Led Zeppelin: Classic Or Dud?

“Just goin out in mah wellies for a wee bit of tendin’ to the old flower patch it is, then playing with the band around 1700”

I read that Page somehow never saw Hendrix perform live. Part of me thinks that’s plausible — certain things just never aligned schedule/timing-wise — and part of me thinks that, with his arrogance, Page purposely avoided the guitarist that shocked and stunned all of his contemporaries into reevaluating their approaches.

Between the radio and being a professional musician I imagine it was impossible for page to avoid hearing Hendrix in the late 60s

Oh, I’m sure Page heard Hendrix on records and/or radio. But all of his musician peers (not limited to guitarists) saw him live. I can easily imagine Page wanting to sidestep an (ahem) experience so overwhelming as to make him possibly question his abilities.

Lemmy used to claim that early Hendrix UK shows were performed with a foot of water in front of the stage because all the preeminent guitar players came down to see him and cried through the whole set knowing they'd never be that good.

i was never a fan but i like the yardbirds alot!

A guitarist friend once commented to me that Page didn’t sound like he had any idea what he was going to play would sound like. And notwithstanding all the session work Page did (in which there was likely very little improvisation), I am inclined to agree. It’s been a while since I played it but you can’t listen to something like that solo in “Heartbreaker” and hear it as anything other than Page kind of fumbling his way from one series of licks and hand motions to the next. It gets by on sheer energy and has some charm but it almost falls apart about 5 times and at no point does Page sound even close to as in control as most of his contemporaries.

Incredible producer and songwriter. Innovator and iconic rock star. But pretty overrated as a soloist.

Yes and no... in live recordings, he sometimes sounds downright hamfisted. And yet, in the studio, he was often an absolute master of the form. His solos for songs like "Good Times, Bad Times", "Whole Lotta Love", "Black Dog" and "Stairway" certainly don't lack virtuosity or excitement.

Yeah come on, there are plenty of concise, well-crafted guitar melodies there, e.g. "Thank You", "Tangerine", "The Rover".

Youtube comments definitely show that a lot of people hear the "Heartbreaker" solo as something other than what you described btw! The second part, after the rhythm section joins, sounds like pretty tight blues-rock playing to me. The first unaccompanied section mostly sounds like it's about relative levels of space and activity - like Eliot Fisk, he sounds like he's pushing his technique past the point where he has total control in order to prioritize the level of intensity he's going for, which I kind of appreciate.

That's also what a lot of the live playing seems like to me.

I think the thing I would say about Page is that he is an extremely _sloppy_ player. And quite honestly, I don't think in this he's particularly different than Hendrix could be. You hear Hendrix at an event like... well, you can talk about the Winter Festival for Peace, or the notorious Scene Club '68 performance, but even something like Woodstock - Woodstock was an _extremely_ uneven gig for him. There were spontaneous moments of absolute brilliance and transcendence, like Villanova Junction, but there was also a lot of mediocrity packed into that set. I think that when you're constantly pushing yourself to the limit of what's possible, what happens is that you do wind up failing catastrophically, a lot of the time.

Also both of them were constantly high as fuck, which made it hard for them to perform consistently.

"I’m not a guitarist as far as a technician goes, I just pick it up and play it. Technique doesn’t come into it. "
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/the-durable-led-zeppelin-36209/

"Failing catastrophically a lot of the time" is an overstatement though imo (wrt both Page and Hendrix).

xp It's been a while since I've read up on Hendrix, but IIRC what was expected of him (like long and over-the-top jams) was a bit frustrating - like he didn't feel the need to do that all the time, but later on he did more of that knowing that's what a lot of concert-goers wanted to see, and he didn't think it made his concert performances all that consistent. I think breaking in new groups (Woodstock, New Year's at the Fillmore) probably contributed to the unevenness of those sets too, and it's implied Hendrix was fully aware this - it's a new group, he's consciously trying new things, it's not going to be an immaculate concert performance.

That's interesting - he felt commercial/social pressure to play long instrumental improvisations instead of shorter songs?

"Failing catastrophically a lot of the time" is an overstatement though imo (wrt both Page and Hendrix).

I guess it would depend on what you think their intentions were.

"Failing catastrophically a lot of the time" is an overstatement though imo (wrt both Page and Hendrix).

― No purposes. Sounds. (Sund4r)

Admittedly I'm holding them both to a lot higher standards than their audiences of the day did. But God, on audience Zep tapes of the day you can occasionally hear audience members muttering about how fucking bored they are when Page would decide to take the next 45 minutes to solo. He also had a nasty habit not knowing when to quit digging - witness the solo on Stairway at Led Zeppelin's last concert before Bonham's death. It's the longest Stairway solo on record, and it spends most of that time begging to be put out of its misery. Hendrix never bottomed out like that, but Hendrix also died really fucking young...

xxp I would say more social than commercial pressure. I imagine others get this impression too, but personal conflicts aside, he usually came off as a very congenial guy who genuinely wanted people at his shows to have a good time.

On Hendrix's Isle Of Wight set he said something like, "You still wanna hear all that old stuff? We're trying to get some new things together."

re: Page vs. Hendrix in terms of their relative "sloppiness," I hear Hendrix as focused, as constantly trying to outdo himself, and never completely satisfied. I don't get any of that from Page's live performances, for the most part (though there are exceptions). There aren't any Hendrix live recordings where I think, "Ugh, just finish the solo already!" I can't think of many Zep shows were I don't think that.

Page can sometimes be sloppy on stage, but that's partly because he's the only guitarist, and trying to replicate these intricate overdubbed arrangements by yourself live was probably an impossible task without a rhythm guitarist on hand to hold things down. If we're comparing to Hendrix, even on record Hendrix generally sounds like he does live, imo. But LZ in the studio is pretty different from LZ live, and of course that also comes down to Page's precision and attention to detail as a producer as well as player. In the studio, the "Heartbreaker" solo is probably the only time he ever comes to "sloppy."

True, I can't think of anything sloppy on record other than "Heartbreaker." While I definitely understand the difficulty of trying to replicate the arrangements onstage, I would point to the Who (because of course I would) and how they managed to perform Tommy live without multiple acoustic guitars or French horns or keyboards. Piano part? Have the bass play it. French horn part? Bass again. Electric guitar overdubbing acoustic? Let the bass handle the electric part. So I guess I'm saying that John Entwistle should've been in Zeppelin.

Bringing it back to Hendrix, by necessity he stripped down any studio arrangements for live performance, and obviously made it work (and, somehow, made it sound more expansive) since he was a simultaneous lead/rhythm player. Not taking anything away from Page's abilities, but he never had the focus on rhythm playing that Hendrix or Townshend had (same problem with Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton).

I mean, a lot of things are 'sloppy' by contemporary studio standards: that lead guitar on "Tangerine" doesn't quite sound in tune with the band, there's a lot of fret buzz etc on "Babe I'm Gonna Leave You", etc. Wrt the unaccompanied part of the "Heartbreaker" solo, though, I'm not even really sure how to gauge the 'sloppiness' - relative to what? He's not playing to a rhythm section, the time feel seems rubato even in the introductory slower parts and it's not like there's some definitive version that predates Led Zeppelin II that we can compare to.

I can't even count a regular time signature there. I always heard it as senza tempo so idk what "sloppy" means in that context. It's like saying Sonic Youth sing out of tune - out of tune with what?

Senza Tempo aka Chief Keef tempo

Maybe it only sounds "sloppy" because it sounds so live and spontaneous, very one-take. As opposed to the considered, specific nature of the band's other 99.99999% of recorded music, it sounds relatively loose and improvised, tentative and tossed off, though not in a bad way. Again, especially compared to a similarly gonzo solo like "Good Times, Bad Times," which is so precise and fussed over, "Heartbreaker" always reminds me of Nigel's clearly Page-inspired solo in "Spinal Tap" (though also not in a bad way).

The "Heartbreaker" solo always sounded to me like someone trying to show off their technical facility and dexterity and not really being able to pull it off. I don't get the sense that he's really trying to communicate anything beyond trying to show off his facility and dexterity, but I don't get that feeling from any other (studio) Page solo.

xxxxxxxp I actually have the transcript buried in a text file. It's been too long since I've seen the whole film, but here's what I have for that general section - FWIW, I'm at a loss as to whether he actually said came or if I'm misinterpreting it as something else.

"This is dedicated to Linda, to the cat right there with the silver face, dedicated to Kirsten, Karen, and that little four-year-old girl over there with the yellow balloon. I wanna say thank you for the last three years, one of these days we'll get together again. Thanks for showing up, you're outta sight.

"If you want the same old songs, we can do that. You all wanna hear all those old songs?"

"Damn, man, we're just trying to get some other things together. I just woke up about two minutes ago, was recording some little things but I don't think... I don't know...I think we'll play something a little more familiar. 'Cause I ain't came (?) yet myself, I don't know about you, but I ain't came (?).

"There I came (?). Thank you. Thank you for being so patient. Maybe one of these days we'll join again. I really hope so. All right."

So really, the difference is mainly that Page is more meticulous about what shows up on the record than Hendrix is. Hendrix's his best stuff is his often more spontaneous stuff (see for instance how most Hendrix fans prefer the sloppier mono version of "Red House" released in the UK to the US version). Yeah, I think it's fair to say that Hendrix was a more consistently great live performer than Page was. I do think that Page was a lot more accomplished and focused when it comes to the studio, though. Which makes sense - Hendrix got his chops playing in US touring bands, and Page established himself as a studio guitarist.

One of the great "what ifs" about Hendrix's death is his planned collaboration with Miles Davis - Miles was arguably making his last great records, so it's not a stretch to think it would've been amazing - but that's also a reflection of the kind of artist he had become. He was taking forever to make his records, partly from perfectionism but he was also recording endless variations of his new material - the fact that so much of it holds up as great listening probably shows how difficult it was for anyone to say "THIS is the one for the album." I never got the impression Page and Zeppelin was like that once they were in the studio - I think they recorded things more like the Beatles (or as composers, if that makes sense) rather than jazz musicians, and it's a big reason why there were able to be a bit more prolific than Hendrix when it came to finishing and releasing albums.

(the kind of artist Hendrix had become that is)

I should amend that, there are great tracks that Zep did make out of jams: "In My Time of Dying" for one (I think that was done in two takes). A few more famously came out of jams, but the final creation don't really seem like they were molded out of improvisations - IIRC "Rock and Roll" came out of a jam, but that's most a great riff repeated over a great homage to Little Richard's "Keep A-Knockin'."

hendrix faced a lot of problems as a recording artist due to contract issues as well. his perfectionism might possibly have been influenced by the lawsuit he was facing from the label he gave "band of gypsys" to, who then went on to sue him saying that it was a sub-par record. if every dollar you make from your record sales is tied up in lawsuits, and if actually releasing records only seems to multiply the lawsuits, what's the incentive to put out an album?

I've not much to add here beyond the fact that th first time I heard Heartbreaker (on the Remasters comps when they came out?) as a teenager me and all my reprobate friends burst out laughing at how shit it was. I've warmed to it a littl more since, but not much.

re: Hendrix’s studio perfectionism, he did put out three LPs in two years, one of them a double, so he was really only taking forever to make First Rays Of The New Rising Sun. And there were many reasons that took forever including, but not limited to, the fact that he was building Electric Lady Studio, his legal problems, and the necessity of gigging in order to finance his studio and his legal problems. The funny thing is, as much of a studio perfectionist as he was, that didn’t extend to recording the rhythm section. Charles Shaar Murray used Page/Zep as a comparison: why do the drums sound so amazing on Zep records but sound like an afterthought on some of Hendrix’s? He was never short of ideas, and was always impatient to record them (especially as he always had gigs breathing down his neck; he wanted to maximize his productivity in the studio) so I think it was, “Mics are on the drums? Good enough, let’s do this” in more than a few situations.

True, but the for the purposes of the topic at hand, I didn't think they refute the fundamental differences between Hendrix and Page in how they create their albums. The first is not the best example because it was the first album, so a lot of the process was planned to accommodate their miniscule budget, but regardless it was still done piecemeal over a pretty long time. The second album was kind of rushed along, and it's where the conflict between producer Chas Chandler and Hendrix really started to get bad, specifically because Chandler pushed back hard when Hendrix kept asking to record more takes - a LOT more takes. (Redding was vocally opposed to recording so many takes as well.) When it came time for the third album, Chandler eventually left the sessions for the same exact reason - too many takes, too much time being spent on the same material. (FWIW, while a double is nothing sneeze at, of the 16 tracks that made it, two are brief fragments, there are two versions of the same song - one of which is an extended live performance - and another was a single that had already been released nearly a year before. 12 brand-new, full-length songs isn't little either, but it's not a significantly large amount.)

I was a big Zep fan in high school, and have recently begun revisiting the band due to the 50th anniversary. I wasn’t much familiar with their bootlegs or live stuff back then, since it took too long on Napster and I didn’t have a guide as to what to seek out. (I had the BBC sessions and that was about it.) I’ve been listening to How the West Was Won and some boots and I have to agree re: the soloing. There’s always moments in a show when I’m in a groove and it just comes to halt thanks to a 5-10 minute solo break. It’s sacrilege but I usually just sample a minute or two, then skip ahead to when the song proper resumes. I’m just not a fan of that “deedly-deedly-deedly" proto-shredding style, I guess.

I was also big into Zeppelin when I was a teenager, and still love them. It struck me the other day, though, that I find myself listening much more often now to Queen.

I actually resisted Zeppelin when I was in high school. I'm not sure if I was oblivious to them before, but when I got to high school and was thrown into a bigger pool of students, it seemed like everyone was a fan. I didn't hate them - I just didn't think they were all that good for a number of reasons. Eventually I got IV and Remasters, but it wasn't until after college when I heard less of them and was away from classic rock radio that I put them on more and tried hearing what others did. I wouldn't say my reservations have completely gone away, but I do think they're a great band now and enjoy most of their stuff.

it's time for another one of these:

robert johnson's "crossroad blues" was further in the past for led zeppelin in 1970 than led zeppelin in 1970 is from us, and it's not particularly close

In all seriousness, it's a credit to Johnson that his works sounds so ancient and even mystical (for lack of a better word). When you listen to other great music recorded in 1936 - or better yet, not-so-great music that was simply popular in that day - it's like they're coming from different planets.

Presumably you've heard the most recent (c. 2011) remasters of the Johnson recordings — the "Centennial Collection"? The sound is unbelievably clear; you can hear his chair creaking on some tracks.

Yep, that's the one to get!

Are people really citing the Stairway to Heaven solo as an example of Page’s improvisational technique? Because every note of that was written out.

It’s not Zeppelin and admittedly it’s a low point but I always remember Page’s “solo” on Plant’s Tall Cool One as an example of how terrible of a soloist he could be when he wasn’t writing them beforehand (this one also sounds comped from a bunch of takes IIRC).

Solo on “Heaven Knows” is great

I just thought we were talking about solos, not improv specifically. Dude definitely isn't Django or Metheny when it comes to improvising "concise, well-crafted guitar melodies".

Although tbh I don't recall if the ones I mentioned were improvised or not. Acc to this, "Stairway" solo was also mostly improvised: https://www.guitarplayer.com/news/the-greatest-guitar-solos-of-all-time

Based on his live playing, I did just assume these were written out, though, and if he says otherwise, I'm not sure whether to believe him. I sort of like the doped-up rambling of some of the live stuff too, though.

What makes Zep's recorded output so great is that everything is so impeccably, perfectly arranged/played/produced, thought-out. That's what sets them apart from so many boring heavy blues rock bands of the '70s, and yeah, it's why that while some people no doubt love the epic improvised guitar/drum/organ solos of the live sets, I can't imagine anyone is listening to those live shows *for* those solos.

The line between writing and improvising a solo is murky when the soloist does multiple takes and/or punch-ins, as Page did.

What's the saying, composition is just very slow improvisation?

I've honestly never listened to any Zep outtakes. Are there any radically different versions of Page solos/takes? Or did he do multiple takes/punch-ins in pursuit of a set idea?

Bill Dixon said, "Composition is the assembling of musical materials into a new order; improvisation is the instantaneous realization of composition, without the benefit (or detriment) of being able to change or alter anything." He also said, "All music is improvised; you can't play the same thing the exact same way twice." That all works for me, to which I would add -- because what about samples? -- you can't play the same thing the same way, or in the same time/space, twice.