Jason Bonham Is Not Quite Ready to Go Un-Ledded

Though his concert at the Galaxy in Santa Ana on Friday will be devoted to Led Zeppelin covers, drummer Jason Bonham--son of late Zep drummer John--actually has been getting into Beck.

And we don’t mean Jeff Beck, Zep guitarist Jimmy Page’s onetime sidekick.

Granted, it’s hard to envision young Bonham following in the footsteps of the other Beck, the alternative rock bohemian known for his iconoclasm. Young Bonham is almost exclusively associated with the type of old-fashioned hard rock pioneered by his dad’s band. Indeed, Jason’s former group, Bonham, scored a Top 40 album in 1990 (“The Disregard of Timekeeping”) largely by following the mighty Zep’s thunderous sonic recipe.

But faced with a stagnating career and a vastly altered rock ‘n’ roll landscape, Jason Bonham is, at 29, looking to reenter the mainstream by borrowing from the now fashionable alternative rock camp.

“I’m more interested in experimenting now,” he said during a recent phone conversation. “Obviously, the music scene has changed drastically. I really like this guy Beck. [Like Beck,] we’re using some hip-hop samples and technology to make it sound more interesting. There are no boundaries now.”

Bonham is putting material together with his recently formed Jason Bonham Band, which includes singer Charles West, guitarist Tony Catania and bass/keyboard man John Smithson, a holdover from the earlier Bonham group.

Still, it would be a mistake to assume that the percussionist is about to abandon all his Zeppelin-esque tendencies. For one thing, he said, his band’s new songs still feature their share of traditional hard rock guitar riffing, and he maintained that his drumming always will include strong elements of his father’s authoritative style.

“My father taught me, so sometimes I can’t help but sound a little bit like that,” he noted. “I’m so proud of him and the music [of Led Zeppelin]. When people said we sounded a bit like Led Zeppelin, I would say, ‘Oh, really? Thanks very much!’ We never sat down and said, ‘Let’s rip off Led Zeppelin.’ ”

Meanwhile, as its own material is developing, the Jason Bonham Band has been doing shows devoted to the legendary Zep song catalog. The Galaxy gig will be another all-”ZepSet” outing, part of a series of live tributes to conclude with a show at the Whisky in Hollywood on Sept. 25, coinciding with the release of an album, “The ZepSet-Live From Electric Lady Land.”

According to Bonham, the first Zeppelin tribute show occurred after West joined the group just days before a scheduled concert. There wasn’t enough time to teach him any unfamiliar songs, so the band members decided to tackle material that was well known to everyone.

“We like the whole spirit of it,” Bonham said. “We can just go out there and jam. ‘Whole Lotta Love’ turns into name that tune, which is the way [Zeppelin] used to do it. They used to play about seven different songs within that song.

“The longest version of ‘Whole Lotta Love’ we’ve done was 32 minutes. In the middle of it we went into [other Zeppelin songs] ‘Dazed and Confused,’ ‘Achilles’ Last Stand,’ ‘Nobody’s Fault but Mine,’ ‘Kashmir’ and then back into ‘Whole Lotta Love.’ It’s all done through eye contact.”

All proceeds from the “ZepSet-Live” album will go to a charity that Bonham is establishing, the John Bonham Memorial Motorcycle Camp, to be run by an organization called Racing for Kids. The camp, in the Cathedral City area, will offer weekend lessons in motorcycle racing--a longtime Bonham family passion--to underprivileged youngsters. Bonham said that two pro racers, Jeff Emig and Jamie Dobb, have volunteered to help teach the sessions and that manufacturer KTM is providing the bikes.

The good-natured percussionist has vivid memories of star-studded jams at the Bonham household in England. As a boy, he would find his father playing late at night with the likes of Paul McCartney and members of Yes or Bad Company. Occasionally, young Bonham would be asked to show these rock luminaries his own drum prowess.

But his fondest remembrances of his influential dad, who died in 1980, have nothing to do with music.

“Every Sunday he would be up at 6:30 making the sandwiches for the [motorcycle] race,” recalls Bonham, who as a youth came within an eyelash of winning the British Junior Championship in motocross. “We’d do the pack lunch. He’d come to wake me up when the trailers were all loaded up. He never used to admit it to me, but he used to be scared to death that I would hurt myself. He’d be sitting there nervously smoking a cigarette.”

After his father died, Bonham switched his focus from motorcycle riding to music. He was only 14 when his dad suffocated in his own vomit after a drinking spree. Led Zeppelin immediately called it quits, though rumors surfaced in the ‘80s that it might re-form with Jason on drums. He did perform with the surviving members of the group in 1988, at the Atlantic Records 40th-anniversary concert.

He refuses to read any of the Led Zep biographies, which tend to portray his father as an unruly road warrior. “People have said, ‘Wow, man, I’ve read the books, and your dad was a real [jerk]. But nobody ever saw the other side of him, the loving husband and father.”

His father’s premature demise has taught Bonham to be careful around the bottle. He says he has learned to consume alcohol moderately, and he credits his own family for helping to keep him on balance. He has a wife and a 3-year-old daughter; a baby is due in about seven weeks.

When you have a family, he said, “you’re not as selfish anymore. You have a whole life there that you created. I’m here now for [my daughter]. It’s no longer me, me, me. Now it’s ‘What are we going to do as a family?’ ”

* The Jason Bonham Band plays Friday at the Galaxy Concert Theatre, 3503 S. Harbor Blvd., Santa Ana. 8 p.m. $10. (714) 957-0600.