Before I move on to the songs of Led Zeppelin's second album, I'd like to do an overview view of the production and history of the band's debut effort.
Recorded in Olympic Studios during the month of October 1968, Led Zeppelin, or Led Zeppelin I, as it is now referred to, was the debut album for Jimmy Page's new band after the demise of the Yardbirds. The band had been together for only a few months before hitting the studio to record their initial release, but it had been a busy few months. The group had already toured Denmark and Sweden, and had had a couple dates around England, and had been in the studio to back P.J. Proby for his album "Three Week Hero". Led Zeppelin I is a grab bag of tunes of a wide variety, from Eastern folk inspired acoustic songs, to gut wrenching blues standards, from trippy psychedelic soundscapes, to good old fashioned rock and roll, it truly is an album that showed the diversity of the new group.
The album itself was recorded in only thirty-six hours of studio time, paid for by Jimmy Page from the earnings he managed to save from the Yardbirds and his studio work; the total for all the studio time came to 1,782 pounds. The reason Page decided to pay for the session time himself was rather simple really, "I wanted artistic control in a vice grip, because I knew exactly what I wanted to do with these fellows. In fact, I financed and completely recorded the first album before going to Atlantic... It wasn't your typical story where you get an advance to make an album—we arrived at Atlantic with tapes in hand... Atlantic's reaction was very positive – I mean they signed us, didn't they?"
The reason the band was able to put the songs in the can so fast was due to the arranging they had already done previously, Jimmy explains, "[the band] had begun developing the arrangements on the Scandinavian tour and I knew what sound I was looking for. It just came together incredibly quickly."
An additional reason for the speed was the fact that Jimmy paid for the album himself, so there was no wasting time on his watch; Page' frugality would become the stuff of legends, he would later earn the nickname "Led Wallet".
For the album Jimmy Page used his trusted "Dragon Tele" a 1950's Fender Telecaster for the electric songs, and a Gibson J-200 for the acoustic pieces. The album itself is quite organic with the group performing the songs in studio all together and at the same time, ""The first album is a live album, it really is, and it's done intentionally in that way. It's got overdubs on it, but the original tracks are live." explains Jimmy. One problem Page ran into when he chose to record in this fashion was that he had underestimated the true power of his vocalist, "Robert's voice was extremely powerful and, as a result, would get on some of the other tracks. But oddly, the leakage sounds intentional."
For the material on the album Page stuck with what he knew at the time, which he described to an interviewer in 1975, "For material, we obviously went right down to our blues roots. I still had plenty of Yardbirds riffs left over. By the time Jeff [Beck] did go, it was up to me to come up with a lot of new stuff. It was this thing where [Eric] Clapton set a heavy precedent in the Yardbirds which Beck had to follow and then it was even harder for me, in a way, because the second lead guitarist had suddenly become the first. And I was under pressure to come up with my own riffs. On the first LP I was still heavily influenced by the earlier days. I think it tells a bit, too... It was obvious that somebody had to take the lead, otherwise we'd have all sat around jamming for six months."
Despite working closely with Jimmy Page and the rest of the band on the several songs for the album, Robert Plant does not receive any writing credits at all. This was due to Plant having a contract with CBS Records that prohibited him at the time from contributing to any other project or collaboration. This is of course does Plant little justice for how integral he was to the creation of the album. Plant does get credit curiously enough for "Occasional Bass" which he commented on in 2005, "In truth, I was an occasional bass player. It says so on Zeppelin I,
next to my name: vocals, harmonica and occasional bass. Very
occasionally – once, I think, since 1968. How in God's name that ended
up on the cover is so funny. I'm sure Jonesy [John Paul Jones] didn't
like it [laughs]. But I suppose every time he fucked up he could say it
was me."
The album was released on January 12, 1969 to poor reviews with many comparing the band's efforts to the album "Truth" by the Jeff Beck Group released only months before. Here is a snippet from a review by Rolling Stone written by John Mendlesohn in 1969, "The popular formula in England in this, the aftermath era of such successful British bluesmen as Cream and John Mayall, seems to be: add, to an excellent guitarist who, since leaving the Yardbirds and/or Mayall, has become a minor musical deity, a competent rhythm section and pretty soul-belter who can do a good spade imitation. The latest of the British blues groups so conceived offers little that its twin, the Jeff Beck Group, didn't say as well or better three months ago, and the excesses of the Beck group's Truth album (most notably its self-indulgence and restrictedness), are fully in evidence on Led Zeppelin's debut album."
Obviously the band bristled against the criticism, John Paul Jones reminisced on the issue later in an interview with Q Magazine in 1990, "We had appalling press at the time. Nobody seemed to want to know us for one reason or another. We got to America and read the Rolling Stone review of the very first album, which was going on about us as another hyped British band. We couldn't believe it. In our naivety we thought we'd done a good album and were doing all right, and then this venom comes flying out. We couldn't understand why or what we'd done to them. After that we were very wary of the press, which became a chicken-and-egg situation. We avoided them and so they avoided us. It was only because we did a lot of shows that our reputation got around as a good live band."
In spite of the poor press, the album went on to become a huge commercial success. Within two months it had managed to fight its way into the Billboard top ten and would remain on the Billboard top 200 for a total of 79 weeks. It was through a strategy of extensive touring and a high rate of FM radio exposure that the band was able to get their music out to the audience who responded enthusiastically over the album and bought them up in bunches. As of today the album has sold almost 10,000,000 copies worldwide.
With the benefit of time and hindsight many critics have re-assessed their view of the album, and today it is considered one of the seminal albums in the history of rock and roll. Led Zeppelin I has garnered many awards since the time of its release including induction into the Grammy Hall of Fame and inclusion on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's list of The 200 definitive albums in Rock and Roll. Even Rolling Stone Magazine has changed their opinion of the work, In an article titled "The Long Shadow of Led Zeppelin" writer Mikal Gilmore stated, "[The album] was pretty much unlike anything else. The arrangements were more sculpted than those of Cream or Jimi Hendrix, and the musicianship wasn't cumbersome like Iron Butterfly's or bombastic like Vanilla Fudge's. The closest comparisons might be to MC5 or the Stooges—both from Michigan—yet neither had the polish or prowess of Led Zeppelin, nor did Led Zeppelin have the political, social or die-hard sensibility of those landmark bands. What they did have, though, was the potential for a mass audience."
Rolling Stone would later place the album at the 29th position on their "500 Greatest Albums of All Time" list in 2007 and deem Led Zeppelin "The Heaviest Band of All Time".
Recorded in Olympic Studios during the month of October 1968, Led Zeppelin, or Led Zeppelin I, as it is now referred to, was the debut album for Jimmy Page's new band after the demise of the Yardbirds. The band had been together for only a few months before hitting the studio to record their initial release, but it had been a busy few months. The group had already toured Denmark and Sweden, and had had a couple dates around England, and had been in the studio to back P.J. Proby for his album "Three Week Hero". Led Zeppelin I is a grab bag of tunes of a wide variety, from Eastern folk inspired acoustic songs, to gut wrenching blues standards, from trippy psychedelic soundscapes, to good old fashioned rock and roll, it truly is an album that showed the diversity of the new group.
The album itself was recorded in only thirty-six hours of studio time, paid for by Jimmy Page from the earnings he managed to save from the Yardbirds and his studio work; the total for all the studio time came to 1,782 pounds. The reason Page decided to pay for the session time himself was rather simple really, "I wanted artistic control in a vice grip, because I knew exactly what I wanted to do with these fellows. In fact, I financed and completely recorded the first album before going to Atlantic... It wasn't your typical story where you get an advance to make an album—we arrived at Atlantic with tapes in hand... Atlantic's reaction was very positive – I mean they signed us, didn't they?"
The reason the band was able to put the songs in the can so fast was due to the arranging they had already done previously, Jimmy explains, "[the band] had begun developing the arrangements on the Scandinavian tour and I knew what sound I was looking for. It just came together incredibly quickly."
An additional reason for the speed was the fact that Jimmy paid for the album himself, so there was no wasting time on his watch; Page' frugality would become the stuff of legends, he would later earn the nickname "Led Wallet".
For the album Jimmy Page used his trusted "Dragon Tele" a 1950's Fender Telecaster for the electric songs, and a Gibson J-200 for the acoustic pieces. The album itself is quite organic with the group performing the songs in studio all together and at the same time, ""The first album is a live album, it really is, and it's done intentionally in that way. It's got overdubs on it, but the original tracks are live." explains Jimmy. One problem Page ran into when he chose to record in this fashion was that he had underestimated the true power of his vocalist, "Robert's voice was extremely powerful and, as a result, would get on some of the other tracks. But oddly, the leakage sounds intentional."
For the material on the album Page stuck with what he knew at the time, which he described to an interviewer in 1975, "For material, we obviously went right down to our blues roots. I still had plenty of Yardbirds riffs left over. By the time Jeff [Beck] did go, it was up to me to come up with a lot of new stuff. It was this thing where [Eric] Clapton set a heavy precedent in the Yardbirds which Beck had to follow and then it was even harder for me, in a way, because the second lead guitarist had suddenly become the first. And I was under pressure to come up with my own riffs. On the first LP I was still heavily influenced by the earlier days. I think it tells a bit, too... It was obvious that somebody had to take the lead, otherwise we'd have all sat around jamming for six months."
 |
| The picture that appeared on the back of the LP was taken by former Yardbird Chris Dreja |
The album was released on January 12, 1969 to poor reviews with many comparing the band's efforts to the album "Truth" by the Jeff Beck Group released only months before. Here is a snippet from a review by Rolling Stone written by John Mendlesohn in 1969, "The popular formula in England in this, the aftermath era of such successful British bluesmen as Cream and John Mayall, seems to be: add, to an excellent guitarist who, since leaving the Yardbirds and/or Mayall, has become a minor musical deity, a competent rhythm section and pretty soul-belter who can do a good spade imitation. The latest of the British blues groups so conceived offers little that its twin, the Jeff Beck Group, didn't say as well or better three months ago, and the excesses of the Beck group's Truth album (most notably its self-indulgence and restrictedness), are fully in evidence on Led Zeppelin's debut album."
Obviously the band bristled against the criticism, John Paul Jones reminisced on the issue later in an interview with Q Magazine in 1990, "We had appalling press at the time. Nobody seemed to want to know us for one reason or another. We got to America and read the Rolling Stone review of the very first album, which was going on about us as another hyped British band. We couldn't believe it. In our naivety we thought we'd done a good album and were doing all right, and then this venom comes flying out. We couldn't understand why or what we'd done to them. After that we were very wary of the press, which became a chicken-and-egg situation. We avoided them and so they avoided us. It was only because we did a lot of shows that our reputation got around as a good live band."
 |
| Led Zeppelin in 1968 |
With the benefit of time and hindsight many critics have re-assessed their view of the album, and today it is considered one of the seminal albums in the history of rock and roll. Led Zeppelin I has garnered many awards since the time of its release including induction into the Grammy Hall of Fame and inclusion on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's list of The 200 definitive albums in Rock and Roll. Even Rolling Stone Magazine has changed their opinion of the work, In an article titled "The Long Shadow of Led Zeppelin" writer Mikal Gilmore stated, "[The album] was pretty much unlike anything else. The arrangements were more sculpted than those of Cream or Jimi Hendrix, and the musicianship wasn't cumbersome like Iron Butterfly's or bombastic like Vanilla Fudge's. The closest comparisons might be to MC5 or the Stooges—both from Michigan—yet neither had the polish or prowess of Led Zeppelin, nor did Led Zeppelin have the political, social or die-hard sensibility of those landmark bands. What they did have, though, was the potential for a mass audience."
Rolling Stone would later place the album at the 29th position on their "500 Greatest Albums of All Time" list in 2007 and deem Led Zeppelin "The Heaviest Band of All Time".
 |
| Getting it right the second time around |
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