"I'm not a flowerchild or anything like that... whatever it was"
About this Quote
The ellipses matter. They give the sentence its evasive rhythm, a half-laugh that suggests Plant knows exactly how close Led Zeppelin sat to the counterculture’s aesthetic while never quite signing its manifesto. Zeppelin sold mysticism, sex, and volume with arena-level ambition - closer to a traveling empire than a commune. So Plant’s line isn’t a confession of conservatism; it’s an insistence on being read as a craftsman and a frontman, not a political mascot.
“Whatever it was” also hints at how quickly “flowerchild” calcified into a consumer category. By the time Plant’s looking back, the label isn’t a lived identity so much as a marketing shorthand: a collage of tie-dye, Woodstock footage, and sanitized rebellion. His refusal is a bid to reclaim complexity: you can share the decade’s energy without pretending you belonged to its saintly origin story. It’s an artist resisting nostalgia’s demand that he play the role fans already bought.
Quote Details
| Topic | Music |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite | Cite this Quote |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Plant, Robert. (n.d.). I'm not a flowerchild or anything like that... whatever it was. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/im-not-a-flowerchild-or-anything-like-that-7126/
Chicago Style
Plant, Robert. "I'm not a flowerchild or anything like that... whatever it was." FixQuotes. Accessed February 3, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/im-not-a-flowerchild-or-anything-like-that-7126/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"I'm not a flowerchild or anything like that... whatever it was." FixQuotes, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/im-not-a-flowerchild-or-anything-like-that-7126/. Accessed 3 Feb. 2026.








