Led Zeppelin II Analyzed

Led Zeppelin II, the band's second studio album was the work that broke the band in America and beyond. The album itself was literally recorded on the run, in studios all over America and the U.K. in between gigs where they debuted material off the new album almost as they had just finished recording it. The album is far and away the groups heaviest record relying on over-driven renderings of riff based blues rock and roll that blew audiences away. The album was also the group's first work to reach number one in both America and the U.K. In the U.S. alone it has sold over 12,000,000 copies.

The album was recorded at breakneck pace taxing the limits of the already overworked group, but as a consequence there is an urgency to the work that is audible to the listener. Tracks were laid down individually, sometimes even in pieces, a riff here, a bass line there and so on. John Paul Jones described the process later, "We were touring a lot. Jimmy's riffs were coming fast and furious. A lot of them came from onstage especially during the long improvised section of 'Dazed and Confused'. We'd remember the good stuff and dart into a studio along the way." Robert Plant added, ""It was crazy really. We were writing the numbers in hotel rooms and then we'd do a rhythm track in London, add the vocal in New York, overdub the harmonica in Vancouver and then come back to finish mixing at New York."

The band in the studio

An untold amount of studios were used to record the second album including, Olympic and Morgan Studios in London, England; A&M, Quantum, Sunset, Mirror Sound and Mystic Studios in Los Angeles, California; Ardent Studios in Memphis, Tennessee; A&R, Juggy Sound, Groove and Mayfair Studios in New York City; and the "hut" in Vancouver.

Eddie Kramer, engineer and partner to Jimi Hendrix was enlisted to help with the production of the album. Led Zeppelin guru Dave Lewis credits much of the album's success to the partnership between Page and Kramer, "That the album turned out to be such a triumph, in particular for a production quality that still sounds fresh today, was in no small way due to the successful alliance with Page and Kramer in the control room." Kramer himself would comment later on the chaos that surrounded the recording of the album, "We did that album piece-meal. We cut some of the tracks in some of the most bizarre studios you can imagine, little holes in the wall. Cheap studios. But in the end it sounded bloody marvelous. There was a unification of sound on Zeppelin II because there was one guy in charge and that was Mr. Page."

Eddie Kramer in the foreground

Jimmy himself later commented on what a turning point the album turned out to be for the group, "Led Zep II was very virile. That was the album that was going to dictate whether or not we had the staying power and the capacity to stimulate. It was still blues-based but it was a much more carnal approach to the music and quite flamboyant. It was created on the run between hotel rooms and the GTOs, and that was quite something." The GTO's were a band of groupies based out of L.A. featuring Pamela Miller, a future flame of Jimmy's.

The album also proved to be a turning point for the group's vocalist Robert Plant, who had not received any credit for his work on the band's first album and was having severe doubts about his ability to carry on, ""[D]uring Led Zep I (1969) as far as I was concerned, I thought that I was going to [leave the band] anyway. I didn't feel that comfortable because there were a lot of demands on me vocally—which there were all the way through the Zeppelin thing. And I was quite nervous and didn't really get into enjoying it until II."

For the album's cover, the band took a photograph of the famous "Flying Circus" a German Air Force unit headed by the Red Baron himself Manfred von Richthofen, and re-worked it to include inserts of members of the band as well as Richard Cole and Peter Grant. The woman on the cover is Glynis Johns the mother from Mary Poppins, an inside joke reference to Led Zeppelin I engineer Glyn Johns. The album also has a brownish tint, with a brown border giving it the nickname "The Brown Bomber".

The original photo that was modified for the album cover of Led Zeppelin II

The album was released with mixed critical acclaim but went on to huge commercial success. It was as a result of the heaviness of the album that the band, almost in fear of being typecast retreated deep into the Welsh countryside the next year to record something a little more soft, which despite the effort, critics still panned. The album has garnered considerably praise over the years and numerous awards and inclusion on countless best of lists. It's place in the annals of rock and roll has been secured.  For the record...It's my favorite album as well.