Monday, May 25, 2026

Led Zeppelin (JBLZE) live in Hollywood?


There is a self, but it's ultimately impersonal.
What is a "band"?* It's a lot like a Buddhist "SELF," a "UCLA" (American college), or a Greek Ship of Theseus. It has a name (from which it derives its stable identity), but does it really have anything else for long? It's an illusion. To demonstrate: I went to a college called UCLA. It doesn't exist. It started on a campus near USC, which is close to the skyline of DTLA/Downtown Los Angeles.

Plant, baby, is there really a "manic" nirvana?
If anyone can grasp these two examples, that person will understand why the Buddha taught that ultimately speaking, there is no self, no soul, no essence, no consciousness that travels from life to life or abides here now. That's impossible to accept. So reject it. Of course, there's a self (atta). It's writing right now, and another self is reading right now...in conventional terms.

So that being the case, WHY would the historical Buddha ever say there wasn't? We have to consider that. The answer is that because it is the unexamined assumption of what the self is that keeps us from awakening, keeps us from enlightenment, keeps us from liberation. There is something. It arises by a process we can call Dependent Origination. This is, so that comes to be. When this is not, that does not arise.

UCLA does not (ultimately) exist. Here's why.
This "UCLA" I say does not exist, isn't it right over there in Westwood? There sure is something called "UCLA" in Westwood right now. But what was born and originated near USC, other than the name or some transient traditions and a charter or photos, what came over from that first thing that remains the same?
  • All of the faculty are different
  • All of the students are different
  • All of the books, curricula, desks...
  • In fact, let's imagine the first place burned down and was completely incinerated, so that nothing, not a brick, not a scrap of the original went from DTLA to the Westside, would we still call it "UCLA"? We sure would! Why? What we identify or imagine to be UCLA is moving from here to there.
  • In a century, will there be a "UCLA"? No, but there almost surely will be a college (university) called "UCLA." All the faculty, students, books, lesson plans, and ephemera will be different, but it'll still -- in a sense -- be good ol' UCLA, at least in our minds and on some plot of real estate somewhere in LA.
There is no ship
Is it the same ship or a different ship?
Aside from the example of an empty college, a figment of our consensus reality to call this this and that that, maybe the ancient Ship of Theseus example would better communicate this. A ship sets off for Greece but along the way has to change the sails then the oars then the floorboards then the wheel then, piece by piece, every single piece. Is it still the same ship that arrives in Greece?

Whaddya mean "there's no car?" It's right here!
The nice answer is that it neither is exactly the same ship, but we can't say that it's another. It is, of course, not the same, but to say it's different does violence to our language and what we mean, as Bhikkhu Bodhi pointed out in As It Is. The same with your car. You could take it into the mechanic over and over so many time that they change every single piece. Then is it still the same car? It's your car either way, but not a lick of it remains, not a single piece. But a paper somewhere at the DMV says it's yours, even with a new license plate and engine block number, paint job, glass, carpet, upholstery, gas, oil, screws, everything.

There is no oxcart
There is no such thing as an oxcart.
In the same way, in ancient times, an oxcart. What is it? It is, broadly speaking, five components fitted in a functionally operational way (wheel, axle, body, steering, ox). Add pieces to the definition or take them away, it doesn't matter. But five is easy. Whose oxcart is this? It belongs to Thad. Its wheels are broken. Change them. Axle is broken. Change it. The body is broken. Change it. The steering is shot. Change it. Ox is exhausted. Change it. Now, every part having been changed, what oxcart? That one. Whose oxcart is it? Thad's. Why? It's because in a conventional sense (by our agreement and his delusion) it has been his all along, even though it is completely different. He has no control over it really; he can't keep it from breaking apart. But we still call it his, and we seem to have no trouble identifying it even as every single part gets switched out.


This "SELF," what is it? It is five things (form, feelings, perceptions, formations, consciousness). Whose is it? This one's mine. What do you call it? "Me." Sometimes "I." It's myself, I mean, my self. My soul. My ego. My personality. My atta (Sanskrit atman). My vessel into which I load my store of karma (deeds, doings, intentional acts, or all of my willed actions).
  1. By "form" you mean this rapidly deteriorating arrangement of materiality composed of solidity, movement, cohesion, and temperature? That's the one! So this material form, this body (this temporary vessel or vehicle), is actually just Four Great Elements, which are not "elements" as such but rather qualities of materiality, in a sense quanta or quantities of it because all material particles (rupa kalapas) are actually composed of all four elements or dhatus (or maha bhuta) but in differing amounts, so that when solidity is in preponderance, it gets labelled "solid" but still has all of the other features to a lesser degree. This is "you"? No. It is my body, but I am not the body. The body changes, but "I" stay the same forever and ever, the eternal self, the unchanged soul, the essence or core of the ego (psyche), the invisible watcher, holder, and owner of all that stands.
  2. Okay, these feelings, that's "you"? Yes, that's me. I'm the feeler. So you're not the feeling? Well, no, not exactly, but feeling-feeler, same thing. Okay, all of them? Which all? You are all pleasant, unpleasant, and neutral feelings passing through? Yeah, sort of, I am the feeler.
  3. All right then. These perceptions? Yes, I am the perceiver. And you are the perceptions passing through, too? Sure, okay, perception-perceiver, I am the all.
  4. And these other mental formations, like these volitions, impulses, motives, intentions (cetanas)? Yes, I am the intender. And the intention? Intention-intender, same thing. I am the all, the owner, the doer, the knower, the experiencer, the controller or the one-who-thinks-he's-in-control.
  5. Okay, and this consciousness? Yes, I am consciousness. All of them? "All"? "You" are eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind-consciousnesses? Uh, yes, I am consciousness. And all the consciousnesses passing through conscious experience? Uh, I guess.
  • "Self" as impersonal processes
    Does anyone know why the Buddha called each of these heaps an "aggregate"? It's very important. It is because there are trillions of them, not one form, one feeling, one perception, one formation, one consciousness. At least with the oxcart, it seems like there is one (or more) wheels, axle, one body, one steerer, one ox, and the conglomeration of those forms one oxcart. But with "SELF," there are no such single items. There are aggregations (heaps of rupa kalapas) of material particles, countless numbers of them in every "material" thing, and that's just the body, the form, which has 32 main parts and lots of subsidiary parts, so many that one cannot find it tenable to consider one's "self" this body. So we cling to the other four mental formations as "self." (Yes, we call the fourth heap "mental formations" or sankaras, but the fact is that feelings, perceptions, and consciousnesses are all mental formations, too. The Buddha segregated them into these five for explanatory and insight purposes. As we develop liberating insight into these, we will clearly know-and-see that what we took to be MY feeling was just feeling being felt -- arising, turning, and passing away at all times, hurtling towards destruction, never standing still for even a submoment. The reason a feeling lasts is not because it arises and hangs around for a while then, realizing it's impermanent, it leaves. One feeling arises, turns, passes away, as another almost identical feeling arises, turns, passes away, in succession until this process dies out, at which time "the feeling" which was a heap of feelings passes to be replaced by another kind of feeling. The same is true of the other four aggregates. Science tells us this material body is nothing but a conglomeration of cells, which are molecules, which are atoms, which are quarks and strong-and-weak forces and thingies and whatnots, ever more subtle until they're not even material.
Add ingredients to the definition of "SELF" or take them away, it doesn't matter. The same is true. What we call "self" is not-self. It is impersonal, and radically impermanent, and ultimately disappointing, painful, stressful, incapable of ever fulfilling us.

*What is a "band"?
With John Travolta as Robert Plant
If ANY of this has made sense, let us deal with the problem at hand: What is a "band"? It's a group, an assemblage, an aggregate, a "heap" of four or five basic members. Whose band is it? (Whoever owns the name, which is just about the only stable thing other than ownership rights of music catalog performed and/or written under that name).
 
What five?
Fifth member Pete (Manager Peter Grant) is the best like Fifth Beatle Pete Best
 
So one day four guys and their manager became the New Yardbirds. And they got threatened with a lawsuit, so they became Lead Zeppelin. But Peter Grant, the manager and fifth member, said, "To avoid mispronunciation, let's call the band Led Zeppelin." All agreed. They played, recorded, became famous, and then the drummer had a son and died. End of the story. Led Zeppelin was over. But capitalism and greed being what they are, Led Zeppelin lived on. There was even a reunion of sorts, but they couldn't bring back the dead, so they did the next best thing: They brought in the next of kin, drummer John Bonham's son Jason. It was like having 3.5 of the original four members present. It worked!

It worked so well, that everyone but Jimmy Page or Robert Plant could have quit, and the behemoth could have gone on like the Who, Stones, Chicago, or any other massive rock act has done for years and years until not even a single member of the original band is touring! How is that possible?! Ship of Theseus. Oxcart.

Who am I? There is no me?
What're ya doin in my hole?!
In fact, there's an Early Buddhist or later Chinese Buddhist parable that may illustrate this even better: A man (let's say it's YOU) is walking and falls into a deep hole, at the bottom of which are two ghoulish demons arguing as they prepare some human stew from human limbs strewn all around their gloomy hole. Seeing you fall in, the angry one asks what the h*ll you're doing there and tears your arm off. And the other, just to p*ss off the first, grabs another arm from off the ground and attaches it to your body. It works! You move the fingers. These demonic ghouls have black magic powers. You're elated to get your arm back, which p*sses off the first, who then tears off your other arm. The other grabs another arms, attaches it to you. Again it works, you're elated, and it, being p*ssed off, tears off a leg, which is replaced, a torso with heart and head. Getting all five limbs torn off and others reattaches, you get the heck out of the hole. Who got out? Who went in. All five limbs are still down in the hole, but here "you" are running away. Is it you, is it not you, is it sort of you?

There is no UCLA?
"UCLA" can restart anywhere with anyone.
Is there one "UCLA," many UCLAs, no UCLA? Is this feeling the self, is that perception the self, is this consciousness what dies and is reborn -- or is it all an impersonal ("empty," devoid of self) process just rolling on? And that's all it's ever been? Ask Jason.

Because Jason must have asked all the remaining members of Led Zeppelin, Inc. to join him on tour. But for one reason or another (think ego, clashes, not wanting to ruin the profitable brand, and solo careers), they did not. So he did. Jason did. Jason went on tour.

Is there a Robert Plant? - Now and Zen
The O2 Arena show (called the Ahmet Ertegun Tribute Concert) was in 2007, and on Saturday night, Jason Bonham said he's been doing JBLZE about 16 years or so. That seems to be how long Jason and Co. ("JBLZE," Jason Bonham's Led Zeppelin Evening) have been at it. They don't need Page; they have "Mr. Jimmy" (Sakurai) on guitar, and he looks and plays more like Page did back then than Jimmy Page does now.
Original Led Zeppelin drummer John's son Jason’s Led Zeppelin Experience Evening “Kashmir” LIVE The Greek Theater Los Angeles Hollywood, California May 23, 2026

Anattā is not a joke or punchline. All things are impersonal and always have been. And so long as we do not realize it (or that they are impermanent and disappointing, too), we will cling. And by clinging, we will suffer. And the way to let go (and stop suffering) is to realize the True Nature of All Things.

All things are impersonal: anattā
Ven. Nyanatiloka, Buddhist Dictionary of Doctrines and Terms edited by Wisdom Quarterly

What are the Five Aggregates in Buddhism?
THERE IS NO SELF (an-attā, not-atta): "not-self," egolessness, soullessness, the impersonal nature of all phenomena (particularly the Five Aggregates clung to as self) is the final and most incomprehensible of the Three Universal Characteristics of All Existence (ti-lakkhana).

The anattā doctrine is unheard of in the universe except that a supremely awakened buddha makes it known and thereby allows living beings an escape from the phenomenal world of endless rebirth and incomprehensible suffering.

This doctrine teaches that neither within body and mind (the bodily and mental phenomena of existence) nor outside of them can there be found anything that in THE ULTIMATE SENSE could be regarded as a self, soul, self-existing real ego-entity, or any other abiding essence or substance.

This is the central doctrine of Buddhism. Without understanding it, a real knowledge of Buddhism is altogether impossible.

It is the only really specific Buddhist doctrine, with which the entire structure of the Buddha's Teaching (Dhamma) stands or falls.

All the remaining Buddhist doctrines may, more or less, be found or hinted at in other philosophical systems, doctrines, or religions. But the anattā-doctrine has been clearly and unreservedly taught only by the Buddha.

It is on account of this that the Buddha is known as the anattā-vādi, or "Teacher of Impersonality." Whoever has not penetrated the impersonal nature of all existence and does not comprehend that in reality there exists only this continually self-consuming PROCESS of arising, turning, and passing away of bodily and mental phenomena and that there is no separate (independent) ego-entity within or outside this process, that will be unable to understand Buddhism.

That is, that person will be unable to understand the teaching of the Four Noble (Enlightening) Truths (sacca) in the correct light.

One will instead think that it is
  • one's soul, self, ego, or personality that experiences suffering (dukkha, disappointment, pain, distress),
  • one's personality that performs skillful and unskillful deeds (good and evil actions)
  • one who will be reborn according to these actions (karma),
  • one's personality that will enter into some kind of everlasting heaven, sphere, place, or state the Buddha called "Nirvana" (Pali Nibbāna),
  • one's personality that practices on the Enlightening (Noble) Eightfold Path.
So it is said in The Path of Purification (Vis.M. XVI):

"Mere dukkha [ignorance/delusion] exists;
No experiencer of dukkha is to be found;
Deeds are, but no doer of the deeds is there;
Nirvana is, but not one who experiences it;
The Path is, but no traveler on it is to be seen." More

Get Him to the Greek, smoking Epstein
Future: Japanese Buddhist girls?
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