Unless you support Wolverhampton Wanderers, you might not feel you’ve much in common with Robert Plant, a rock icon from a time when we expected our heroes to be anything but relatable. But what’s immediately apparent from our interview with Plant in the new issue of MOJO is he’s very like a typical MOJO reader: insatiably curious about music; enthusiastic about sharing his latest discoveries; honest enough to understand that while he knows and loves a lot, there’s always something else worth hearing.
MOJO joins Plant in the corner of a 15th century country pub, blasting North African electronica out of his phone. Later, he will talk candidly about how working with Alison Krauss revealed to him an enriching strain of American music that, in spite of his restless spirit of enquiry, he’d never previously explored. On the CD that comes with our new issue, Robert and Alison have chosen some of their favourite songs to illustrate how their contrasting musical worlds have come together in such striking harmony. “I knew nothing about the Louvin Brothers,” Plant admits.
Maybe you already know the Louvins well, and are schooled in some of the other musical worlds we explore this issue. The esoteric frenzies of Faust and Van Der Graaf Generator, say, or the devastating quietude of Low. The passion of Aretha Franklin or the fanatically contoured big music of The War On Drugs. Even the gems hiding in plain sight in Dylan’s much-maligned ‘80s catalogue. But this, in a way, is our mission: to find fresh stories and perspectives on the music that changed your life (if you were at Reading Festival in 1988, you won’t want to miss this MOJO!), and to point you towards a dozen new potential obsessions that might, in some small way, change it again.
The Fat Angel Sings 