Skeletons In My Closet (Part 2)

I'm not ashamed to say I like Led Zeppelin. I'm just ashamed that it's taken me so long to finally get interested in them. So my second publicly aired skeleton is this: I consider myself a big fan of music and fairly knowledgeable about it, but have, for the past 15 years or so, largely ignored the catalog of work Led Zeppelin created. Once I was of the mind they were way too metal for my tastes, and way too popular, too middle of the road rock for me. Now I think, "How can you not like them? How can you not like the chances they took musically throughout their career? How can you not appreciate the power of Robert Plant's singing or John Bonham's drumming?"

Changes that I am anticipating for later on in the year made me decide to download some of their songs online, as opposed to buy another CD. This is a really hard thing to do when some of the song titles are never sung during the course of the song! I plan on buying their CDs at some point (I already own Led Zeppelins II and IV), but right now I'm worried about seriously going berserk in HMV at this point, and while it breaks my heart a little to go in and walk out empty-handed, I am a little proud of my self-restraint!

But Led Zeppelin are one of those bands I grew up with, or I should say, one of the bands my dad listened to while I was growing up. When I was much younger, I was plagued with chronic headaches that would last for 2 or 3 days at a time, ones that would prevent me from sleeping until my body couldn't take the strain and I would eventually pass out from exhaustion. Anyways, during that time, as most TV stations were not in a 24 hour format like they are now, my dad would stay up with me into the wee hours of the morning, and we would watch his video collections of concerts and videos, made from taping MTV overnight, back in the day when the channel actually played music.

One of the specials was the Led Zeppelin concert movie The Song Remains the Same. I vaguely remember Robert Plant's video sequence, where I think it was medieval themed. The one that sticks out the most for me, though is the one featuring John Bonham, where we see him play Moby Dick and cut into the performance are clips of him racing a car, some nitroglycerin fueled funny car. I don't know how this memory came about, but I do remember learning that he had died and then asking my dad if he had died in the car crash. My dad probably thinking I'd grow up to try the same thing if I knew he had actually died from a serious bender of 26 vodka shots in one day, told me "yes."

Then when I got older I somehow associated Led Zeppelin with being like the grandfather of all things hair metal. Yes, I (at the time) saw bands like Poison and Warrant in the same light as Led Zeppelin. I now see that all four members of the band, whether separate or together are extremely talented. This is not the case for Warrant. But at the time, I saw Led Zeppelin as too excessive and flashy and was turned off by the whole thing.

I think they are one of the most musically interesting bands out there. It doesn't matter what part you concentrate on. It's all really interesting and amazing. I tend to pay attention most to John Bonham's drumming. It's amazing how much force he put behind his playing. He just beat the shit out of his drums constantly, both destroying his sticks and the drum heads. He drummed with four sticks on the song appropriately titled Four Sticks.

While Stairway To Heaven leaves a bad taste in my mouth, only because it was the one song they played over and over at my school dances to signal the dance's end and thereby signaling to me another wasted evening where I hung out on the sidelines and never was asked to dance, I am now starting to slowly appreciate the song and especially starting to love the guitar solo for it.

I think the best Led Zeppelin song where they all come together so well has to be The Immigrant Song, which is off Led Zeppelin III. I'm really amazed at just how short that song is, just over 2 minutes long. I guess when I first heard it while driving around with my father, I was pretty dumbstruck at the combined forces of Robert Plant's wailing and the solid rhythm section of John Bonham and John Paul Jones.

Also I learned something kind of funny while trying to research Led Zeppelin completely through the wonders of Google, but you have to wait for it. When Robert Plant's 5 year old son died (not the funny part) he was so devastated that he almost decided to quit Led Zeppelin and music for good (also not the funny part) and become a kindergarten teacher. How awesome would that have been? Former rock god Robert Plant once wailing "Squeeze me baby, till the juice runs down my leg!" on The Lemon Song, now singing very soulful versions of the ABC Song and The Eensy Weensy Spider. I wonder how much the bootlegs would have gone for!

I'm very glad he had a change of heart and decided to carry on, even though John Bonham's death only a few years later would shelve Led Zeppelin for good. Robert Plant's song to his deceased son, All My Love is one of the prettiest songs Led Zeppelin songs I have ever heard and it becomes even more beautiful when you realize that this is not a run of the mill love song between a man and a woman, but an elegy to his son who spent such a short time on this earth.

My Top Five Led Zeppelin Songs (subject to change as I am still figuring them out!)

1. The Immigrant Song
2. Good Times Bad Times
3. Four Sticks
4. Misty Mountain Hop
5. All My Love