November
8th marks the 50th anniversary of the release of Led Zeppelin’s
eponymous fourth album, alternately known as Led Zeppelin IV or
sometimes “ZOSO” in reference to the mysterious symbol used by Jimmy
Page for the album graphics. It remains the group’s most critically and
commercially successful album, being home to what has become their
“signature” song, Stairway to Heaven.
With the somewhat
lukewarm & dismissive critical response to Led Zeppelin III, which
is MY personal favorite of their canon, Jimmy Page determined to stick
it to the critics a bit by making it deliberately difficult to reference
the new album by virtue of the fact it technically has no title. Even
down to the album graphics on the cover, there’s virtually no
information present anywhere. This was a decision the band’s record
company resisted as much as they could, considering it commercial
suicide, but the band, by this point, had enough clout that they
stubbornly hung onto the master tapes until the label agreed to release
the album precisely according to the group's instructions. It’s a
decision vindicated by the successful mystique that ended up enveloping
them and the album in the wake of its release.
Musically, the
group found a relaxed retreat to record the bulk of the album when they
located production to the Headley Grange country house in Hampshire,
England. For recording, they rented the Rolling Stones mobile studio
facility. This setup allowed them to work out ideas in a loose,
improvisational manner where some compositions could arise out of
impromptu jam sessions. The result is an album that manifests
organically from the band members, who were able to contribute a wide
range of elements to the finished product beyond their established
roles. The album also features the extremely rare presence of guest
performers in the form of Fairport Convention vocalist Sandy Denny’s
contribution to The Battle Of Evermore and Rolling Stones pianist Ian
Stewart on "Rock and Roll".
The album has gone on to achieve
legendary status in the realm of classic rock, no doubt propelled to
astronomical heights thanks to Stairway to Heaven and its near
ubiquitous presence on FM radio over the past half century. Personally,
I find the song suffers from over exposure and overshadows a lot of
other great material that is contained on the album, but you can’t
really fault the band for their success. In a sense, this could be
considered the peak of their perfection as subsequent releases struggled
to live up to this level of achievement.
