A primer on Led effing Zeppelin? What’s next, a guide on how to enjoy ice cream? Or a think piece on why sex rules? Yes, the legend of Zeppelin is beyond played out; you’ve already heard how the band defined arena-scale onstage excess, did unspeakable things to groupies in soon-to-be-trashed-hotel rooms, and soundtracked thousands of dorm toke sessions.** **What could use a fresh look, though, is Led Zeppelin the band, the quartet of freakishly talented Brits who not only turbocharged ’60s blues-rock with absurd amounts of groove and raunchiness, but also left us with some of the most diverse, enthralling, and stupendously rocking LPs ever made. Lucky you: A massive, still-ongoing reissue campaign, spearheaded by guitarist Jimmy Page, kicked off last summer. Now’s your chance to deprogram. Forget classic-rock radio’s merciless cherry-picking of this deep and majestic catalog; the "why" of true Zeppelin worship lies between the cracks: John Bonham’s hiccuping bass drum on "Good Times Bad Times," John Paul Jones’s nastily funky clavinet on "Trampled Under Foot," Jimmy Page’s queasy chords on "The Wanton Song" or Robert Plant’s fluid murmur on "Tea for One." You’ve spent too long staring at the tip of the Led Zeppelin iceberg; it’s time to behold the massive, glorious whole.
What’s Their Rep?
In their time, Zeppelin were the mother of all dismissed-by-critics, adored-by-fans bands. Tastemakers dealt them backhanded compliments—reviewing 1970’s Led Zeppelin III in Rolling Stone, Lester Bangs wrote, "their music is as ephemeral as Marvel comix." But these days, Zeppelin Bashing as a big-game sport is pretty much extinct. Rolling Stone now hangs on a graying Jimmy Page’s every utterance, and even indie-centric outlets like Pitchfork have lined up to toast the band’s new reissues.
The Big Break
Cue up any Zeppelin live footage from around ’73 on, and you’ll get a window into just how huge this band was at their peak. Plant’s painted-on jeans, kingly smirk, and swaggering stage stance tell the whole story. By the mid-’70s, Zeppelin’s dominance was so absolute, they didn’t have to try. Yet they continued to challenge themselves, searching for that ideal blend of grace and presence. With each release, they proved that the further you pushed the boundaries of rock & roll, the sexier and more overwhelming it became.
Family Tree
There was blues rock before Zeppelin the same way there were scary movies before The Exorcist or bors before Muhammad Ali. The catalogs of John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers, for example, or even the mighty Cream, endure as nifty time capsules, but when stacked up against Zeppelin classics like, say, "Heartbreaker" or "The Ocean," their aesthetics sound quaint and stilted. And while a thousand artists—from hair metal era pretty boys like Whitesnake to more recent throwbacks like Jack White—have emulated Zeppelin’s quintessential swagger, none has unseated the Plant/Page/Jones/Bonham quartet as rock’s all-time heavyweight champ.
Cliff’s Notes *The band’s name allegedly stems from a quip made by Keith Moon, in reference to a proto-Zeppelin group that teamed the Who drummer with Page and Jones. Moon had likened that band’s chances of taking off to those of a "lead zeppelin." (Har-har…)
*In addition to assembling the band and writing many of their most recognizable riffs, Jimmy Page also served as Zeppelin’s career-long producer. The guitarist’s sonic aesthetics—most prominently his obsession with a huge drum sound—set a perennial high bar for warmth and mass in rock record-making.
*The common wisdom is that punk killed off Zeppelin and the other arena-dwelling giants. But Zep didn’t take it lying down: Of "Wearing and Tearing"—a raw, raucous track off of ’82’s outtakes collection Coda—Plant said, "Page and I wrote that because we were so pissed off at the whole punk thing saying, ’What do those rich bastards know?’ "
The Beginning and the End
Zeppelin grew out of The Yardbirds, a ’60s-era British band best remembered as rock & roll’s most illustrious farm team. That group broke up in the summer of ’68, but by the fall, Page—their late-era guitarist—was busy assembling the New Yardbirds, the group that would soon change their name to Led Zeppelin, with Plant, Jones and Bonham. Zeppelin’s glorious reign ended 12 years later with the sad alcohol-related death of Bonham, who—there’s no nice way to put this—choked on his own vomit while sleeping.
Obvious Jams
Overplayed doesn’t even begin to describe the way the Classic Rock Machine has beaten a pitifully small sampling of Zeppelin songs into the ground. Still, you try resisting the urge to air-strum Page’s opening riff on "Heartbreaker," do your best Plant pout in front of the mirror during the vocal breaks in "Black Dog," or mime Bonham’s iconic climactic fills in "Stairway."â��
Deep Cuts
Zeppelin’;s first five LPs are pretty much fully canonical. (Though we’;ll never grasp why III’;s "Out on the Tiles," a rollicking, riff-happy masterpiece, isn’;t ubiquitous.) But by the mid-’70s, they were releasing entire albums’; worth of prime deep cuts. Sure, you know Physical Graffiti’;s "Kashmir," but have you heard "The Wanton Song," a lean, neck-snapping groover that might be the most punishing track the band ever recorded? Or "In the Light," an extended, mostly Jones-penned suite that juxtaposes eerie synth breaks with homey post-Beatles pop? "Achilles Last Stand," which kicks off 1976’;s sorely overlooked Presence, shows off late-model Zeppelin in all their rumbling, textural glory, while Coda’;s "Darlene" finds the band effortlessly Zeppelin-izing good-time R&B.
Top Five YouTubes
Live at the Royal Albert Hall (1970)
Live at Madison Square Garden (1973)
Watch these videos in sequence, and you’ll see Zeppelin evolving from daredevil blues-rock upstarts to preening arena darlings. The Danmarks Radio and Royal Albert Hall performances show how the band’s trademark wallop and improvisational bent were already in effect by the very beginning. The MSG show perfectly captures the way the quartet, then at peak hedonism, blurred the line between style and substance. (Check out those lovably goofy Jimmy Page hand moves.) The Knebworth performance, filmed the year before Bonham’s death, is less cocky theater and more career-twilight exorcism. Meanwhile, the Plant/Bonham interview shows real prescience, as when the drummer discusses the shift in fan attitudes from the pop ’60s to the rock ’70s: "I think that they’re coming to listen to what you’re playing and not just to look at you and see what you are." In the end, as it turns out, they were coming for both, and damn, did Led Zeppelin ever deliver.