Can we talk about why Presence by Led Zeppelin is the best album ever made when you're actually listening to it, but it's easy to forget about when you aren't listening to it?

"Presence conveyed the sense of a band up against bad odds, fighting back. The opening two tracks, "Achilles Last Stand" (about the car accident) and "For Your Life" (about hell and drugs and terror, and about how life inside the band may have been developing), featured the best solos Page would ever play -- abstract, desperate, raging. "Presence was pure anxiety and emotion," Page said later. "We didn't know if we'd ever be able to play in the same way again. It might have been a very dramatic change, if the worst had happened to Robert. Presence is our best in terms of uninterrupted emotion."

Over the years, Presence hasn't sold as well as most of the band's catalog. It's more or less the forgotten album, its feelings are too hard, too intense and probably too insular to stay close to or very long. In effect, Led Zeppelin accomplished something akin to Eric Clapton's achievement on Derek and the Dominos' Layla: They forged the spirit and purpose of blues into a new form, without relying on blues scales and structures. Presence is clearly singular in Led Zeppelin's body of work, and it's likely the best album the band ever made.

"It was really like a cry of survival," Plant said. "There won't be another album like it, put it like that. It was a cry from the depths, the only thing that we could do."

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When I read that, I figured Gilmore was on crack and was just playing up the melodrama. Guess you had to be there to feel the intensity, because I don't remember any of the songs. I don't remember them being horrible, but just didn't leave an impression. But there are at least a couple people here who might agree with Gilmore to an extent.

I think with the exception of II, all the Zeppelin albums are inconsistent. I never understood what anyone saw in Physical Graffiti aside from "Kashmir" and "Houses of the Holy." So I'm open to hearing Presence again and entertaining the possibility that it's, like, their, um, fifth best. I'll pick up a used copy tomorrow.

"Achilles Last Stand" is absolutely incredible...my friends and i used to listen to that song for hours. "Tea For One," in my opinion, seems like a b-side to "Since I've Been Loving You," but a b-side that is just as enjoyable as the a-side.

Presence in its entirety would not be a good introductory album, but it is one of my top 5 Zep albums.

Think i'll give it a listen. It's been long enough.

If anyone here is old enough to actually remember this record when it came out in 1976 and can comment on the overall musical milieu it was born into, I'd love to hear about it.

i like their later period albums. prefer the vocals to plant in his supposed peak. he sounds like hes not trying so hard on presence. just relaxed. more like himself. and the riffs are still great. theres just an easier going charm about this era of led zep, you know theyre not trying so hard, have less to prove etc, but rather than = lazy, theres something appealing about them just doing what they do.

Surprised Bonham doesn't get more mention here. To me his drumming is on fire on this rek. That said, it's pretty much the case on everything. I love the guy to death.

When I did my Zep POX, I started from the premise of Presence + 3, then looked at the rest of the catalogue for songs strong enough to knock any of Presence's songs out. (My POX was 3 out of 10 Presence... before I managed to whittle it down, it was 5 out of 15 Presence.)

― truck-patch pixel farmer (my crop froze in the field) (Rock Hardy),

Took me a minute to decipher my own post there. But yeah, this is the absolute biznis, always will be to me.

My thoughts on Presence.

bringing this back up to the top for Sunday morning readers...

it's brilliant stuff, Marcello. Thank you for that. Still a huge fan of this, probably 3rd fave Zep record.. Bonham is so phenomenal on this, the whole thing does have that "room sound" that puts me in mind of what Albini strives for

also, as massive a Zep geek I am, did not know that bit about the Stones coming in for 'Black and Blue'!

seriously fantastic piece, Marcello

This isn't even LZ's best album but it's good enough for me.

Great post -- thanks! Very evocative -- I was instantly listening along in my head as you described sections.

As i said on twitter, an amazing piece of writing Marcello. kudos.

dude, marcello, A+. for real. and i hate everything and everybody! makes me want to work harder.

Presence is going on the turntable now.

Damn, that was a great piece.

that was great

(could do without the 'if you aren't feeling _____, you aren't really listening' tho)

http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/20668-presence-in-through-the-out-door-coda/

Anyone heard the new presence out takes "10 ribs and all?"

lol @ some corny Pitchfuxor giving Presence a 7.6 (and ranking ITTOD higher?!) -- it's better than 90% of the records on Best New Music

I guess 10 ribs will be available on Friday. Intrigued by the description of it as yacht rock and happy that's it's about 5 minutes long.

this album + headphones + weed could prevent (or at least postpone) a suicide

yes and the new pod song is great even if it's a pastiche

The opening chords sound like a sequence in the first track on the new Jim O'Rourke (who was just quoted praising Presence).

Anyone heard these remasters? Worth replacing my old LP copies (and 90s era CDs) for?

I have this semi-regular argument with my wife about how the 90s were the worst decade for mainstream rock, but listening to Presence again, so much of it sounds like a blueprint, it almost makes me want to reevaluate a lotta that bullshit: the obvious Stone Temple Pilots theft of the "For Your Life" riff, the double bass intensity on "Achilles Last Stand" that people think Metallica invented on "One," the "la la la" parts of "Hots On For No One" that invents Jane's Addiction, etc. I reckon any decade that could draw so much influence from this fucked up and amazing album can't be so bad.

I've mentioned before that "Achilles Last Stand" pretty much renders the Mars Volta's entire discography redundant.

the double bass intensity on "Achilles Last Stand"

That's a single bass drum. Bonham only played a double-bass setup once, on a demo of "Communication Breakdown" that was never released. Accounts vary, but supposedly either JPJ or Page felt that Bonham on a double-bass kit overwhelmed the rest of the band.

That's insane.

I guess, then, you could say "double bass-like intensity!"

My favorite moment on this record has always been the breakdown in "For Your Life" – the spectacularly overdubbed descending Page riff, Bonham's empty but relentlessly steady beat, Plant singing, "Do it! Do it! Do it! Do it! Do it when you wanna..." It's such a brilliant reminder of everything that made Zeppelin great.

That's insane.

I guess, then, you could say "double bass-like intensity!"

― Wimmels, Wednesday, 5 August 2015 15:26 (4 days ago) Permalink

Bonham had a notoriously fast right foot, however the kick hits on Achilles aren't really that rapid most of the time, it's sort of an aural illusion created by the interplay between the drums and JPJ's percussive bass part.

However "One" is an interesting touchstone to bring up, because the "DARKNESS/IMPRISONING ME" section definitely echoes the breakdown in Achilles.

Yeah, that's the part I was thinking of. It really didn't even strike me until recently.

Most insane drumming Bonham ever did: "Good Times Bad Times," especially during the "I sure do wish I was at home" part. Those bass drums you here are all his right foot!! I tried to play it myself, oh Lord how I tried.

Praising Bonham's drumming on tunes like "Good Times Bad Times" is kind of like that old SNL skit about Larry King's USA Today column where he spouts controversial observations like, "John McEnroe was a very good tennis player."

This is probably kind of a weedy thing to say, but it just occurred to me that Achilles Last Stand really is, like, their last stand. They just never go that hard again either for the rest of the record or on ITTOD.

Most insane drumming Bonham ever did: "Good Times Bad Times," especially during the "I sure do wish I was at home" part. Those bass drums you here are all his right foot!! I tried to play it myself, oh Lord how I tried.

― Mr. Snrub, Sunday, August 9, 2015 11:24 AM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

It is great, but I think there is plenty of competition for that. The one that always gets me is the breakdown in In My Time of Dying.

Yeah, that's the part I was thinking of. It really didn't even strike me until recently.

― Wimmels, Sunday, August 9, 2015 9:34 AM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

On that part it's actually just heavy snare hits combined with bass, the kick is only hitting a few times.

The triplet lick on For Your Life reminds me of Woody Woodpecker

ok this is the day I finally come to see Presence as a masterpiece. by all measures Page was smacked out during the making of it, but it concentrated the little attention he could manage, and so the result is intricate & alien. it's like the album art, with the odd black totem in otherwise normal settings. you could call Presence meat & potatoes rock, but you'd be ignoring its inhuman focus. in that way it's well paired with another masterpiece of 1976, Station To Station. you could call those albums anti-psychedelic, in that cocaine and heroin promote no journeys to the center of the mind, but in products of an artificial self-mastery they are psychedelic in their own way.

I like that take.

this is the realest math rock, both in that the rhythms are algebraic, and in that everything must be decoded.

Also, black magic.

a second name for the album could be, After Evil.

Euler did you read M4rc3ll0's excellent piece on Presence, linked up-thread? He too makes the connection with Station to Station.

I just did! I hadn't seen it before I thought of the Station to Station connection, but I'm gratified to read his nicely-worked out version as well.

Station to Station is a good comparison, there's also something about this record that is very spare and harsh, being the only Zep record that is all electric rock band;there's acoustic songs (or at least elements) on all the other records.

Also, black magic.

― Josh in Chicago, Friday, May 10, 2019 8:33 AM (three hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I read this initially as bleak magic, which I think you could also use to describe this record.

I have such a skewed view of this album cuz the first LZ I heard (aside from songs on classic radio) was a tape with IV and Presence on the flip side, so to me this just always been one of LZ's best records

I hadn't really read anything about the connection before, but The Crunge always made me assume they were James Brown fans.

it's been made many times -- Page and Plant mentioned it?

(not trying to dis you)

i fuckin love this album and this thread

This, Station to Station and Animals form some kind triptych of 70s anomie/awesomeness.

― 29 facepalms, Friday, May 10, 2019 2:18 PM (ten months ago) bookmarkflaglink

guess what also came out in 1976, that's right aerosmith's rocks

which "hots on for nowhere" kinda exists in the same universe of

The persistent avoidance of For Your Life, the dark center of this album and my favorite song from this release by some distance, renders this otherwise classic ILM thread less potent than it ought to be. Bonham is playing lead here and Plant is singing off him, his vocals are like fills, as the drums start, stop, rush, and swing. Structurally, the song is sneakily complex with five distinct parts—ABABCDCEAB—with the whole descending riff in the “Do it when you wanna” section a master class in tension and release as Bonham unveils a straight 4/4 beat while a chorus of Plants tease and coo over the top about the darkest cocaine hell I could imagine. Run-on sentences do not capture how much I admire this song.

Yes
And the off beat on the Do you Wanna section
Magic

still the greatest ilm thread

this album kinda terrifies me, putting me into a very weird mood right now

always