Ian Anderson says it’s possible that future Led Zeppelin frontman Robert Plant wanted to replace him in an early version of Jethro Tull.
Speaking on the Classic Album Review podcast, Anderson says the prospect was raised by legendary British blues figurehead Alexis Korner at a Jethro Tull club show in 1968.
“Korner brought Robert Plant along to some club date that we did in early 1968 and produced his protegé, and more or less insisted that Robert was allowed to come up and jam with us.
“You know I remember at the time, ‘wait a minute, there’s something else going on here’, and I saw myself in the situation of being potentially replaced by Robert Plant in the early Jethro.
“I didn’t join in. Robert got up and sang – I think he played some harmonica as well – he got up and did the standard blues thing that everybody could play, and straight away you knew this was a voice from another universe. He had some qualities, not only in terms of his vocal ability but in terms of his charisma.
“He obviously was someone who was going to do very very well. which Alexis had noticed and was nurturing, but it didn’t come to pass. As far as I know, Alexis didn’t actually make any overture to the other guys to be Robert’s backing group, but it wouldn’t be inconceivable that he [Plant] might have made some noises to some of them.”
Host Barry Robinson then asks Anderson if Plant could have successfully replicated the Jethro Tull man’s iconic playing-flute-while-balancing-on-one-leg stance.
“Who knows?” responds Anderson. “Quite plausible, yes.”