LED ZEPPELIN

Led Zeppelin's self-titled debut album remains one of the iconic and truly innovative pieces of rock music, an album so influential and revolutionary that it had "announced" the birth of a loud new genre of music and it had initiated a movement that had soon enough become a sprawling phenomenon, inspiring a myriad of artists in the pursuit of this more unhinged, raw, and uncompromising style of playing, and even if the four-piece band borrowed heavily from blues and folk musicians of the recent past, their originality remains intransient, as can be heard on this historically-significant 1969 release. Seamlessly incorporating the influences of blues and rock music into their own signature style, Led Zeppelin's sound introduced a fierce, invigorated power that was intelligently embedded into the adventurous labyrinths of their compositions, often featuring extended solos, experiments with effects and fast-paced tempo changes, almost as if in random bursts of energy and aggression.

The entire album is nothing short of a massive step towards the "progressivization" of rock music, and despite the presence of a number of songs that would become omnipresent radio staples, its structure and concordant atmosphere, combined with the raw playing, the quirky hooks and the fine blues licks, 'Led Zeppelin' is also one of the most influential pieces of album-oriented rock. This marvelous debut album might not necessarily be the very first instance of heavy metal, but it is a sufficiently eclectic work that had anticipated the major pillars of the classic Zeppelin sound, in the face of the straightforward blues pieces like 'You Shook Me' and 'I Can't Quit You Baby', or the fascinating playful folk tune 'Black Mountain Side', a captivating short vignette among the flaunting orchestral inclinations of more experimental songs like 'Your Time is Gonna Come' and 'How Many More Times' with its extended instrumental middle section. And then there are all-time classics like 'Dazed and Confused', the hard-rocking 'Communication Breakdown', the gorgeous 'Babe I'm Gonna Leave You', or the commercially-catchy rock tune 'Good Times, Bad Times' that make this debut album ever so special and influential. It is evident from this very first release of Led Zeppelin that this band had something special going on, and even if they would go on to perfect their playing and songwriting soon after, this album is an imminent, powerful and unshakeable classic that has withstood the test of time.

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