Japanese bootleg label Empress Valley has released another snippet of a soundboard recording from Led Zeppelin’s Japan 1971 tour.

A Japanese bootleg distributor announced in an email on February 7 that the full soundboard recording of “Immigrant Song” from Led Zeppelin’s September 29, 1971 Osaka, Japan show would be released on an unofficial bootleg CD.

The CD is limited to 100 copies, and there are five different covers available to purchase. Each copy comes in an envelope which conceals the artwork inside.

Japanese Twitter user yuminori0616 posted photographs showing the packaging of the bootleg single:

Led Zeppelin『Immigrant Song』(1971/9/29 OSAKA, SBD, 1CD EVSD) pic.twitter.com/CLMZsLN30I

— 70’s ROCK大好き親父 (@yuminori0616) February 8, 2018

And here are all of the packaging variants for the release:

Another Twitter account, LLX2774, posted photos of the envelope that the release comes in:

Led Zeppelin "移民の歌" 1971-09-29 大阪
紛れもなくマルチトラック録音からミックスされた音源。低音が強めでステレオ感は乏しいものの各パートのバランスは良好。ベースが低音の塊に埋もれがちなのが1975 SBD音源とは対照的。
外装の封筒には本物の切手が貼ってある😳 pic.twitter.com/CawML1rZUo

— Blimp_Life (@LLX2774) February 9, 2018

And they also shared a photo of the disc itself:

Led Zeppelin "移民の歌" 1971-09-29 大阪
OGやLZLの2LPから聴き始め、時代がCDにシフトしてからも数え切れない程聴いた公演の決定的な音源に接することができた歓びに浸っている金曜日の午後＠新宿の喫茶店☕️💿 pic.twitter.com/GyC1c1h5N1

— Blimp_Life (@LLX2774) February 9, 2018

This release follows Empress Valley’s July 2016 release of the soundboard recording of “Black Dog” from the previous night of the tour, September 28, 1971, also in Osaka, Japan.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3a-IH9GcPWQ

That song was included as a bonus disc on the label’s release of Led Zeppelin’s September 23, 1971 show. It was later released as a standalone CD single in three different sleeves, but no other tracks from the soundboard recording of the show have been released since then.

The continued emergence of soundboard recordings from Led Zeppelin’s Japan 1971 tour indicate that the full soundboard recordings of multiple shows from the tour are likely to be in the hands of collectors.

And the bootleg releases may also suggest that Jimmy Page is considering officially releasing some of the Japan 1971 soundboard recordings later on this year as part of Led Zeppelin’s fiftieth anniversary celebrations.

Realistically, we’re probably not going to see any more previously unheard studio material from Led Zeppelin. Page’s remasters series plundered the vaults for the companion discs. Page confirmed as much in a press conference to promote the final remasters in 2015. “As far as the studio side of things, this is it,” he reportedly said.

Led Zeppelin’s five-date tour of Japan in 1971 has been widely bootlegged, but it’s seen as a pinnacle of the band’s career in terms of live performances.

It’s widely believed that Page has the soundboard recordings of the 1971 Japanese tour, so it would make sense that he could edit together a supercut of the five shows into one live album, similar to what he did with “How The West Was Won.”

Led Zeppelin will kick off its fiftieth anniversary celebration this year

Led Zeppelin will begin a series of events and releases to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary in September 2018, according to an official description of the upcoming re-release of the band’s live album How The West Was Won.

Retailer Bull Moose published the official description from Led Zeppelin of the upcoming release, and it hinted at upcoming announcements from the band (emphasis ours):

“On September 7, 1968, John Bonham, John Paul Jones, Jimmy Page, and Robert Plant first took the stage together in Gladsaxe, Denmark. Then billed as ‘The New Yardbirds,’ the band would assemble in the studio for the first time later that month to start recording their debut album as Led Zeppelin, and rock ‘n’ roll would never be the same again. Before the band’s 50th Anniversary celebration officially begins in September, Led Zeppelin will continue their reissue campaign with a new edition of their celebrated live album How The West Was Won, originally released in 2003, featuring newly remastered audio, which was done under the supervision of Jimmy Page. Details of additional Led Zeppelin 50th Anniversary releases and events will be announced later this year.“

The description makes it clear that more Led Zeppelin releases are planned for later this year, along with events starting in September.

Jimmy Page has hinted that there will be unheard Led Zeppelin music released this year to celebrate Led Zeppelin’s fiftieth anniversary

“There’ll be Led Zeppelin product coming out, for sure, that people haven’t heard,” Page said in an interview with the Academy of Achievement, “because I’m working on that. Next year will be the fiftieth year so there’s all manner of surprises coming out.”

In September we reported that an executive from Led Zeppelin’s record label Warner Music Group wrote a letter in support of a planned statue of John Bonham in which he said that Warner Music is planning “a series of high-profile events” in 2018. He also said that the label plans to conduct “extensive outreach to media and fans worldwide” in conjunction with the events.