Why Robert Plant Once Opened for Dee Snider

Did you hear about the night that Led Zeppelin singer Robert Plant opened for Dee Snider? It seems implausible, but it actually happened.

Plant talked about it on the Twisted Sister frontman’s program, Dee Snider Radio. The two friends had been chatting briefly, when Plant’s parting words reminded Snider of the story.

Snider had been invited to the wedding of the son of his manager, Phil Carson, who also happened to be a former Atlantic Records executive who used to play with Dusty Springfield and was very involved in the career of Led Zeppelin. The wedding day, according to the The New York Times, was April 17, 1998.

Upon walking into the wedding reception, Snider noted a live band performing. Noticing Plant was also in attendance at the reception, he approached the Zeppelin frontman to see if he had any intention of getting up onstage. Plant replied that he did not.

Snider adamantly stated that neither he nor Plant are big fans of singing at weddings, even though they are often expected to do just that. The two vocalists hatched a plan to potentially “escape” the wedding reception – after making sure everybody noticed they were there – without having to get on stage to sing. But before Snider knew what happening, Plant was on stage singing “Jailhouse Rock,” and two other songs with the band.

It was at that point that Snider’s manager approached him to ask if he was in turn going to get up on stage to sing. Remembering that Plant had once told him that he hated hearing his own songs, Snider and the house band launched into the Led Zeppelin classic “Rock ‘n’ Roll” as a means to jokingly get back at the singer for having broken their agreement.

Plant eventually made his way toward the stage and wound up singing the last word – “time” – from that song.

And what a time it must have been.