Led Zeppelin
The English rock band that built the template for hard rock and heavy metal, then spent a decade proving how much more the form could hold. Formed in London in 1968 from the ashes of the Yardbirds, Led Zeppelin paired guitarist Jimmy Page's studio craft with Robert Plant's banshee wail, John Paul Jones's musicianship, and John Bonham's thunderous drumming into the heaviest and most inventive band of the 1970s. Across eight studio albums — Led Zeppelin, Led Zeppelin III, the untitled fourth album, Houses of the Holy, Physical Graffiti, and more — they moved from blues-rock through folk, funk, reggae, and Eastern modes without ever losing the weight that defined them, all while famously resisting the singles market that made most of their peers.
They were among the biggest-selling and most influential acts in the history of recorded music, with worldwide sales estimated at 200 to 300 million records. The band ended abruptly in December 1980, dissolving within months of John Bonham's death at 32, the surviving members unwilling to continue without him. Inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995, Led Zeppelin remain the measure against which heavy rock is still judged, their catalog as widely studied and imitated today as it was the day the band walked away from it.
Articles on Led Zeppelin
Led Zeppelin – In My Time of Dying (Live at Earls Court 1975)
Eleven Minutes About Dying, Sung Three Months Before the Crash That Almost Made It Prophecy
Led Zeppelin – Achilles Last Stand (Live)
When Zeppelin Tried To Outrun The Thunder
Led Zeppelin – Since I’ve Been Loving You (Live at Madison Square Garden 1973)
A Slow Blues in C Minor That Took Led Zeppelin Longer to Record Than Any Other Track on the Third Album — and That Jimmy Page Finally Captured the Guitar Solo for on an Unplugged Amplifier He Found Outside the Studio. Three Years Later, the Cameras at Madison Square Garden Filmed It for The Song Remains the Same.
Led Zeppelin – The Song Remains the Same
Led Zeppelin – Dazed And Confused (Live)
Led Zeppelin – Trampled Under Foot (Live at Earls Court 1975)
The Groove Stevie Wonder Started and Led Zeppelin Finished — Live at the Peak of Everything
Led Zeppelin – Rock And Roll (Live at Knebworth 1979)
Led Zeppelin – Whole Lotta Love (Live at The Royal Albert Hall 1970)
Led Zeppelin – Stairway To Heaven (Live at Earls Court 1975)
Plant's Hand Wrote The Words Before His Brain Knew What Was Happening
Led Zeppelin – Kashmir (Live at Knebworth 1979)
A song with nothing to do with Kashmir, no chorus, no resolution, and an orchestra Led Zeppelin had to rent for the session — performed in 1979 at the last UK shows the four of them would ever play, and finally — 46 years later — released as an official single.
Led Zeppelin – Black Dog (Live at Madison Square Garden 1973)
The Song That Let Silence Do the Heavy Lifting
Led Zeppelin – Immigrant Song (Live 1972)
A civil-servant strike nearly cancelled their Reykjavík show — the makeshift concert the students threw together instead gave rock one of its greatest war cries.