Never one to rest on his laurels, Robert Plant continued his ever-evolving musical quest this year with the first album from his new band Saving Grace. A subtle, beautifully crafted set of blues, alt-country and folk covers, it found him weaving fresh magic from a wide spectrum of base materials. You can read MOJO’s 4-star review of the album HERE, and also check out our report of Plant and Saving Grace’s spellbinding show at Eastbourne’s Congress Theatre HERE. As part of our review of the year, Plant shares some of the music he’s been discovering, rediscovering and returning to in 2025…
“Like so many people of my generation, I was enamoured by what was once the music of the Delta and how it modified and modernised as it moved north into Chicago with the likes of Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf. I suppose what I hadn’t realised was how far this music had travelled, to the extent that some of these artists were wondering where their people were. I remember going to the Checkerboard Lounge, which was a club that was run by Junior Wells and Buddy Guy on Chicago’s South Side. It was a Junior Wells show and it was virtually an entire white audience with a few guys at the back who were his friends. It was a particularly funny night for me because he announced, “Ladies and gentlemen, tonight we have an internationally famous star in here, Led Zeppelin! Stand up, Led!” So ‘Led’ stood up on a table.
Anyway, later on I realised there was this whole other blues culture in the north Mississippi hill country, artists who hadn’t got the train to Chicago, and had their own thing going on. I’ve been listening to that music a lot this year. Train Train by Jimmy ‘Duck’ Holmes on his [2019] Cypress Grove album – it’s just insane.
Robert Belfour’s Done Got Old…
Junior Kimbrough’s Feels So Good #2…
R.L. Burnside’s Let My Baby Ride:
On our album this year we did a version of Chevrolet. Historically that comes from Memphis Minnie & Kansas Joe McCoy, but it moved up into the hill country where Alan Lomax recorded Ed And Lonnie Young’s definitive version. Other things I’ve been listening to? The Rolling Stones and Steve Riley – Zydeco Sont Pas Salés off the Clifton Chenier tribute album that came out this year. Riley is this insanely good accordion player I’ve played with alongside C.C. Adcock.
Florence + The Machine – One Of The Greats [off Everybody Scream]: this song has taken me by storm.
I mean, I have no idea what she’s dealing with here but I can relate to it with every single iota of my energy.
Oh yeah, and a record by a young man playing the folk clubs of Greenwich Village… Something called Bootleg Series Vol. 18: Through The Open Window 1956-1963, by his Royal Highness Bob Dylan, who just happens to be playing three nights in fucking Swansea. The music on there is just so… mind-altering to me.”
Find out who made MOJO’s rundown of the 50 best albums of 2025 – including where …Saving Grace ranked – HERE!
