Mr. Plant (Photo: Wikimedia)

Led Zeppelin singer Robert Plant, at MOMA on Tuesday with bandmates Jimmy Page, John Paul Jones, and Jason Bonham, son of the band’s late original drummer John, for a press conference to promote their new concert film, “Celebration Day,” entered the journalist-packed auditorium singing, “treat me like a fool...” He was clearly in a festive mood.

That mood would not last.

Ever since the 2007 concert featured in the film, a tribute to the late Atlantic Records co-founder Ahmet Ertegun at London’s O2 Arena, the band has said in countless interviews that they would never reunite again, largely due to Mr. Plant’s desire to focus on other projects and just generally move on. But that didn’t stop the assembled fourth estate from harping on the reunion talk, to the band’s growing annoyance.

At first, Mr. Plant showed flashes of humor. When asked if they find it difficult to watch themselves, he replied, “I used to be better looking than this.” Discussing Mr. Ertegun, Mr. Plant noted that he would talk about “everything from Coltrane, Modern Jazz Quartet, through to Ratt and White Lion.” He practically spat these last two band names, then paused for a contemptuous smirk that evoked laughter from the crowd.

But the scorn he felt toward cheesy hair metal was nothing compared to that he reserved for questions about a possible reunion. After one reporter asked if the film was in anticipation of something bigger, he replied, “We’d been thinking about all sorts of things. And then we can’t remember what we were thinking about. Schmuck.” Another asked whether after their previous reunion gigs they felt like they had “unfinished business,” and Mr. Plant seemed to be straining his face not to let his eyes roll.

Still, some did not get the message. One radio host said, “I’d like to ask a follow-up to the question posed by the schmuck, if I might.” He complimented them on the film, then said, “I don’t know that it’s gonna quench the thirst of those who wish to see you in the flesh.” Gasps of incredulity echoed through the room. “What would you say to them?”

Seven seconds of deadly silence followed, and then laughter bubbled up, almost drowning out Mr. Jones’ subdued, sing-songy answer to the question: “Sorry.” The laughter blazed anew, the moderators passed the mic to the next questioner, and twenty seconds after he had asked his question, the radio host, apparently not having heard Mr. Jones’ reply, said, “Is anybody gonna say anything?”

It took a whole three-and-a-half minutes before the next journalist jumped into the reunion fray, noting that in the film, they looked like they were having fun. “Why is it so hard to come together again?”

The band’s silence this time went on for twelve seconds before the journo implored, “can someone answer it?” A voice in the crowd cried out, “It’s been answered a million times, sir.”

Yes, one doesn’t want to be a tribute band, though apparently hooking up with the guy who sings for the Creed spin-off, Alter Bridge, wouldn’t be so bad. That’s right, according to Billboard.com, rumors are flying that Myles Kennedy—the singer who joined what was left of Creed after douche-nozzle Scott Stapp launched his ill-fated solo career—has been rehearsing with the band and may join them on tour. Let’s just hope, as some have suggested, that this is all some ruse to get Plant on board.

In other reunion news, according to Idolator, Orange Juice—a Scottish band who in many respects falls at the very opposite end of the testosterone spectrum from Led Zeppelin—will be getting back together for a reunion show when the music-therapy organization Nordoff-Robbins honors them next month. Since the quartet’s break-up in 1985, the band has gone on to influence a slew of indie-pop bands, particularly folks like Belle & Sebastian and Franz Ferdinand. What makes this reunion particularly notable is that the band’s frontman, Edwyn Collins, suffered a debilitating brain hemorrhage in 2005 that left him unable to speak, read, write, walk, or use his right hand (meaning he couldn't play guitar). And yet, just a year and half later, he was posting new tunes to his MySpace page. Makes getting Plant and the boys back together seem like a walk in the park.

We can’t say we’re terribly surprised. Plant has a critically-lauded album to promote with Alison Krauss, and a tour to do through October, and really, he’s always been the most hesitant Zep when it came to getting the ol’ gang back together.

On the other hand, it was Plant who made a show of denying the “rumor” last summer that Led Zeppelin planed to honor late Atlantic Records honcho Ahmet Ertegun (the same Ahmet that originally signed his band) with a one-off reunion show. Of course, then Plant went out and made history with Zeppelin’s sold-out performance at London’s 02 Arena that December. Critics and fans are still recovering. And even just yesterday—hours before Plant surfaced to deny rumors of a full-fledged reunion—the Guardian quoted an anonymous source dishing to the Sun about how Plant had signed on with the band after Page and the boys threatened to get another singer to replace him on tour.

It’s all very complicated… And yet the biggest news seems to be the simple fact that Led Zeppelin (for the moment, sans Plant) are working on new material, at least according to an interview Bonham the Younger gave to Detroit’s WCSX radio in August.

In The New Yorker’s review of Zeppelin’s reunion show last year, Sasha Frere-Jones—though gushing about their performance—hoped the band would stay away from a full-fledged tour. “Let the songs remain,” he wrote. We have to agree. Nearly every American falls in love with Led Zeppelin at some point in their teenage years; they’re the perennial high school band. A new tour—though we’d certainly pay to see it—would change all that. Mothers and fathers—PR execs and hedge-fund managers—people who could afford to see them, would largely do so. They’d be your parents’ favorite band. Nostalgia costs money, folks.

Ratliff reports:

The digital release will coincide with the release of the 24-track, two-CD compilation "Mothership," which will include tracks spanning the band's 12-year career.

• Billboard
• Variety

Destroyer’s Rubies, just out on Merge Records, is the most compelling reason yet to grapple with that voice and give it a chance to justify itself. On Destroyer’s seventh LP, Mr. Bejar, who’s also contributed to the three albums by acclaimed Canadian collective the New Pornographers, has assembled an engaging batch of songs and an accomplished group of musicians to back him. The tracks are immediately infectious, and they’re embellished with arrangements that reveal more and more details on repeat listens. Sonic surprises and varied textures abound, and yet they form part of a coherent idea.

Mr. Bejar is equally adept at sprawling, improvisatory-sounding vocal melodies and concise, insistent tunes. He often incorporates both into one song, as on the nine-and-a-half-minute opener, “Rubies.” It’s a great introduction, dotted with instrumental flourishes and outlandish, allusive lyrical quirks.

Against the tense, galloping strums of an acoustic guitar, Mr. Bejar tells a hushed fairy tale set in a hallucinatory version of Vancouver, crowded with characters, places and expressions lifted from pop songs, including some of his own. He mentions “Proud Mary,” the “dock of the bay”; he borrows other phrases from Dylan, Led Zeppelin, the Smiths and, twice, from the titles of his previous albums, one of which also alludes to the Beatles. It’s nonsense, but with disturbing paranoid undercurrents: “…Doctor, / do your worst, cut me open. / Remove this thirst. Hidden but near / a series of visions, I won’t repeat them here …. ”

Musical elements drop in—flickering keyboards, electric guitar tones that range from liquid to sandpapery—and drop out. The main drum tracks are augmented by isolated, distant-sounding snare volleys. The beat races, then marches, then drifts. The song builds and surges to a grand climax before slipping without warning into a sparse, intimate coda. Mr. Bejar’s elliptical verses carry on for another few minutes, accompanied only by an intentionally distorted acoustic guitar. When it’s over, you feel like you’ve stepped out of someone else’s dream.

The catchier, more succinct side of Destroyer is represented by the ambling country swing of “Your Blood,” and also by the mellow pop of “Painter in Your Pocket,” which develops as patiently as “Rubies.” For more than a minute, the instrumental backing consists only of suggestions: one-note guitar swells, subliminal vibraphone chimes, gentle bass figures and drums that break in furtively, resonating steadily, as if from afar. A bell-like guitar riff enters on cue after the first chorus, and not until another minute after that does the whole band kick in, finally fleshing out the melody that has been keeping it all together (and holding the listener’s attention). As on many of the other tracks, the use of major- and minor-seventh chords produces a shimmering and melancholy feel. Even on the bounciest numbers, a hint of elegy intrudes.

Throughout the record, Mr. Bejar’s vocal phrasing occasionally subverts the meter: He crams more syllables into a bar than would seem possible, or accents unexpected beats in odd verbal clusters. At other moments, the music drops a beat or two when there are no words to fill the time. The band ably mirrors these gestures, making them sound organic but rhythmically disorienting all the same. “And I was just another / West Coast maximalist / exploring the blues / ignoring the news / from the front,” goes one overflowing pronouncement.

Eventually, the lyrics start to divulge bits of meaning and weird logic. On “Watercolours Into the Ocean,” Mr. Bejar recalls “Listening to ‘Strawberry Wine’ / for the 131st time”—probably a reference to one of My Bloody Valentine’s more obscure songs. “It was 1987, it was spring,” he continues, “…Now it’s 1987 all the time.” He’s reminding us of the way people construct personal soundtracks—and then taking that tendency to an obsessive extreme. On “Looter’s Follies,” an expansive waltz halfway through the record, he asks with genuine impatience, “Why can’t you see, / That a life in art / And a life of mimicry / —It’s the same thing?!”

And with that, we get the point of the fabricated accent and the exaggerated delivery: Authenticity is boring. The mannered voice is a signal of Mr. Bejar’s intention not merely to cobble together an album of catchy tunes, but to construct a topsy-turvy artificial universe—the kind invented by eccentrics in secluded apartments—in which nothing exists outside of pop music, and the events and emotions of a person’s life come to depend on remembered lyrics and stray guitar parts, rather than the other way around. It’s 2006; it’s almost spring. Listen to Destroyer’s Rubies enough, and it could be 2006 all the time.

Like many of his fellow students, Teddy is a member of thefacebook.com, a collegiate Friendster where students post profiles listing their classes, their dorms, their favorite music (Def Leppard, Led Zeppelin, Metallica), movies (Lord of the Rings, Black Hawk Down) and books, and in which they form groups according to their interests.

The young Pataki is one of three officers—his title is "United States Marine and Professional Killer"—of a group entitled "AMERICA! ... FUCK YEAH!!!" (remember that irony-laden song from Team America) which describes itself as: "We are Americans. We can do what we want when we want to and can say whatever the fuck we want about foreigners. ‘Suck my balls world'—America. Those who are proud to say they love America and will fight anyone who threatens her. We'll help anyone who is ashamed to be an American pack if you'll just leave and promise to never come back."

Other notables listed in the facebook include presidential daughter Barbara Bush (whose profile is largely blank) and her reported beau, Jay Blount, who's concentration (conveniently for his potential father-in-law) is Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations and who belongs to the groups, "Virginia Is for Hustlers," "Balls and Sacks," and "Varsity Alcoholics."

The latter group's description concludes, "This group is for the many ex-varsity athletes at Yale who have quit their sport, but still maintain that competitive edge, and thus, have dedicated their time and energy to drinking... the most spirited ex-athletes may even be on the verge of alcoholism."

Blount also tallies a long list of Spring Break thoughts, including "Only in Iraq can a man like Saddam Hussein find work," "Bend ovaaaa, Sally," "Go Ballz Deep, NSS (no shaft showing)" and a series of quotes parodying President Bush's hilarious comments making fun of the groom at a friend's 1992 wedding, which was captured on video and leaked to the Smoking Gun a few years ago: "You have very boring dance moves, very boring," "You are very boring when you sleep," "You are very skinny, a fine golfer, but very boring, you are a very boring person."

Blount seems to enjoy the good life. Last year, during Yale's Sex Week, he was photographed partying at Mory's Temple Bar in New Haven along with sex doctor Susan Block and "Girls Gone Wild" founder Joe Francis.