Robert Plant has revealed that The Rolling Stones' 1963 debut single, a cover of Chuck Berry's "Come On", was one of the most formative records of his life, crediting it with steering him towards the blues before he found fame as Led Zeppelin's frontman. Speaking on BBC Radio 2's Tracks Of My Years, Plant explained that as a teenager obsessed with the music of Chicago and Mississippi, he found the blues largely inaccessible until The Rolling Stones acted as a gateway, bringing that sound to British teenagers like him.

Plant was 15 when "Come On" came out and later saw the Stones perform live on their first major UK tour in 1963, sharing a bill with Bo Diddley and Little Richard. He described witnessing the band step outside London to bring the blues to provincial towns as "really special", recalling how none of his generation had quite mastered that sound yet, but the Stones were leading the way. His devotion to the blues was so strong that he quit an accountancy course at 16 to pursue music full-time, a decision shaped in part by that formative encounter with the band.