WALKING INTO CLARKSDALE

After the great success of "No Quarter", Page and Plant took their reunification further with a collection of new songs in the form of "Walking Into Clarkesdale", released on 21st April 1998 on Atlantic with indie rock Producer Steve Albini, a heavier, bluesier affair, Clarkesdale being in the spiritual home of the Blues the Mississippi Delta.

The album gives one an idea of what Led Zeppelin could have sounded like had they stayed together, includes more Eastern style songs most notably "Most High", a very dramatic show stopper of a song with full African orchestra as on the "No Quarter" album, but the opening song "Shining in the Light" is a more Country Rock affair, with strumming guitar and Mellotron accompaniment, and familiar Page style riffs and power chords. The following song "When the World Was Young" takes an emotionally loud-soft-loud look at the past, followed by the Zeppelin style "Upon a Golden Horse " complete with complicated time signatures, infectious heavy riffs and heavily layered keyboard passages, the closest the pair may have got to recreating the traditional Zeppelin sound. The softer "Blue Train" is cited as another tribute to the memory of Plant's lost son Karac, and "Please Read the Letter" was reworked with Alison Krauss on the later hugely successful "Raising Sand" album in 2004.

As mentioned "Most High" is one of the most standout tracks, the title track "Walking Into Clarkesdale" is a Country Blues rocker as is "Burning Up" , "When I Was A Child" Is another slow paced emotional recollection of the past, leaving fast rockers "House of Love" and "Sons of Freedom" to finish the album, with characteristically raucous sounding production from Steve Albini. Page actually had another album of songs demoed, some of them really good according to Robert, so they may even see the light of day in the future hopefully.

Japanese copies of the album included the song "Whiskey from the Glass" as a bonus track.