Led Zeppelin

For my first real post, I decided to do a "back to basics" kind of review by going with Led Zeppelin.

Now, almost everyone has heard of Led Zeppelin at one time of another, but I have found that there are a surprising number of people that don't really know who they are. I always find that surprising because of how much they influenced music today.

Jimmy Page, one of the former guitarists of The Yardbirds, started Led Zeppelin. Originally, the band was to be called "The New Yardbirds," but a comment from The Who's drummer Keith Moon saying that "they will go down like a lead zeppelin" changed that.

Jimmy had an idea for a "riff based band." This mean that songs would be, for the most part, based around guitar riffs that Page had created. This of course, changed the music industry forever.

Now, you may wonder why I didn't choose "Stairway to Heaven" for one of their songs. There are two reasons why I didn't pick that song. Firstly, everyone knows it. Even if you've never heard of Led Zeppelin before, odds are that you've heard at least part of it once in your life. Secondly, I personally don't like it as much as some of their other stuff. That probably has a lot to due with it's popularity (I always have more difficulty liking music if it's popular).

The first song on my list is "Since I've Been Loving You" off of the album Led Zeppelin III. This is one of their best songs in my opinion. To me, this is one of those songs where you want to close your eyes so you can fully appreciate the song (which is very dangerous while driving). One interesting thing about this song, is that it was mostly recorded live in the studio with the band improvising over the pre-discussed idea. There is one noticeable mistake on the song however, John Bonham’s bass drum pedal squeaks during the song. Jimmy Page had this to say about the squeaky pedal:

“It sounds louder and louder every time I hear it! [laughs]. That was something that was obviously sadly overlooked at the time.”

The Second song on my list is Dazed and Confused off of their first self-titled album. Something I didn't know until I researched further was that the song was originally written by folk singer Jake Holmes (his version is also on the playlist). Jake Holmes opened for The Yardbirds when Jimmy Page was still in their lineup, and the song greatly inspired him. Later, when he was in Led Zeppelin, he changed the lyrics and enough of the melody to escape a lawsuit from Jake Holmes. Something that a lot of people complain about with this song is the long experimental part of the song in the middle. Although it is very different from “normal music,” you have to give them credit for doing something that nobody else had done before. In my opinion, the bass line on this song is the best part, and is definitely the driving force for the whole song

Whole lotta love is one of the easiest songs in the world to review. This song alone inspired a whole generation of kids to pick up the guitar. That alone speaks volumes. In the movie “It Might Get Loud,” Jimmy Page shows The Edge of U2 and Jack White of the White Stripes how he plays “Whole Lotta Love,” and their expressions show that this song influenced them a great deal as young boys. Other than that, the song speaks for itself.

Communication Breakdown is a simple, straight-forward, and in-your-face rock song. Listening to this song I can almost hear some early punk overtones in the simplicity of the chord progression.

As a guitarist, I can remember the feeling the first time I heard the solo to this song very clearly and easily, when most of the other Led Zeppelin songs were an acquired taste for me (mostly because my Dad liked them).

For the longest time, I didn’t understand why people liked The Immigrant Song so much, until one day I was driving along, blasting a Led Zeppelin CD and the Immigrant Song came on. I don’t know why, but this time it seemed to click with me and I’ve loved it ever since. It took me a long time to really understand the message of the song, not so much in the lyrical sense but more in the musical.

The song was inspired by Vikings traveling from their home to find new land. The idea for the song came when they played a concert in Reykjavik, Iceland, which apparently had a profound effect on Page, who wrote the song.

It’s hard to describe how much Led Zeppelin has changed the music industry, but if you listen very hard, you can hear them in at least some aspect in almost every band in music today.