Robert Plant has for years been under pressure from fans and friends alike to get his old band back on the road — but most of them probably did not have the Band of Joy in mind. Those with a taste for rock history will know that this was his band before he was invited to join Led Zeppelin — and last Thursday night Plant led out the Band of Joy for their first UK gig in 43 years.

Only it was hardly the gang of Brummies that the young Plant had cut his teeth with: the 2010 version is made up of stellar Nashville session men, who have given the singer the perfect platform to follow up his multi-grammy-winning partnership with Alison Krauss.

He arrived on stage looking like a grizzled Royalist Civil War general to rapturous applause, opening with Down To the Sea, before delivering songs from his new solo album, which like the wildly successful Raising Sands is another homage to blues and Americana, largely made up of covers. Only now Ms Krauss has been replaced by Patty Griffin, an altogether livelier stage presence, if hardly the equal partner that Krauss was. But on Please Read the Letter, their voices blend perfectly, while a blistering version of Richard Thompson’s House of Cards show this was not to be an evening for the country purists.

Zep classics such as Misty Mountain Hop, House of the Holy and Gallows Pole were all substantially reworked, with the most famous wail in rock kept to a minimum, while the guitar playing of Buddy Miller added subtlety without selling anyone short on power.

The lovely ballad All the Kings Horses and the delicacy of I Bid You Goodnight allow Plant to show he remains at 62 a remarkable vocalist, relishing the variety and range of material that would have been closed to him if he had succumbed, after the O2 Zeppelin reunion, to the temptation of stadium tours with Page.

The evening finished with a thundering version of Rock and Roll with Plant proclaiming “Oh to be in England.” He might have added, with the right band.