“Listening to this takes me back to my old bedroom in my parents’ house. Slipping the record out of its rather naughty cover of naked children, placing needle to groove and getting my head blown off. In a good way. . It’s a mixed bag, as most Led Zeppelin albums are, with the heavy rock number: The Song Remains The Same; the amplified pastoral folk: The Rain Song written by Page in response to George Harrison’s complaint that they never wrote any ballads (the first two chords are the same as his Something); the playful jams: The Crunge and the rifftastic The Ocean; the potentially dubious foray into reggae: D’Yer Mak’er (as in Jamaica, get it?); the radio-friendly single (in the US only) Dancing Days; and then the classic Zeppelin epic: No Quarter. . As a wide-eared fifteen year old I absolutely loved D’Yer Mak’er (the drums! the drums!) and think it ranks with When The Levee Breaks for archetypal Bonzo drums. I still do love it, and The Crunge for its James Brown “where’s that confounded bridge” take off. Listening to it 33 years later, I probably appreciate The Rain Song a lot more; Page’s guitar work, and its delicate build up before reaching catharsis at 5 mins into a 7 min song. . Over The Hills And Far Away manages to encompass all these traits in one song: the folk rock, the heavy chords, Plant’s distinctive wailing a solid rhythmic foundation from Bonham and Jones. This has also grown on me over the years. What the album doesn’t contain, is a song called Houses of the Holy, you have to wait for Physical Graffiti, released two years later, for that to appear from these studio sessions. , One of the other things I remember loving about this album when I first bought it, is that it contained the lyrics for every song – their only album to do so. The way they are laid out on the sleeve looks like concrete poetry. And perhaps in a way it is.” . #ledzeppelin @ledzeppelin #housesoftheholy #thesongremainsthesame #noquarter #therainsong #vinyl #recordcollection #nowplaying #randomrecordreview https://www.instagram.com/p/CCHZRfaJIC_/?igshid=ta74ub1c4a78
