Review of Led Zeppelin's Physical Graffitti

Released 1975

"Down by the seaside
See the boats go sailin'
Can the people hear, oh
What the little fish are sayin'
Oh, oh, the people turned away
Oh, the people turned away"

I'm stepping temporarily back, out of my chronological retelling of my first encounters with classic prog albums, to about eighteen months before University, to include Physical Graffiti. There is some logic to this. Before leaving for University, I spent an inordinate amount of time transferring a few dozen of my favourite vinyl records to a large pile of C90 cassettes. I'm fairly certain my entire Led Zeppelin collection (excluding In Through The Out Door) travelled with me.

My interest in Percy and Co was born out my adolescent predilection for classic rock music. In my mid-teens, I saw Led Zeppelin as predecessors of ACDC and Whitesnake et al, rather than contemporaries of Pink Floyd and Genesis. As such, I suppose I had more affinity with Black Dog and Heartbreaker than with Misty Mountain Hop or No Quarter. That's not to say that I didn't enjoy the more mellow or experimental moments, just that I had yet to develop my love of prog and didn't recognise the less metallic tracks as 'progressive'.

It wasn't until I sat in my room at University a couple of years later, with my headphones, metaphorically hunched over Descartes, that I listened with a more mature comprehension of Led Zeppelin's legacy.

I think I requested Physical Graffiti as a birthday present. Either way, I recall being mightily impressed with the package. I was fortunate enough to have a vinyl copy with the original artwork: it had the holes in the outer sleeve windows, with the various window dressing graphics on the inside sleeve. I loved the drama of the actual Swan Song label on the record itself. So much so that I had a tee-shirt made up replicating it at some point.

By the time Led Zeppelin's only double studio album was added to my shelves, I already owned all the preceding albums and was intimately familiar with every nuance of the band's infamously debauched career and discography. Thus I had already invested this record with great importance, and, like many coveted albums, actually put off my first listen to the record both for the fear of disappointment and the knowledge that you can only play a record for the first time once. It had be right. Funny, I still feel that way now.

One of my preconceptions about this record was that it was their 'serious' album. After all, it was a huge behemoth of a record across four sides with a number of lengthy prog-tastic workouts.

From the first notes of Custard Pie, I knew two things: firstly that I was going to love it in its entirety and that this was a wonderfully produced album. Although many will cite the recording techniques on their fourth album as revolutionary, have you ever heard a more authentic drum sound? Perfect. It was obvious that the band had reached the peak of their powers as a very tight cohesive unit.

The Rover feels like an instant classic from the first listen, with a outrageously catchy riff and Percy expounding his hippy: "If we could just join hands" lyrics, reminiscent of much of the fourth album.

If push came to shove and I had to nominate my favourite Led Zeppelin track, it would be In My Time Of Dying. Although prog purists may argue that it is too heavily stepped in the blues to be prog, I would counter claim that it qualifies on the strength of the musicianship alone. I find it utterly hypnotic, not least for Mr Bonham's contribution: there appears to be a form of telepathy enabling him to mirror Pagey's riffing and soloing so precisely. Remember this was in the days when many bands recorded live, without multi-tracking. I'm not saying that it wasn't tweaked on the mixing desk, but having read copiously about the session in question and from the unintentional sound effect at the end of the song, I am continually stunned by what is, in effect a live performance.

Houses of The Holy sounded as though it could quite easily have slotted onto the album of the same name. It may not be a highlight of the album, but this is largely due to the high quality of it's accompanying tracks.

I loved Trampled Under Foot, having heard it for the first time on a re-run of The Old Grey Whistle Test, it's defining moment being a sterling JPJ keyboard solo. Gorgeous.

I believe that I may be in the minority in that I think Kashmir is overrated. I don't think it is a bad song. Clearly it isn't, but it has yet to 'click' for me, despite several hundred plays. Sorry.

Physical Graffiti is nicely balanced in that the first two sides are predominantly more rock orientated while the second two have more acoustic, mellow, stoned and chilled out vibe. Man.

In The Light begins with another JPJ keyboard theme, this one being eerily like being stalked on a nocturnal walk on a rainy foggy night. Bron-Yr-Aur is very Led Zeppelin III; brief, acoustic and beautiful. The slide guitar of Down By The Seaside and the lazy dragged out beat for the first part of the song again maintains the summery hippy feeling. It is easy to picture Percy doing his teapot impression in the studio to this one. I love the tempo change in the middle of the song. The intonation of "You still do the twist...etc" is perfect archetypal rock vocal phrasing. Again, perfect.

The mellow feel continues with Ten Years Gone built around a very MOR guitar solo from Jimmy and a lovely echoey drum sound with fast / slow passages. Night Flight ups the pace somewhat with spirited Pyrex-shattering delivery from Robert and an irresistible start / stop drum motif: both deeply bluesy and highly individualistic at the same time.

The fourth side of the record is probably the weakest. The Wanton Song starts it off pleasantly enough with a very aggressive guitar sound, flushed with sustain and feedback, but Boogie With Stu is execrable nonsense. Both Black Country Woman and Sick Again have their moments, but, personally I usually start to get itchy fingers over the eject button by this stage in proceedings.

It's a shame that the ending isn't great, as the remaining eighty percentage of the album is unrelentingly excellent.

It may be because the are both weighty double albums purported to the pinnacle of their respective artists careers, but I think of Physical Graffiti in much the same way as Pink Floyd's The Wall: I have a huge amount of respect for both, but I play them less often than other albums in their band's discography's. However when I do, I always do so with great admiration for the breadth of the music and the brilliant inventiveness therein.