Over the decades, Howard Stern has welcomed the biggest names in the entertainment world into his radio studio, with everyone from Paul McCartney to Quentin Tarantino stopping by for a conversation. Therefore, Stern feels comfortable in the company of cultural giants and rarely makes a mistake while on the airwaves.
Although Stern has spent most of his adult life in show business, meeting and speaking with his heroes never seems to lose its thrill. Known for asking thought-provoking questions that fans want answered, Stern’s skill comes naturally—he’s a fan himself. While he usually does a great job of hiding his admiration for the guests sitting opposite him, every now and then, the mask slips, as it did during his conversation with Led Zeppelin’s Robert Plant.
Led Zeppelin remain one of Stern’s all-time favourite groups. Therefore, it was a dream come true when he finally got to speak with Plant in 2017. However, Plant wasn’t interested in speaking exclusively about his former group and had a new album to promote. Although he was happy to reminisce, Led Zeppelin ended in 1980, and it feels like a distant lifetime to him now.
While Plant will never be able to break the association between himself and Led Zeppelin, in his eyes, his time with the band only represents a chapter of his career. However, it is the most noteworthy period of his life, and whether he likes it or not, the audience for Stern’s show wants to hear anecdotes about their tenure rather than tales about his new songs.
Before Plant arrived in the studio, Stern shared his excitement with listeners, explaining, “I love this guy. I fucking love Led Zeppelin. I’ve got to talk to him about so much.” Once Plant came on air, the conversation began with a lengthy dose of Led Zeppelin chat, which Stern could have happily continued with all day.
At one awkward juncture, Stern asked him why he had yet to pen an autobiography. Plant, who prefers to look forward rather than back, said he had no plans to do so because he was still alive before adding, “Where’d you find this guy?”
Furthermore, Plant began to disregard Stern’s talent as an interviewer semi-jokingly, stating: “I thought maybe I can do something like this. I could be really absurd and ask those fucking stupid questions to people. Do you always have people in and do this?”
Plant ended the conversation on a positive note, telling Stern before exiting, “I’ve got another record coming out in three years, I’ll be back.” However, it’s now 2025, and Plant has yet to return to Stern’s studio for another conversation.
While it wasn’t a nightmare interview, it could have gone more smoothly, and Stern takes full responsibility for how it played out. During an interview with the New York Times in 2019, Stern admitted, “There are some people who are so closed off they don’t want to go there. My biggest fault as an interviewer is I keep trying. If I don’t get to the [expletive] shot I go home and beat the [expletive] out of myself.”
When asked for an example, he named the Led Zeppelin singer, adding, “I am such a fan of that guy, and I took the wrong approach. He came in, and I’m dying to ask him about Led Zeppelin. I wanted every detail. After a while, he says something like, ‘I don’t want to talk about Led Zeppelin.’ Then I go back and back and back because I was hyperfocused on thinking that’s what the audience wanted. So, in some ways, I blew it with him. But some people are just open books.”
While Stern could have handled the interview differently, he felt compelled to deliver a conversation his audience wanted to hear, so he continued to probe about Led Zeppelin. For Plant, the band is ancient history, and despite their monumental success, it’s old news to him. Although some rockstars of his era, such as McCartney, could happily reminisce until the cows come home, Plant prefers to leave the past in the past.
