and musicianship. It’s lovely. I do view this band as my saving grace. They saved my sanity, really.
You took off several years to create your second record with Alison Krauss. Did you always know in the back of your head that you’d go back to Saving Grace when that was done?
My work with Alison has been an absolute rebirth for me in the whole idea of what I can be and do and share as a performer. So I didn’t see myself jumping from pillar to post. I just see it as a continuum of just enjoying what I can do. My adventures with Alison were just a dream, really a dream. And Alison had her plans with Union Station, and I thought, “Well, I’m singing, I’m in good voice. I’m just going to keep doing things, and hopefully our paths will cross when we’re both playing maybe the same town or the same festival or whatever it might be.”
Tom Oldham*
How did this Saving Grace album start?
Well, we began with one microphone on a mic stand in a field adjacent to Matt Worley’s place. We had a little desk set up. And we would get nowhere nearer than about four yards away from each other, and one by one go up to the microphone, and spray the microphone. On the last track on the record, you can hear some birds singing because we’d individually play a part and come away from the mic.
It was an experiment that took me back to Physical Graffiti with Led Zeppelin when I did quite a few vocals outside. I really enjoyed the whole idea of being out there rather than in the constraints of a studio. It began with “Higher Rock,” I believe, and maybe even “Chevrolet.” That was probably about 2019 or ’20. And then I’d go off somewhere else, and then we’d come back to it.
A friend of Steve Winwood’s got an old farm down in Gloucestershire, and he used to be quite involved with the very early days of Traffic. And so as the conditions changed and the world started to open up, occasionally we’d go down to his barn and see what we would do there. It’s really great, very pastoral.
I think maybe we made one sojourn to Peter Gabriel’s Real World Studios to try and see how we would get on with a different drum sound or whatever it was. But it’s been pretty organic all the way through. I know that’s a very overused word, but that’s how it is. Nothing was riding on it, nobody was thinking beyond maybe putting this record out. Some shows in the U.S. later in the year might be about the zenith of anything that anybody ever imagined really. There’s never any sort of aspiration.
Whereas when I came back after the demise of Led Zeppelin, I was in a different place, a different headspace, a different time in my life. I was really quite determined to take my music with a lot more drive, whereas this seems to be, it seems pretty pastoral really.
In Saving Grace, I don’t think any of us live more on about eight miles apart. It’s a very familiar combination of people in every respect, because I guess we’ve come out of the same area completely. There’s a coherence even in our humor. We’ve got a good thing going on without where there’s no huge imperatives. It’s just really nice.
Let’s talk about some of the songs on the record. You cover Moby Grape’s “It’s a Beautiful Day Today.” What drew you to that song?
Oh, 1967 drew me there. I used to live in a house full of very wayward New Age guys from the urban spore in the middle of England. And we were just transfixed by Moby Grape. They just had so many things going on in that group, so many voices, and with Jerry [Miller] and Skip [Spence], the great guitar player, it was like a clarion.
That whole era to me was just…there was so many new avenues of how youth culture, guys in their early twenties…It was the [Jefferson] Airplane and it was just a whole sort of a new wave coming over from the West Coast. It was almost like it kind of bludgeoned the bubblegum pop, moved it completely out of the way, and asked a lot of important questions of the listener.
“It’s a Beautiful Day Today” is such a very beautiful and sweet piece, which comes from Bob Mosley, a guy whose life was to take so many twists and turns and curves and beautiful great stuff.
You introduced Memphis Minnie to quite a few people when you covered “When The Levee Breaks” in Led Zeppelin. What drew you back to her for “Chevrolet?”
Well, I heard “Chevrolet” initially when it came out of Como, Mississippi. It was a drum five piece, which I think Alan Lomax had recorded in ’59 when Shirley Collins was traveling with him. Someone called the song “Chevrolet.” They’d taken the Memphis Mini song and moved it into a very great rhythmic hypnotic piece, which I knew.
And then of course, a dear friend, Donovan, moved it along again. Hey gave it another title, a very typical Donovan title, of “Hey Gyp (Dig the Slowness).” I love it. It’s always been one of those things like “Bald Headed Woman” that were coming out of the Delta. I mean, the music of Memphis Minnie is all over the world right now.
You also cover some new artists, and some of them are relatively unknown. Where did you come across “Higher Rock” by Martha Scanlan?
I have no idea. I cannot, even for the life of me, remember. I think when me and Alison and others were looking for songs..we were not alone in that adventure because the magnificent Henry [T-Bone] Burnett was never far out of the picture. It may have been Buddy Miller, it could have been T-Bone, it could have been me. I can’t remember.
How about “Ticket Taker” by Low Anthem?
Oh man, what a record that was. I mean, that whole album [Oh My God Charlie Darwin] is mesmerizing, just absolutely mesmerizing. And it’s a song that had been carried around. I’ve got a book here in this hotel room, which is loaded with the titles and with the little vignettes and cutlets of ideas that come from everywhere. Quite a lot of them actually come from between my ears, mysteriously. But that record was such an inspiration to me. I think Low Anthem had a really great effect on me.
“Everybody’s Song” by Low is amazing.
That’s the third track that I’ve borrowed from [their album] The Great Destroyer. I find them absolutely spellbinding. I saw them live a couple of times in London, and they were always so impressive and beautiful.
You’ve never toured outside of Europe with Saving Grace. Are you looking forward to the upcoming U.S. shows?
Of course I am. It’s just that sometimes we play in South Wales in a theater for 200 people, and sometimes we go and do this. And it would seem appropriate because a lot of the songs are really inspired by the American song itself.
It’s going to be wonderful to see and feel how it turns out for these people because it’s not something they ever imagined. I think they were always waiting for me to just say, “Okay, well that’s it now. I’m going to form a Link Wray tribute band.” I think it would be good to enjoy it through their eyes as well.
How was your experience on the Outlaw Tour last summer? I’m sure there were some people in the audience every night not super familiar with your work.
I never even thought about it like that, really. I just thought of what Alison and I had to offer with the musicality, with the players that I was very fortunate to be in the company of. I thought it was appropriate that we weren’t going to be playing too many pieces that perhaps were super well known. Although the two records that we have made so far have got a little bit of recognition.
I just warmed to the whole idea of that Outlaw deal. I always wanted to be a sort of Grateful Dead cavalcade. I loved the whole idea of musicians traveling together from town to town, the whole romance of it all. And of course, I guess really it’s anything but romantic really when you think about how the years have gone, and how they leave us all.
But I do remember in about 1971, Jimmy Page and I had this idea. We’d been writing Zeppelin III, and we’d really got into the whole idea of a cooperative of music. We knew that it would be feasible, probably disastrous…I think Ronnie Lane tried later on to actually move through towns in an old converted bus, and really just pull up in small towns with a little generator, and just play. So I guess really you think about Rolling Thunder Revue, and you think about that train [The Festival Express] that ran across Canada with Janis [Joplin] and was it Joni [Mitchell] too?
I believe it was the Grateful Dad, Janis Joplin, the Band, and the Flying Burrito Bros.
It must have been pandemonium, thinking about it the way that we do things now. I guess at the time I found that romance something really great. And they say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. But I really enjoyed [the Outlaw tour] and I enjoyed Willie [Nelson]. I loved his family. And the master there, sort of moving through the spheres…Dylan, he was just otherworldly and every foible, every twist and turn, he’s on something else. I just love it.
Did you watch Bob’s set many nights?
Yes, I did. And I saw him in Wolverhampton [in November 2024], out of all places, too. He told me he was going to England, and he said he was playing in Wolverhampton. I mean, it’s the industrial heartland. It’s where the Industrial Revolution began more or less, and the aftermath of it all. I said, “That’s going to be amazing, you doing that.” I think he was doing two nights in Wolverhampton. I was flabbergasted. So I went to see him, and it was better for me because it was a closed space. It was a 3,000 capacity room, and I just felt that it was like spoken word. I was really moved. It was a great inspiration. I thought it was magnificent.
The two of you obviously come from very different worlds. But you’re both the singers of very, very famous songs you hear every day on the radio. The easy path is to just go onstage every night and sing those songs just like they sound on the radio. But you’ve both always resisted that easy path.
I take your point. We opted out from what we might’ve been, and where we might’ve gone in a life path because we had some expressionism. We had something to say, something to offer, some nuance. Look at the prolific nature of his work, like “False Prophet” from Rough and Rowdy Ways. You know that guy’s got the whole thing down, and that’s not an easy place to be.
My world was a different world, but I escaped from the tedium of revisiting past successes. And repeating the chimes of great choruses in the same style would be more or less doing exactly what I tried to avoid in the first place. You have to keep it fresh.
Not that long ago, I went to see Dion DiMucci. His voice was immaculate. And he has such a groove when he sings, but of course, I was exactly how people are towards me. I was waiting for the particular songs. And of course, he actually had progressed into giving us these songs in a different fashion. You have to stimulate yourself. You cannot become part of that great… The jukebox is a jukebox. That’s fine. I get that. Time’s come and go. I’ve had a great time as a singer getting through it, getting away with it, getting beyond it, getting in front of it, and that’s where I belong. Somewhere in the middle of all that.
Speaking of past success, the Led Zeppelin documentary was pretty great. It wrapped up around the time of the second album though. Fans are hoping for a second one that finishes the story. Would you have any interest in that?
I think the fact that it ended before we needed to take a shave in the morning was probably the most appropriate. I think that kind of shook up the joyous instance of everything, and then we had to go out and buy a razor, and that was it.
Do you ever think about writing your memoir?
Not a chance.
Why?
I’m going down with the ship, and so is my memory.
There’s been a glut of rock and roll biopics recently, and a lot more are coming. Do you think the day will ever come where you’ll sign off on a biopic about your life?
No chance. I’m back on the ship, and I’m going down with it.
Robert Plant’s Saving Grace Track Listing
“Chevrolet”
“As I Roved Out”
“It’s A Beautiful Day Today”
“Soul Of A Man”
“Ticket Taker”
“I Never Will Marry”
“Higher Rock”
“Too Far From You”
“Everybody’s Song”
“Gospel Plough”
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Robert Plant & Saving Grace Tour U.S. Dates
October 30 – Wheeling, WV @ Capitol Theatre Wheeling
November 2 – Charlottesville, VA @ The Paramount Theater of Charlottesville
November 3 – Washington DC @ Lincoln Theatre
November 5 – Brooklyn, NY @ Brooklyn Paramount
November 6 – Boston, MA @ Boch Center Shubert Theatre
November 8 – Port Chester, NY @ Capitol Theatre
November 10 – Toronto, ON @ Massey Hall
November 12 – Chicago, IL @ The Vic
November 15 – Denver, CO @ Ellie Caulkins Opera House
November 18 – Seattle, WA @ The Moore Theatre
November 19 – Vancouver, BC @ Vogue Theatre
November 21 – Oakland, CA @ The Fox
