You define the criteria. Just pick the album from Led Zeppelin you think is best. I did this one slightly different, the catalogue is small for Zep so I went with the original 10 classic albums.
If this remains popular, I’m going to do some other discographies.
So I have 4 favorite groups. Pink Floyd, Yes 6, Led Zep and The Beatles. I started with the most obscure one by far. Yes Pink Floyd has almost twice the votes in 1 day vs 2 days for Yes. Pretty much what I expected.
This one’s a bit harder, as I’m not that much of a Led Zeppelin fan, and there are only a few of their songs that I really like, and they are distributed across several albums.
I’m divided between Led IV for “When the Levy Breaks” and Physical Graffiti for “Kashmir”. I guess “Stairway to Heaven” makes it break for PG, as I actually really dislike that song(and honestly that may just be because of how massively overplayed it is, not anything wrong with the song itself).
I do think Kashmir is their best song. But they have many great songs. None is bigger than Stairway, possibly the biggest Rock song of them all, but biggest doesn’t have to mean best.
Hell, I still get excited every time I hear Immigrant Song. But When the Levee Breaks is incredible. The Rain Song is a top rock ballad. I do think hearing Battle Evermore rolling right into Stairway is a pairing on par with We Will Rock You and We are the Champions. But that might play to my Middle-Earth fanaticism.
Moby Dick shows why Bonham was/is so respected as a drummer.
Babe I’m Gonna Leave You you be the greatest song most groups had. It is so awesome and from their first album. It starts soft and builds up to an incredible level but then back to soft for interludes. I mean the song might be the first Heavy Prog song, if that is even a thing.
One of my favorites is Gallows Pole, I’ve heard older versions, but they made it their own.
Ramble On, Dazed and Confused and Communication Breakdown are so great. But Whole Lotta Love might be the best song on Zep 1.
I went with LZ II. That’s the one that i would get the most enjoyment listening to from start to finish. Plus The Lemon Song is just one of my favorite jams.
As a whole, it has to be IV. I know it’s the boring, obvious choice, and I probably don’t need to ever listen to that album again as it’s engrained in my brain, but it clearly IV for me. (And I don’t even like “Stairway to Heaven” – I skip over it most of the time these days if I happen to be listening to this album.)
After that I would probably go with the under-appreciated III.
Second album I ever bought was IV, and I still think it’s the best of them.
This reminds me of when someone ran a poll on the Dope that asked “Who is your favorite character on The Wire besides Omar?” Sometimes there is an obvious favorite, even if it won’t be unanimous.
If the question had been what is your second favorite Led Zeppelin album, I would have been torn between Led Zeppelin II and Houses of the Holy. Probably the former.
The first six Led Zep albums are all almost flawless, the only other band that had such a run with their first six albums are the Byrds. So it’s hard for me to make a choice, but my dearest of the bunch is III. Every song on it has its own mystique, and I like the contrast between the electric hard rock side A and the folksy side B.
nods * I went with Physical Graffiti but would have gone LZ IV as second choice and on a different day might have voted the other way around. I don’t like side 2 of LZ IV as much as side one.
I didn’t vote. I got lots of Zep music, but its all from compilations/hits albums. I can’t honestly say I know what albums have what on them. I guess you could say I’m just barely a fan.
