Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Evening is gearing up for a final run of its tour celebrating the 50th anniversary of Led Zeppelin’s Physical Graffiti. “This is it, the last run,” the son of Zeppelin’s late drummer John Bonham promises Billboard. “We will not do it again.” Explore See latest videos, charts and news But Bonham already has a good idea of what he’ll do next. “After 15 years of doing this, I’m always inspired to go, ‘What could be next?’ And this time…Presence!” he says, referencing Led Zeppelin’s seventh studio album, which will celebrate its golden anniversary next year. “That’s one of my favorites. And underrated: ‘For Your Life,’ ‘Achilles Last Stand,’ ‘Candy Store Rock.’ I can’t wait. I feel like we’ve definitely got to try it.” Bonham did, in fact, play the epic Presence opener “Achilles Last Stand” during shows last year after avoiding it previously — “’cause I was always scared of it,” he notes with a laugh. Bonham acknowledges he’s even looking beyond Presence. “I’m not too sure if I’ll be able to play that well, but in 2029, Presence into (1979’s) In Through the Out Door, in their entirety, would be the way to go,” he says, noting that most of the latter’s songs were never played live by Zeppelin due to the band breaking up after his father’s death 13 months after its release. He’s particularly hot to take on the careening “Carouselambra,” which he played with Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones during rehearsals in 2008, when Zeppelin was trying to continue after its triumphant December 2007 Celebration Day reunion at London’s O2 Arena. “They played it as if they had just left the studio, and they hadn’t played it since they day they recorded it. It was mind-blowing,” Bonham recalls. “Jimmy was only using this tiny little amp, and it still had that sound (sings), that breakdown in the middle. I’d love to play that for (an audience).” With that future mapped out, albeit loosely, Bonham is looking forward to returning to the Physical Graffiti shows, starting Oct. 22 in Louisville, Ken., with 26 North American dates booked through Nov. 26 in Hollywood, Fla. He considers the Billboard 200-topping Physical Graffiti — Zeppelin’s first on its own Swan Song Records label and the first album to go platinum on advance orders — to be “THE Led Zeppelin” album. He says performing it has been as rewarding as he hoped when he and the JBLZE band set out to do it. “It’s the first time we’d ever had to go into a place to rehearse,” he says, “because even though we had done nearly every one of these songs at some point, maybe just for one tour, we never thought of actually doing it as the whole album. (Led Zeppelin) used to do ‘In My Time of Dying’ live. They did ‘Kashmir’ live, ‘Ten Years Gone,’ ‘Sick Again.’ But then to do ‘The Wanton Song’ and ‘Down By the Seaside’ and ‘Night Flight’…When I found out ‘Night Flight’ was a Led Zeppelin IV outtake, it made perfect sense; when dad does the (sings drum fill), that’s the ‘Stairway to Heaven ‘ fill. You know, drummers, when we find a new fill we’ll put it in anything, like, ‘Oh, that’ll work there as well..’” He’s also fond of talking to the audience about why the song “Houses of the Holy” wound up on Physical Graffiti and not on Zeppelin’s preceding album of that title. JBLZE does not, however, play Physical Graffiti in its original running order. “It’s a show; we’re trying to keep people engaged in this,” he explains. “I know if I went to a concert and knew it was gonna be in order, you subconsciously go, ‘I can nip off to the bathroom on this one’ if it’s not one of my favorites. There’s no way you can put ‘Kashmir’ [the sixth track on the album] that early in the show. And it’s working. From what we’ve done so far, it’s been one of the most successful runs we’ve ever done, just from the feedback we’re getting. People are like, ‘It’s so great to hear those songs in a live environment,’ ’cause nobody plays ‘In the Light.’ Zeppelin never played ‘In the Light.’ Some of these songs never saw the light of day other than when they were recorded, so…here they are.” Those emotions are resonating even stronger with Bonham this year, which marks 15 years “of doing a project that I really didn’t think I was gonna do that long…. But I realized it’s not about what I want, really. Who am I to stop? It’s what Zeppelin means to so many people. People write to me about it, still, and it gets me every time. I get emotional. It took on a life of its own and I’m glad.” Besides DNA, of course, Bonham’s own Zeppelin history includes playing with Page, Jones and Robert Plant at the Atlantic Records 40th anniversary concert in 1988 at Madison Square Garden as well as at the 02 show in 2007. He still has particularly fond memories of the latter. “I’d gone from this younger version of me when I’d played with them before, when I had kind of a chip on my shoulder…and now I was a sober 39-year-old that wanted it to be perfect, wanted the knowledge,” he recalls. “I wanted to know everything. I wanted to ask them all the questions…because it’s my dad’s peers, my dad’s bandmates. So you’re having conversations with them, musically, to the point where they’re like, ‘Whoa, slow down! Cut the coffee out.’ “People ask me a lot, ‘What was the highlight of playing with them?’ back when we did Celebration Day. To be honest with you, the highlight was the six weeks leading up to it, being with them from 11 in the morning ’til 6 p.m., five days a week. That was really special.” Bonham also holds dear one special conversation with Plant, with
