LED ZEPPELIN

"Brand new ideas, and lots of influence.". This is the general consensus of the second studio release by Led Zepp a sequel surpassing the original in every possible way, a tour de force of songwriting, hard rock bombast, cockiness and, thanks mainly to that riff everyone will be humming while reading these lines, a precursor to heavy metal. First of all, let's talk about the "original" aspect. Everyone that thinks this is a far more original, on a songwriting level, offering than the debut is fooling himself. Off the top of my head: Whole Lotta Love is lyrically and melodically inspired - off of a Willie Dixon tune called You Need Love, Bring It On Home's first part is a cover from?Willie Dixon's Bring It On Home To Me, The Lemon Song's fast section is taken from Howlin' Wolf's Killin' Floor and of course, both Whole Lotta Love's and Moby Dick's guitar riffs are suspiciously similar (but are not stolen) to Hendrix's Hey Joe and Bobby Parker's Watch Your Step riffs, respectively. To be fair, though, most of the rip-offs were later acknowledged in credits by the band; my point is that this is more or less a semi-original effort by the band songwriting-wise.

As for the "drive" part, here you are: While II may sound harder and heavier than the debut on a first listen, this isn't quite the case; the "heavy" numbers on their first release were more ferocious and uncompromising by a long mile. Few of the songs here match the threat and menace of a gem like Dazed And Confused or How Many More Times; these were simply more gripping and edgier than most material on here, whether one adores or despises blues- influenced music. Only Whole Lotta Love showcases some of the darkness of the debut, while the rest of the record is rooted more on hard rock than early metal. It's not a disadvantage, but too many people mistake this release as the heavier one while this is not the case.

The only improvement I can see in the album is the over-abundance of riffs here; truly, this is actually the most riff- heavy album in the Zeppelin Pantheon and for good reason; the riffs allow the group to move on a harder rocking territory, as opposed to the debut's blues leanings. Whether they are brash and heavy on the album opener, bluesy on The Lemon Song or baggy and groovier on Heartbreaker, Jimmy works wonders with these catchy phrases on his guitar. Sometimes, even the bass works up some incredibly memorable and nifty lines, as on What Is And What Should Never Be; speaking of which, isn't it a terrific tune to begin with? A compelling fusion of jazz, hard rock and pop that should not be missed. Jimmy's dynamics are also prominent here; loud and sharp on the choruses, light and restrained on the verses and a bit of both on his awe-inspiring slide solo. Fantastic!

Whole Lotta Love is such a famous classic that I won't even bother talking about it; suffice to say, if you haven't heard this one, your rock knowledge is really incomplete. The Lemon Song is the album's You Shook Me; not as earth- shaking as that one, but incredibly groovy on the other hand. From the opening riff to the middle part, where Jones lays down every bass trick he knows while Jimmy with Robert engage in a terrific 'call and response' routine, this is as fantastic as blues jams can get. Even more impressive, from a songwriting standpoint, is Ramble On; Robert sings a sweet melody before leading the way for the explosive chorus, Jimmy mixes impressively acoustics with electrics, not to mention an astonishing "harmonized" solo figure in the middle of the song. Jones' playing is as inspired as on What Is and Bonham treats the verses with African percussion. Impressive!

Living Loving Maid is the brother of Communication Breakdown in the sense that it is a pop-meets-hard rock experiment, but quite often feels watered-down. It lacks the trademark Zeppelin fire and the group mistakenly emphasizes the pop side rather than the hard one, the former of which they never truly mastered. Another let down is also Thank You; where has Babe I'm Gonna Leave You gone? This is arguably a low point in Zep-ballads, where even the admittedly good melody can't save the tune from its overly sentimental and 'adolescent' nature. This is a band that would, in the following years, pen mature gems like Going To California and That's The Way.

The closing Bring It On Home is one last valuable addition,to the album but it pales in comparison to the debut's closing number, which kicks it by the window any time of the week, but it has a well-written riff, as well as interesting harp lines from Robert?and that's about it. Live, it worked much, much better as a medley; everyone should check it out. The honor for the worst cut, though, must fall on Moby Dick. Now, don't get me wrong; John Bonham is tied for my favorite drummer together with Keith Moon and Neil Peart and others. , but this is not the essence of his playing. He became famous for being an inventive, dynamic and instinctive drummer, not a soloing beast. Not to mention that, the only people who need drum solos on an album are, guess what, drummers. The rest should, logically, press the forward button as soon as possible.

To cut the story short, this a solid and in places improved follow-up to the group's first album. Unfortunately, it has a solid percentage of filler and, quite frankly, I'm not going to forgive this flaw just because Whole Lotta Love and Heartbreaker are/were radio standards. The debut had a zero amount of bad songs and a much more threatening vibe that truly is the essence of early Led Zeppelin. And while it opens much more impressively, it finishes rather poorly compared to I. In any way, it is Zeppelin at their prime without a doubt and one of the best they did throughout their impressive career. Great sophomore album, 4 stars

1969 is considered one of the best years for music and this album is just one of the legendary albums coming out that year. Definitely in the running for the greatest debut albums in my opinion. Led zeppelin got their sound in the first swing with this album. The lineup includes iconic vocals by Robert Plant crispy percussion by John Bonham, John Paul Jones on bass and Jimmy Page from the Yardbirds on guitar. Speaking of Jimmy Page he would actually use riffs he used from his time with the Yardbirds on "How Many More Times". Led Zepplin would later become one of the essential Classic rock bands and even people who don't listen to Rock have Led Zep t-shirts. The personal highlight for me is the closing track "How Many More Times" however this is NOT the song to introduce yourself to Led Zepplin to. I would suggest listening to this album first and then Led Zepplin II III and IV right after. great start and would be foundation for the band Led Zepplin. 4 stars.

In Memory

Back in the '80s, we were inseparable. I was 17 when we met, just trying to survive high school. He was two years older and in college pursuing physics. We had the most intense friendship, the kind where young men bond and surf the wave between adolescence and adulthood. We did it all: learned how to party, chase girls, build hot rods. We started a band. We spent many summer nights on the roof of his parents' house smoking and discussing weighty topics. We trusted each other with our fears. We became experts at the art of keeping 'adult considerations' at bay as long as possible. If maturity was sunlight, we were vampires. If you've read about Anthony Kiedis and Flea back in their youth, you'll have the picture, although we didn't achieve their level of mastery at music, partying, or girls. While our shared love of hard rock and metal was fierce, our mutual old faves were likely Heart and Zeppelin. The Song Remains the Same was my holy grail for certain, both the album and movie. It was the 1970s in one perfect symbolic artifact, and we were two young men who lamented missing that boat. We were trapped in the middle 1980s, hating that culture and wishing we were at Madison Square in '73 instead. (I'm more appreciative of the '80s music scene now, having far more expertise, but at the time and at that tender age, we were two proud, purist '70s freaks, two "throwbacks" as his sister called us.) More on us later.

Song Remains is Zeppelin's finest hour(s) captured, their live peak despite what they've said about being tired that night or what the blowhard critics think of it. Nonsense. The '73 tour was the band in perfect possession of their full rock powers. They had acquired and mastered the experience from the earlier tours, yet they had not lost an ounce of their edge to the factors that would begin to dog them with each tour thereafter. I can watch them in '75, '77, and '79 and see the slippage immediately in all of them except perhaps Jonesy. Age, substance use, vocal damage. Different factors affected the other three. Not horribly, necessarily. They could often do just fine on later tours, but it's still noticeable to my keen Zep eye. My only point is that '73 was the perfect crystalized moment where they could...do...no...wrong. Even the mistakes and missteps that did occur felt acceptable here, more charming than cringe. My favorite stuff here is the Houses of the Holy material which was the new stuff at the time. It's fresh and powerful, but most especially "SRTS/Rain Song, and Over the Hills and Far Away," all of which are have so much extra spark running through them as compared to the album versions.

Quite simply, these powerhouse live selections have become definitive versions of some of their best material, fleshed out and expanded with glorious interplay and personal prowess. I have nothing against the studio versions of these songs which are masterful in their own way, but these live versions are so on fire: there are songs within songs hatched of improvisation, much cool embellishment, and just sheer bravado on high. For me it is Jimmy I most connect with, the sheer beauty in his playing, especially the added luster and emotion of "Rain Song," the "golden" Les Paul hue to his sound, and the complete confidence he had on the harder rocking tracks. His playing is full of adrenalin and sensuality, masculine and feminine, the "light and dark" that he has often asserted were so important to the Zep canon. I understand the criticism some have of Page as "stumblefingers," and he is guilty of it sometimes, but he so transcends it. His runs, bends, his feel for the emotion, his service to the songs are ample reason so many consider him among the best. Pagey was certainly our hero for this album alone, and we tried to play like him in our band. My friend got way closer than I ever did. He could play anybody.

Our legendary friendship lasted into our early 20s before we took different paths and never reconnected, leaving all of that fire where it burned hottest, in our past. It was a beautiful thing that had to be short-lived because it was so fiercely a youth thing. I've been pretty cavalier about the lifestyle we used to lead, that partying is no big deal, that it never hurt us. But I can see now how it did take down some pretty cool people I've known, far too prematurely. Today I would tell young people to avoid abusing themselves and embrace healthier fun. But my dear friend who left us at age 57 was unrepentant to the end. He told me back in our youth, "There's an old saying that 'youth is wasted on the young.' They're never gonna be able to say that about me." And he was right. He hit the ground at 90 mph and never did slow down.

I loved him. Still do. After he died, they gave me his guitar which, as you can imagine, is an unreal emotional experience for me to play now. I strap it on only occasionally, and I swear I'm able to play better on his axe than I can on my own. I think that's his doing, and I can see him smile at the trick. The Song Remains the Same (along with Bebe Le Strange and Little Queen in particular) remains the soundtrack to every crazy night in our beloved suburban past, our youth pressed to a slab of vinyl. It remains a masterpiece to me. Similar to Yessongs and The Grateful Dead Movie, The Song Remains the Same is simply an absolute gift to fans, complete live shows captured in their prime so that people who were too young may experience them. It's a shame that the Floyd didn't have the foresight to do something this bold on the Dark Side or Wish tours. I don't really have the time of day for criticism of these documents as I feel privileged that they took the time to do them for us younger kids who couldn't be there in person. Cheers, mate. We'll jam again one day.

After the irregular "Presence" and hit by their complicated personal situations, Led Zeppelin released "In Through The Out Door" (1979), their eighth and last studio album. A work that in most of its development lacks the indispensable contribution of Jimmy Page, one of the fundamental bases of the band's success, involved along with John Bonham in his battles against addictions, basically ceding the creative control of the album to John Paul Jones.

And beyond Jones' solvency and musical ability to take charge not only of the bass but also of the multiple keyboards, he is not Page (nor does he have to be), and so "In Through The Out Door" has little to do with what one might expect from those who marked the path of hard rock and inspired that of heavy metal. A bit of classic rock in the opening "In the Evening", fragments of the very progressive "Carouselambra" with Jones' keyboard display, and Page's guitar solo in the bluesy half-time of "I'm Gonna Crawl", escape from the ordinary, but neither the versatility of the great drummer that was Bonham in the Latinised and disconcerting "Fool in the Rain", nor Plant's heartfelt tribute to his young son in the poppy "All my Love" help to lift the album off the ground.

Page commented at the time that "In Through The Out Door" had left him (and a large legion of fans) unsatisfied, and that the intention for the next album was to return to Led Zeppelin's more muscular path, but the tragic and unexpected death of Bonham months later and the consequent decision to break up the band permanently cancelled any future projects, and ended the career of one of the greatest rock bands of all time.

2/2.5 stars

The difficult personal circumstances the band members were going through, with Robert Plant recovering from a serious car accident in Greece and both Jimmy Page and John Bonham in a tough battle with their addictions, cast a shadow over Led Zeppelin's near future. With no touring on the horizon and the urge to do something rather than fall into stagnation, the quartet decided that the best way to deal with the moment was to return to the recording studio, and the result was 'Presence' (1976), their seventh album, a work that took less than three weeks to complete.

Devoid of big production and frills (no keyboards, no acoustic elements), and focused on the most basic rock principles, 'Presence' travels an uneven path combining the brilliance of 'Achilles Last Stand' and its mythological references to the Trojan Achilles in a great guitar demonstration by Page, the best track by far on the album, the dense and choppy melodies of 'For Your Life' and 'Nobody's Fault but Mine', and the bluesy 'Tea for One', a heartfelt reflection by Plant with obvious similarities to 'Since I've Been Loving You' from 'Led Zeppelin III' sustained by Bonham's great percussive work in slow motion mode, with lesser tracks such as the insipid Funky airs of the burlesque 'Royal Orleans' and the nostalgic 'Hots On for Nowhere', or the monotonous and dull rockabilly of 'Candy Store Rock'.

It tasted like so little for such a great band, so little that one of the elements that attracted more attention than the music was the strange black object on the album cover and on the internal graphic packaging... The band's decline was giving its first warning sign.

2.5/3 stars

After the versatile 'Houses of the Holy' and with overflowing popularity translated into extensive tours and packed stages around the world, Led Zeppelin, exhausted, took a break and only two years later released 'Physical Graffiti' (1975), their sixth album and the most extensive of their discography, mixing songs developed for the occasion with pieces discarded in previous years.

And it is in this context that the Englishmen sustain their unmistakable hard rock imprint with the undeniable blues influences in songs like the erotic 'Custer Pie' and its incisive guitar riffs, or the extensive 'In my Time of Dying' with Page using a 'bottleneck' to achieve that dense and slippery sound seconded by John Bonham's boxed percussion and Robert Plant's very successful singing, but above all with the hypnotizing and mysterious 'Kashmir' and its orientalized orchestrated melody, one of the best of the album.

The band also reaffirms their folksy leanings with Page's beautiful acoustic arpeggios on the instrumental 'Bron-Yr-Aur' (original from 1970) or the fractured 'Black Country Woman' (dropped from Houses of the Holy) with Plant and excellent harmonica playing, and they retain that laudable exploratory spirit with the progressive chords of John Paul Jones' hypnotic synthesizer and Page's bowing effect on the intriguing 'In the Light', the funky chords of 'Trampled Under Foot', Jones' electric piano on the melodic 'Down by the Seaside' and the refreshing 'Boogie with Stu' with the bluesy piano of esteemed sessionist Ian Stewart (both tracks recovered from 1971), before closing with the glam airs of 'Sick Again', a mention of Led Zeppelin's innumerable groupies.

Despite the enormous wear and tear caused by the self-demanding nature of the band on their way to the top, which left some after-effects in terms of the intensity of the proposal, 'Physical Graffiti' is a very good work and surely the last great album by Page and company.

3.5/4 stars

Review Nº 781

"Coda" is the ninth and last studio album or a compilation album, as you wish, of Led Zeppelin, released in 1982. It's a collection of unused tracks taken from various sessions during Led Zeppelin's musical career, and so, it could be heard as a quasi compilation album of unreleased tracks in the same tradition of other albums such as "Odds And Sods" of The Who and "Basement Tapes" of Bob Dylan. It was released two years after Led Zeppelin had officially disbanded following the death of their drummer John Bonham. The word "coda", meaning a passage that ends a musical piece following the main body, was therefore chosen as a title. So, it represents the end of the musical career of a great band.

"Coda" has eight tracks. The first track "We're Gonna Groove" was a song co-written by Ben E. King and James A. Bethea with the original title "Groovin". It's a live track recorded on 9 January 1970 in London and was edited with guitar overdubs. This track was originally stated for inclusion on "Led Zeppelin II" and kicks off the compilation album with the heavy, funky blues so common on the early band's works. Lyrically, it's a song with a high energy and an excellent musicianship, being just a plain of a pure Rock'n'Roll song. The second track "Poor Tom" was written by Page and Plant and is an outtake from "Led Zeppelin III". It tells us the story of the eponymous railroad worker whose clairvoyance leads to the knowledge of his wife's affairs. Musically, it opens with a solid drum riff and with Plant dinging softly. The drums are the predominant instrument through the early musical stages of the group and this song isn't an exception. However, it's very curious and extremely rare for the highlight on an acoustic song to be the drums. The third track "I Can't Quit You Baby" was written by Willie Dixon and recorded by Otis Rush in 1965. It was included on Led Zeppelin's debut studio album in 1969. It's an edited live track recorded on 9 January 1970 at the Royal Albert Hall, in London. It's a song heavily influenced by the blues riffs and the slow bass drumming. This live version is better than the original with nice guitar solo and the sound just seems tighter than on the original studio take. It's a nice flashback into the early days of the group. The fourth track "Walter's Walk" was written by Page and Plant and is an outake from "Houses Of The Holy", possibly with later overdubs. It's perhaps Led Zeppelin's rawest song on the album. It opens strong with the guitar followed by a solid drumming. Plant's vocals, although strong, sound like they are in the background. The musicianship is very strong and despite being a good song is probably one of the weakest tracks on the album. The fifth track "Ozone Baby" was written by Page and Plant and is an outtake from "In Through The Out Door". It opens very promisingly, and musically it continues all over the song. Plant's vocals are very good, as always. He sings very well in tune with the music, and its upbeat guitar riffs and fills with a nice solo too. It makes of this song as one of the best tracks on the entire compilation. I probably would have liked to have seen it on "In Through The Out Door". The sixth track "Darlene" was written by Page, Plant, Jones and Bonham, it's also an outtake from "In Through The Out Door". This is another good song with a great beat and where Jones makes a great piano job, once again. Plant's vocals are once more great and the way that it put his vocals back up Page's interesting guitar line, make this song being catchy and nice to hear. The seventh track "Bonzo's Montreux" was written by Bonham and was recorded in 1976 at Mountain Studios in Montreux, Switzerland. It's a four minute drum solo taken from one of Bonham's sound checks at Royal Albert Hall. It can be compared to "Moby Dick" in that they are both drum solos, although, aside from that, they are slightly different. It doesn't open and close with Page taking the centre stage and Page added some electronic effects over the solo in the studio. This is a great track and shows for the last time, just how great Bonham was, really. The eighth and last track "Wearing And Tearing" was written by Page and Plant, is another outtake from "In Through The Out Door". This is a musical effort to mirror the growing popularity of the punk movement at the time, and it imitates its style. The chaotic musical atmosphere of the track provides an excellent background for Plant's stylishly sung vocals. However, I've never was a great fan of punk, really. But, it's a fresh song, for the time, and I don't dislike it.

Conclusion: As a true album, "Coda" isn't definitely, to anyone, one of the favourite albums of Led Zeppelin. It was composed of the left over stuff from the band, even if Led Zeppelin's throwaways are better than most groups usually make at their best. This is definitely an album that would be labelled only for hard core fans, even thought that the world is full of them. It's one that every Led Zeppelin's fan should save in the last. It's an album that only a real Led Zeppelin's fan would or could really enjoy, if your musical collection of pre "Coda" isn't complete yet, I wouldn't recommend this album to anyone. Concluding, "Coda" is definitely not the Led Zeppelin's best musical work. It's not a bad album, but not a good start off to listening to Led Zeppelin's music. Fans of the band, like me, will probably enjoy it to an end, as I do. It's non-essential, but as a posthumous work for Bonham's, it's a very emotional album for the group and fans too.

Prog is my Ferrari. Jem Godfrey (Frost*)

After "Led Zeppelin IV" as the high point of their meteoric rise to the top of the rock scene, the English band left their comfort zone and opted to venture into new and challenging paths, the end result of which was "Houses of the Holy", their fifth album.

Distanced from the dense guitar riffs and thick instrumental walls of the previous album, Led Zeppelin presents a collage of styles from the very beginning of the album, with Jimmy Page's clean guitars close to progressive sonorities in the hyperactive "The Song Remains the Same", the acoustic folk overflown by the invaluable contribution of John Paul Jones' evocative mellotron in the beautiful ballad "Rain Song", and the Celtic reminiscences of JJR Tolkien's work in the boisterous "Over The Hills And Far Away", a piece sustained by Page's rhythmic acoustic riffs and John Bonham's mastery on percussion.

But the styles that are furthest away from the band's recognisable frontiers come with the American Funky of "The Crunge", a piece that doesn't quite manage to take off, the jubilant and persistent Groove of "Dancing Days", and the unsuspected "rock" reggae of "D'yer Ma'ker", in a clear demonstration of the exploratory concerns of Page and company.

The musical mosaic reserves for its final stretch the experimental progressive exercise that the vaporous and aquatic tension of "No Quarter" proposes with a stupendous work on Jones' atmospheric synthesizers, Robert Plant's voice loaded with effects and Page's saturated riffs in one of the best passages of the album, and "The Ocean", the track that comes closest to the band's hard rock roots.

"Houses of the Holy" is another of Led Zeppelin's great albums, and like "Led Zeppelin III", it has achieved widespread recognition over the years.

3.5/4 stars

The fact that the general reception of "Led Zeppelin III" was not as expected, hit the band's self-esteem and especially Jimmy Page's, who considered it the best album of the three released up to that time. And so the fourth album, "Led Zeppelin IV" (although officially untitled by the musicians' decision), had a meticulous creative and production work to harmonise its intense hard rock vein with folk and blues influences.

The first part of the album is outstanding and there is nothing to be wasted, with pieces with the necessary ingredients to make up timeless anthems of the genre: Page's dense riffs in the lusty "Black Dog" and the incendiary "Rock and Roll", Celtic reminiscences in "The Battle of Evermore" with the contribution of Page on mandolin and English singer Sandy Denny, and the perfect electro-acoustic combination of the immortal "Stairway to Heaven" with the growing instrumental wall built by John Paul Jones and John Bonham and crowned by Page's portentous guitar solo and Plant's heartbreaking phrasing, one of the band's and the genre's flagship songs.

Although in the second half the rushed "Mystic Mountain Hop" marked by Jones' electric piano and the orientalised "Four Sticks" lag a little behind the rest of the pieces, "Going to California", a beautiful acoustic tribute to the Canadian singer Joni Mitchell, and the infallible blues of the parsimonious "When the Levee Breaks" (an adaptation taken from the American singer Memphis Minnie) interpreted in the way that only the British can do, maintain a superlative level and bring the work to a close.

The album of the portrait of the mysterious peasant hunched over with a bundle of branches on his back hanging on a peeling wall, would become one of the cornerstones of the genre and would raise the band to the top of the rock scene.

Excellent

4/4.5 stars

Led Zeppelin were on the crest of the wave with their revolutionary "I" and "II", and hence the expectation for their next release was enormous, with a growing legion of fans eager to receive more voltaic shocks that Jimmy Page's riffs and Plant's powerful and erotic voice brought with them, and, as sometimes happens, the results would not necessarily be the expected ones. And a bit of that happened with "Led Zeppelin III" (1970), an album divided into two large segments with dissimilar orientations.

The first segment approaches (with the exception of "Friends") the hard rock sound of the band, as with Page's guitar riffs, John Bonham's intense percussion and Robert Plant's demonic screams in the combative "Immigrant Song", with the dark ezquizophrenia of "Celebration Day" and the anxious riffs of the lively "Out of the Tiles" and, on the other hand, the deep blues influences of the band, the deep blues influences are also present in the plaintive "Since I've Been Loving You", a very solid instrumental progression (courtesy of the Jones/Bonham duo) that supports Page's masterful guitar ramblings and solos and Plant's heartbroken singing giving his life in every verse, in one of the best moments, if not the best, of the album.

The second segment, nevertheless, shows a significant turnaround, no more thunderous and saturated walls of sound, and the Englishmen's undeniable taste for acoustic nuances takes over: the folk arrangement of "Gallows Pole", a traditional song of probable 18th century Anglo-Saxon origin, the beautiful and melancholic grey tone of "Tangerine", the reflective "That's The Way", attributable to the Page/Plant duo's inspirational sojourn in rural Snowdia (Wales), a place that also lent its name to the percussive agility of the also folk "Bron-Y-Aur Stomp", all tracks that make for an unexpected and unbeatable unplugged set. The haunting "Hats Off to (Roy) Harper", which borrows elements from legendary American blues representatives like Bukka White and Fred Mc Dowell, closes the album with a nod to the band's singer/songwriter friend Roy Harper.

Despite the initial feelings of bewilderment and suspicion generated by the unpredictable drop in revolutions, "Led Zeppelin III" is a great album (including its psychedelic cover art), and with hindsight it has achieved the recognition it deserved.

Very good.

4 stars