Conflicted about Zep?

I think I understand what you mean and tried to address it in my own way with my last post. I think some things just seem cheesy when you are looking back at them years later. I do think we have grown so cynical that it would be hard for a band to be like Led Zeppelin was. They were completely into it. Nowadays, we'd be worried about how silly we looked.

I think twenty five years from now, people will look back and say how stupid we dressed in 2013.

I've tried, but I can't find any conflict with the music itself.

Okay, I do have one thing. What was the deal with Jimmy Page's duck mouth? lol

 

On a good to great night 1970-1975, they could destroy or at least stand toe to toe with any band.......ever.

 

That was cool...man...the duck face, not the duck walk..

 

Led Zeppelin was still huge well into the 80s...at least where I grew up.

 

Yes, I've always been a little conflicted about Led Zeppelin. In fact, I would go so far as to (here we go!) consider them possibly the most overrated classic rock band in some respects...but that's just my opinion of course. There are three or four studio albums I really love and the rest I could take or leave. Zeppelin were certainly a powerhouse live up through around 1972; then the drugs and groupies got to their collective brains. Listening to some of the live shows from 1975 and 1977 is sometimes painfully boring but there were still moments of brilliance. I mean, it's incredibly cool that the last night of the LA Forum run from 1975 that "Dazed and Confused" ran for about 45 minutes but then you add a 20 minute drum solo, a 20 minute keyboard solo and a 15 minute guitar solo and you just wish they'd play the damn songs sometimes!

What I'm saying is that so many bands were tagged self indulgent in the 70s but to my mind, Zeppelin could be the most indulgent band of all. Don't get me wrong. Led Zeppelin were a great band. But the fact that they are considered among the elite class like The Beatles, The Stones and Bob Dylan and way above the likes of Sabbath, Purple, Yes, Jethro Tull...I can't make sense of that.

 

I think this is very true. There was no irony in the Zeppelin live act. But now we live in an ironic age where it's easy to poke fun at Plant's "golden god" stage persona, or Jimmy's satin dragon-embroidered jumpsuit. But you're right, they were completely into it.

 

As a rule, I am no great fan of extended solos of any kind in rock music, but I make an exception for Zep. Once they got over Page's finger problems in the earliest leg of the '75 tour, they were pretty consistently great night in and night out on that tour, in my opinion. Even in '77 they were far better in concert than received opinion would have you believe.

 

Nice, I think I got a rosary.....

Hope your parents didn't read the lyrics to "sick again" or you would have been marched off to confession!

 

Roger Daltrey and members of AC/DC used to criticize Zep in the music press for similar reasons. Roger said he didn't see Zep as competition cause the Who can play about four or five songs in the time Zep spend on one solo at live shows and Angus Young and Bon Scott said that it's rediculous that people think Zep are the best rock band when they don't even really rock out till the last half hour of their show "and even then, it's just on the covers of old rock and roll songs they do during Whole Lotta Love. That's sick."

 

They didn't have a clue

 

Given the extended jamming that you can hear on, say, "My Generation" from Live at Leeds, that sounds sort of like a case of the pot calling the kettle black.

 

Not really, Driver 8. Even the longest live versions of My Generation and Magic Bus are still shorter than the shortest live versions of Dazed and Confused.

 

I've been a fan before I saw them live in 1969...no conflict there..I have room for endless amounts of my musical likes...the corridors of files will never spill over!

 

So were we.

 

There was most likely a lot of envy in play when these statements were made.

 

Not to me it isn't. Out of the 1st 6 albums, this one places last with me.
My personalranking :

2nd album
3rd album
1st album
Houses Of The Holy
Physical Graffitti
4th album

 

If you don't think there's anything to be conflicted about, why post in this thread? The OP made the parameters pretty clear...

 

Conflicted in the form of a question can be answered both ways, this is a discussion forum and I do not consider my response thread crapping, maybe other do.

PS: It's always nice to provide a full quote, as I explained myself in my post.

 

You could say Pink Floyd's iconic status treads a similar path ....... Their appeal to the majority of the masses out there hinges on probably only 3 - 4 albums in their entire catalog.
But, you combine that with a live presence that becomes an event in itself and you have an awesome one/two punch.

 

It's not, but wish somebody would threadcrap or troll, just to liven things up a bit.

 

Fair enough! What is the point of this thread! Well, with most bands, I either enjoy them enough to listen
or I don't. period. But often with this band I am compelled to listen to tracks that make me wince!!!
What is that about? Well for one thing it's unusual. That's why I brought it up.

Let me give a few examples of the kind of thing I'm talking about, just off the top of my head.

A number of posters have admitted they like Zep IN SPITE OF Plant's singing. Let's consider
Plant for a moment: On the one hand, I (not speaking for anyone else) don't understand how
it is possible to "like Zep" EXCEPT for Plant. Plant's contribution, for better or worse. is
definitive. The sound of the band is essentially, the sound of Plant interacting with Page.
Replace Plant with anyone else and the band has changed so substantially as to be unrecognizable.
Take the one hit, Whole Lotta Love. Replace Plant and the track is unimaginable. Yet, it's true,
on paper at least, he is no singer at all! My whole idea of a singer is an interpreter of lyrics.
But, even in those cases where I think Plant is absolutely perfect (and there are many such cases)
his singing doesn't compel me to pay attention to what he's saying!!! (???) . I can recite the entire
lyric to every Beatle song. It's just my nature to pick up and remember lyrics of songs I love. It just
happens, with no effort from me, if I hear the song more than twice. But with Zep, I haven't a clue
what the lyrics are, even in the cases of tracks I love! ...... I've never heard them!
Plant's singing, when I like it, compels me to listen to HIM but not to
what he's saying!! What is that!! So I would think I would hate Plant. But the fact is I think in
many cases he is perfect. Whole lotta love is a good example. Of course, you may not like the track,
but if you do, there is no denying that an essential part of what you like is Plant's over-the-top bombast.
I hear his singing like I hear an instrument like a trombone, just expressive noise. Weird!
It seems to give the track, and Page's guitar specifically, just what it needs.

Let's go another way. Consider Zep VI, Physical Graffitti. Now the story on that one, the double,
is that they didn't intend a double at all, but a single l.p. They went in and recorded 8 tracks. Perfect.
But the tracks were too long, totalling about 55 minutes. Too long for vinyl. One option would have been
to edit the tracks down to a more serviceable 40 minutes. But apparently that option was not entertained.
The tracks were DONE. So instead, Page took the outtakes from the previous three l.p.'s and added them
to the roster to fill out a two record set. Now here's my take on all this. On the one hand, those eight tracks show real growth from the two previous records, which I love. But, on the other hand they are just too ****ing long! Jeez! They go on and on and any energy and interest they initially build just gets bled out. I hold if that if they'd taken just the eight new finished tracks and edited them as described and put it out as a single, it would today be considered their best record, their "masterpiece".

No one might agree, but I know this is how I feel because I've done it. I've taken those 8 tracks originally recorded for Graffiti, and painstakingly edited them down to about 40 minutes and to my ears
what I get is the ultimate Zep. Here is what I think is the strangest thing of all. The longest track of them
all is In My Time Of Dying. It has this simple blues riff that just repeats endlessly for what is it, 11 minutes?
Except for 15 or 20 seconds in he middle where Page breaks things up by rocking out a little. and yet,
I find this Zep at its most listenable! The only thing I edited out in that case is the 15 or 20 seconds where
Page tried to liven things up (spare me!) Now, even I think that's weird. The rock version of a meditation record???

Here's my point. I obviously really really loved those eight tracks to bother to go to all that trouble.
But, on the other hand, I obviously really really hated those tracks to bother to go to all that trouble......
......... to FIX them!

See what I mean? What do I feel about Zep? They are the wonderful band that constructed the
tracks. AND they are the idiots that spoiled them with their what? laziness? self-indulgence? lack
of discipline? ...................................

 

No, they don't. Most new "rock" bands look rather sad and ridiculous. No danger. No sex appeal. No balls. No rock. Either they have crap style, no style or one that has already been dated by decades. They rip off the past, but generally get it all wrong.

Not only don't they take themselves that seriously, they don't even take music that seriously!

Or songwriting.

Or musicianship.

The difference between bands like Led Zeppelin and a lot of modern bands is: P#ssy backstage vs. p#ssies onstage.

 

No conflict here....never liked 'em.

 

Maybe not. But in recent years if feels over the top (ie: Get the Led out radio show, being called the Beatles of the 70's, etc.) that wasn't around in the decade post LZ's break up.

 

Just to add, rock critics weren't big supporters of the band, when they were current. Now, many of them act as if they were there all along.