My Led Zeppelin expanded album compilations

While building my wife's appreciation for Zep, she discovered that her preference was largely for the early albums. When I asked her one time "What about 'Physical Graffiti'?", she replied with strong dislike. Knowing that half of the songs on 'Physical Graffiti' were leftovers from previous albums, I was curious to see how they might reintegrate on 'Led Zeppelin III', the untitled 4th album, and 'Houses Of The Holy'...and whether I could help change her perspective.

At the same time, I drew from "Coda" and a few other sources to round the discs out. My goal was to not shuffle the existing tracks form these albums...but to instead see what places these songs might be inserted to complement the vibe. There was no crossfading or messing with song content, though sometimes the lengths of gaps between songs were played with to improve the flow.

I'm extremely satisfied with the results, and I thought you might want to try them out for yourselves.

What follows are my playlists and rationale:

Led Zeppelin III

1. Immigrant Song
2. Friends
3. Celebration Day
4. Since I've Been Loving You
5. Out On The Tiles
6. Gallows Pole
7. Tangerine
8. That's The Way
9. Bron-Y-Aur Stomp
10. Poor Tom (from 'Coda')
11. Bron-Yr-Aur (from 'Physical Graffiti')
12. Hey Hey What Can I Do (from b-side of 'Immigrant Song')
13. Feel So Bad/That's Alright Mama (from grey sources)
14. Hats Off To (Roy) Harper

• Notes: It wasn't my plan to tuck these all at the end like bonus tracks, but they honestly fit best as a block after "Bron-Y-Aur Stomp". Continuing that softer rhythm, "Poor Tom" was a perfect insert. "Bron-Yr-Aur" gracefully slides in and out, and "Hey Hey What Can I Do" picks up gently before kicking in. The outtake "Feels So Bad/That's Alright Mama" is in much the same vein as "Hats Off To (Roy) Harper", but starts off much more gently, acting as a wonderful transition.

untitled 4th album

1. Black Dog
2. Rock And Roll
3. The Battle Of Evermore
4. Stairway To Heaven
5. Night Flight (from 'Physical Graffiti')
6. Misty Mountain Hop
7. Down By The Seaside (from 'Physical Graffiti')
8. Four Sticks
9. Going To California
10. Boogie With Stu (from 'Physical Graffiti')
11. When The Levee Breaks

• Notes: Side 1 of this album was too iconic to interfere with, though "Night Flight" works really well coming out of the end of "Stairway To Heaven". By the same token, "Night Flight"'s hard ending is the perfect lead-in to "Misty Mountain Hop". "Down By The Seaside" nicely brings down the dynamics while carrying forward Jonesey's electric piano. From there, we pick back up on the original album's sequencing, with "Four Sticks" and "Going To California". "Boogie With Stu" acts as a great prelude to "When The Levee Breaks", both for showing 2 dramatically different sides of the blues, and because "Boogie With Stu"'s drum pattern feels like a light demo of what's to come in "When The Levee Breaks".

Houses Of The Holy

1. The Song Remains The Same
2. The Rain Song
3. Over The Hills And Far Away
4. The Rover (from 'Physical Graffiti')
5. The Crunge
6. Houses Of The Holy (from 'Physical Graffiti')
7. Dancing Days
8. D'Yer Mak'er
9. No Quarter
10. Black Country Woman (from 'Physical Graffiti')
11. The Ocean

• Notes: The album plays as originally sequenced until the 4th track. From there, "The Rover" comes in as a heavier counterpart/response to "Over The Hills And Far Away". "The Rover"'s accentuated drum pattern is a precursor to the funky drums of "The Crunge", and that song's ending "Where's that confounded bridge?" creates the perfect opportunity to welcome "Houses Of The Holy" back into the album that bears its name. From there, the album plays as originally sequenced, through "No Quarter". The casual airplane conversation that precedes "Black Country Woman" then appears, and the overall casual song leads nicely into Bonham's spoken intro for "The Ocean".
  Studious folks will know that "Walter's Walk" was begun during the "Houses Of The Holy" sessions, however the final work done to it in before its inclusion on 'Coda' creates in a sound that, frankly, wouldn't ever blend with the remainder of these songs.

Physical Graffiti (condensed)

• Custard Pie
• In My Time Of Dying
• Trampled Underfoot
• Kashmir
• In The Light
• Ten Years Gone
• The Wanton Song
• Sick Again

• Notes: There's nothing done here except to lift out the earlier albums' leftovers, leaving an album comprised solely of the 1974 recordings that Robert Plant called "the belters".

With these 3 expansions and one contraction, each album now sits comfortably between 53-59 minutes. What was most interesting to me is how little was apparently done to mess with the leftovers that ended up on 'Physical Graffiti'...obviously a fair about of production was baked-in when they were recorded, but they don't sound like they were heavily modified when it came time to sequence them among the 1974 recordings.

Anyhow, that's the big post. Any feedback is always welcome.

 

That's a pretty awesome idea. I've also considered giving the IV & Holy outtakes back to their albums in my iTunes. I might just do it now based on your tracklisting.

 

I like this idea a lot. I too condensed PG down to the original 1974 tracks and IMO it MAY be Zep's heaviest LP. I like your Houses a lot too, and your IV looks good. I dont know about the III. I might totally alter everything after side 1.

Maybe for III I might open with HHWCID, and end with Gallows Pole, and mess with everything in between. I like how Pole fades away to nothing to end it all.

I actually think all of the Lp's are stronger, with the possible exception of IV> I would completely remove Hats OFF to Roy Harper from III, and Dyer Maker from Houses though, and I think it makes them even stronger.

PS> My girlfriend too has been REALLY getting into Zep and she is saying perhaps her fave is the condensed PG. She LOVES it

 

I broke the songs out to their respective albums a few years back and made cdr's. I used info from this site which has recording dates for most songs to re-order them correctly to their albums.

http://www.led-zeppelin.org/reference/discography/index.php?m=disc-studio

Make sure your pop-up blocker is turned off or down as this info only comes up in little pop-up windows. Click the [More Info] line to open the windows.

 

Great idea.

I did a similar thing with House of the Holy but I removed The Crunge and D'yer Maker to keep the album at around 45mins length so it would fit on vinyl.

Might try these tracklistings out myself.

 

On Youtube I like the live electric version of Gallows Pole and Four Sticks from Coppenhagan 1971.Those awful quality recordings would be at the end of Zep IV for me.

I still like to play The Zeppelin crop circle box and 1993 II on shuffle mode in any order.

 

I like what you've done here.

You did not address what to do with "We're Gonna Groove", but I think that is fitting because there really isn't any place on III where it would work. (It barely works on Coda.)

The condensed PG is the best music Zeppelin ever recorded, IMO.

 

Wasn't that recorded during the LZII sessions?

I really like this idea. I'm gonna put these comps on my Ipod for my walks!

 

I like it , lets have a new box set 'Zepthology' , {mastered by Steve of course}. With 'Jennings Farm Blues' squeezed in there somewhere too http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xS3-_Xb3DOc

 

Love it!

 

I think "We're Gonna Groove" is the live Royal Albert Hall version from 1970 with overdubs added by Page later for Coda.

 

Correct. Video and original audio is on the Led Zeppelin DVD, which really lets you hear how much monkeying Page did to it (guitar overdubs/replacement, cutting out the middle "groove" in favor of a much later solo, etc) for use on 'Coda'. Besides the fact that sonically it would never blend in, I didn't want to include a live recording.

 

I did a similar thing with those albums, on LZ3 i crossfaded Friends into Bron-yr-aur which worked pretty well as they're in the same key. On HOTH I played around with the track order a bit ending Side one with The Rain Song which closes well. I think The Crunge and D'yer maker would have been better IMO on PG as the double album can weather those tracks a bit better than a single album...

 

'Baby Come On Home' can also be added to LZ I.

 

Cool idea...I'm digging the condensed PG!

 

In The Evening
South Bound Saurez
Ozone Baby
Fool In The Rain
Hot Dog
Carouselambra
Darlene
Wearing And Tearing
All My Love
I'm Gonna Crawl

 

I've always said that fans often do a better job compiling things than the labels do and this is another good example.

 

Fans often do a better job than the band. Why oh why did they feel the need to put "The Crunge" on HOTH?? "Dy'er M'ker" is a catchy song at least.

 

Agree
"The Crunge" makes me think....Why?????????

 

Anyone ever notice that Bonham plays the same drum fill in both "Stairway to Heaven" (6:21-6:24) and "Night Flight" (2:55-2:58)

 

Good point.

This is one of the reasons that I don't try to extract from Coda too much. "Poor Tom" still blends in with III just fine, but the rest of it doesn't belong anywhere.

I tried adding "Ozone Baby", "Darlene", and "Wearing And Tearing" to ITTOD. It doesn't work. They don't have the same feel. I don't know why. They just don't.

As you mentioned, "Walter's Walk" doesn't really fit on HOTH and the rest of songs don't come from album sessions (again, "Poor Tom" notwithstanding).

I kept wanting to extract from Coda, but it is really a stand-alone, for better or worse.

 

thats pretty cool...but i listen to the albums on vinyl...not cd..so im screwed..

 

Thats a good idea. I will definitely try that.


Physical Graffiti (condensed)

Custard Pie (4:13)
In My Time Of Dying (11:04)
Trampled Underfoot (5:37)
Kashmir (8:32)
The Crunge (3:17)
In The Light (8:46)
D'yer Mak'er (4:23)
Ten Years Gone (6:32)
The Wanton Song (4:07)
Sick Again (4:42)

Under 62 mins so a little bit light for a double album. Okay for cd length. Not 100% on the track order though.

 

I've gone back to the comps I did where I tried to re-order them as if they had originally released them with slightly different tracks so not really going over 45 minutes.
I think LZ4 is great and strong, I think the only two which need any fiddling about are LZ3 and HOTH.

I have come up with this for LZ3;

Side One
Immigrant Song
Out on the tiles
Poor Tom
Hey hey what Can I do
Since I've been loving you
Side Two
Friends
Bron Yr Aur
Tangerine
That's the way
Gallows Pole
Bron y aur stomp

Getting rid of 'Celebration day' and 'Hats off' adding in 'Poor Tom', 'Hey Hey..' and 'Bron Yr Aur', I think it makes side two stronger and more unified and the same for side one which ends on an epic (Like on LZ4). The transition from 'Friends' into 'Bron yr aur' is good as they're in the same key. Bron y aur stomp ends the album on a high jovial note

And for Houses of the Holy;

Side One
The Song remains the same
Over the Hills and Far away
Dancing Days
The Rain Song
Side Two
Houses of the Holy
Black Country woman
No quarter
The Ocean

I think ending Side one with an epic again sounds good but also balancing it up with 'Dancing Days' as a more lighter one - thought tracks 2 and 3 could be swapped as required, they're all (2,3 and 4) in the same key so all work very well together. 'Houses of the Holy' is a good side two opener and then drifts nicely into 'Black Country woman', i've always thought of this as a very 'summery' album so wanted to get more songs of that vibe onto it. Though 'The Rover' also comes from these sessions and is very good I think it is too heavy to go on the album and still sounds better on Physical Graffiti.

Then PG could stay as it except adding in 'The Crunge' and 'Dyer Maker' which both would work better in my opinion on here where the sprawl of a double album allows these tracks to work, rather like 'Boogie with stu' works there better rather than if it had been on LZ4.
I think 'The Crunge' sounds good when put at the start of 'Side 2' of PG replacing 'Houses of the Holy', because then it goes straight into 'Trampled Underfoot' - so you get two funky songs in a row and it kind of works!
'Dyer maker' could also sit well on Side 4 with the sort of odd tracks on there - anyway I know they didn't do any of this but I thought it made sense to me...!

 

(Unpopular opinion alert)
Celebration Day always sounded like one of the stronger songs IMO.I understand Hats Off To Roy Harper isn`t a popular tune but I really like it quite a bit and could never get rid of it.Hey Hey What can I Do and Bron Y Aur Stomp are about my two least favorite Zeppelin tunes ever recorded along with Babe Come On Home & Hot Dog and maybe Darlene.