IN THROUGH THE OUT DOOR

It's a shame such a legendary band had to end on a low note. The posthumous "Coda" wouldn't help redeem this one either. I imagine at this time that Page, Plant and Bonham were so hopped up on drugs, John Paul Jones took the reins with this album, as evidenced by the much more prominent use of the keyboards. You could also look on the liner notes and see Jones listed first in writing credits for all of the songs, except for the terrible "Hot Dog"- a Page and Plant collaboration.

Anyway, "In Through The Out Door" is mostly full of duds, but there are a few redeemable moments. The opening song, "In The Evening" is a classic Zeppelin tune with the trademark catchy riff and (at this point) good keyboard lines. It gets a little repetitive because of its length, you shouldn't mind that too much considering there are worse things on this album. "South Bound Saurez" is a fast, piano driven filler song- nothing interesting. "Fool In The Rain" redeems things a bit, but the salsa fiesta thing going on at the end certainly was not expected. Piano dominates again. "Hot Dog" is the worst song on the album (not surprising considering Jones wasn't involved) and maybe the worst Zeppelin song ever. It's a country/bluesy waste of time.

The epic "Carosuselambra" is an epic 10 and-a-half-minute song, one of Zeppelin's most interesting this side of "Zoso". It can be easily broken down into three parts: the beginning is driven by Jones's keyboard playing the riff over and over, things slow down in the middle as Page plays some atmospheric guitar parts, and at the end, things speed up again thanks to Jones's keyboard, playing a different riff this time. It's really a great song, but, sadly, is the only redeemable thing on this album. "All Of My Love" is an emotional, string driven ballad. Plant gives a heart-wrenching vocal performance- it's a rather powerful song. The album closes with "I'm Gonna Crawl", another bluesy song but kind of sounds waltzy as well. Even though they didn't know it at the time, this would be the last official Zeppelin tune and oddly enough, the mood of the song fits it's place perfectly.

Overall, I only recommend this album to the hardcore Led Zeppelin fans and/or completionists. It's kind of sad such a band ended on a low-point.

Standout songs: "Carosuselambra"