Watch Previously Unseen Led Zeppelin Footage Of Record-Breaking 1977 Concert At Pontiac Silverdome

On April 30, 1977 Led Zeppelin brought what would turn out to be their final North American tour to the Detroit area for a performance at the massive Pontiac Silverdome in Pontiac, Michigan. Twenty-three minutes worth of previously unseen footage of the show — which can be viewed below — was carefully restored, synced with an audience recording and posted on YouTube this past Sunday.

Led Zeppelin drew a croad of 76,229 to the home of the Detroit Lions on April 30, 1977 setting a world record at the time for a solo indoor attraction. Tickets for the sold-out concert cost $10.50 with the band netting a reported $642,000. The quartet gave fans their money’s worth by performing a three-hour show with no intermission.

“It was surreal,” guitarist Jimmy Page said of the concert during a 2014 interview conducted by 94.7 FM WCSX’s Trudi Daniels and Jim O’Brien. “We played to massive crowds on the outside, but that reminded us of A Clockwork Orange or 2001.

“I could relate to that because those were the sort of films back in the day,” noted the guitarist. “It was really odd walking into this air-lock,” Page added. “But I think we played well under the circumstances.”

Surprisingly, the massive crowd was well behaved unlike audiences at some other stops on the tour. “Police and stadium officials said they were amazed at the relative tranquility of the throng, after earlier expecting the worst from the Led Zeppelin faithful,” Billboard reported as pointed out by Ultimate Classic Rock. “This is the first time in five big rock shows at the Silverdome that we’ve had no problems with crowds rushing the turnstiles or a major tie-up on surrounding roads,” Pontiac police chief William Hangar told Billboard.

Page and bandmates vocalist Robert Plant, drummer John Bonham and multi-instrumentalist John Paul Jones — who celebrates his 78th birthday today — may have been touring in support of Presence, yet only played one song (“Achilles Last Stand”) from the year-old record. Instead Led Zeppelin went heavy on cuts from 1971’s Led Zeppelin IV and 1975’s Physical Graffiti with four and five songs from each LP making the setlist. Bonham showed off his powerful drumming during “Moby Dick” and Page took a massive solo of his own.

The newly surfaced footage was captured by late photographer Jim “Speedy” Kelly and shared on the Speedy YouTube channel. Kelly shot the 8mm film footage from the crowd. The 8mm film was transffered to digial by the Genesis Museum. Led Zeppelin historians Etienne and LedZepFilm handled the film restoration and audio sync respectively.

LedZepFilm weighed in on the process, writing as per LouderSound.com the following:

“Usually I take the audio source as gospel and sync the film accordingly. I may adjust the audio if it runs too fast or slow to my ears and then go from there. Some clips may be adjusted differently than others. But of course, as you probably know, the speed can never truly be 100% correct because both sources are analog!”

See the 23-minute clip of Led Zeppelin performing in Pontiac on April 30, 1977 below: