If the music scene today should teach us anything, it would be
\nto appreciate artists that take risks. Now don’t get me wrong –
\nsuch bands still exist today, but it seems to me that quotient is
\nnoticeably lower. One doesn’t hear Britney Spears or 50 Cent go out
\non a limb and completely redefine his\/her sound. Thank God bands
\nlike Led Zeppelin did.<\/p>\n
Zeppelin’s first two albums were absolute monsters; it’s hard to
\nthink of a better one-two punch than those two works. That is why
\nIII<\/i> doesn’t get as much respect as it should. How could it
\npossibly follow the previous two masterpieces? But Zeppelin, in
\ntheir own way, went out on a limb and laid the foundation for
\nfuture albums. I daresay
\nIII<\/i> has more in common with
\nIV<\/i> and
\nHouses Of The Holy<\/i> than
\nI<\/i> and
\nII<\/i> do.<\/p>\n
It was here on
\nIII<\/i> that Plant, Page, Jones, and Bonham began to experiment
\nwith different sounds and styles. One can hear the seeds of
\n“Kasmir” being planted with “Friends.” The abstract, distorted
\neclecticism of “Hats Off To Roy Harper” would be focused into “When
\nThe Levee Breaks.” The problem is that these first efforts don’t
\nmeasure up to their successors. “\u2026Roy Harper,” has always
\nbeen one of my least favorite Zeppelin tracks; I hear it as the
\nband saying, “this proves we’re really serious musicians willing to
\nexplore.” That sentiment should be conveyed subtlety, not
\nscreamed.<\/p>\n
Where Zeppelin really shows off their “maturity” is on the
\nsecond half of the album, with the acoustic numbers. “Gallows
\nPole,” “Tangerine,” “Bron-Y-Aur,” and “That’s The Way,” are more
\neffective than anything else on
\nIII<\/i>, save the classic “Immigrant Song.” I would argue that
\nthe acoustic guitar, banjo, and mandolin used on “Gallow’s Pole” is
\none of Zeppelin’s finest moments. Not many rock bands would take
\nthe initiative and create such unique sounds. “Bron-Y-Aur” gets in
\nyour head and doesn’t leave for a long time. Both “Tangerine,” and
\n“That’s The Way,” are touching, with the former invoking a country
\nvibe that is quite refreshing, and the latter with some gentle
\npedal steel guitar that simmers underneath the main track.<\/p>\n
\nLed Zeppelin III<\/i> easily gets my recommendation; I mean, with
\nthe exception of one album, their entire catalogue is stellar. What
\nit comes down to is how does it stack up with their absolute
\ngreats? I’m going to come down more on the glass-half-full side of
\nthings. Yes, the band would take what went right on
\nIII<\/i> and run with it, but the actual quality of the music
\nremains high. Just think if Zeppelin hadn’t gone this route, who
\nknows what they would have sounded like. We could have ended up
\nwith 5 or 6 clones of
\nLed Zeppelin II<\/i>. However, Page and co. took a chance, and it
\npaid off handsomely.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":25116,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[5700],"rating":[5617],"class_list":["post-38476","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-led-zeppelin","rating-rating-b-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38476","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38476"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38476\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=38476"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=38476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}