The later albums?

[IpMan]

5 hours ago, jimtriantafyllou97@gmail.c said:

I hope I didn't offend anyone with my post, really (you weren't offended, but I don't know about the rest . I agree 100% about the total subjectivity of music  I see your reasoning in disliking All My Love, although I'm rather fond of the tune.  That's the beauty of Zep! There's something for everyone! 

P.S. Is there any way to change my username? As you can see, I typed the email in the space for the username when signing up  I send a message to the admin last year, but no reply yet  

I have no idea my friend. I just went into settings to find out you can edit everything there EXCEPT your username. There used to be a function which allowed you to change it up to two times but it appears to be gone. Maybe someone else will know some  trick but I too am befuddled.

 

[jimtriantafyllou97@gmail.c]

10 hours ago, IpMan said:

I have no idea my friend. I just went into settings to find out you can edit everything there EXCEPT your username. There used to be a function which allowed you to change it up to two times but it appears to be gone. Maybe someone else will know some  trick but I too am befuddled.

 

No worries, mate, thanks for the info anyway! 

[dandak]

On 6/7/2017 at 11:06 PM, JohnOsbourne said:

Presence is a truly great album, and certainly the end of an era.  ITTOD is awful, I just cannot abide the change of style.  (Yes, I know it incorporates elements that had always been in Zep's music, but it signaled a change of direction for the 80's, and not for the better IMO.)

Agreed. Presence is my favorite zep album. ITTOD is such a let down. Almost never listen to it. In the Evening and only the first half of Carouselambra (or however its spelled) are the best on that album in my mind. The last half of carouselambra is one of the worst songs zep ever even thought about. Fool in the rain is one of the few, perhaps only as I think about it more, zep song that I change the radio station when it comes on. Unfortunately it gets a lot of airplay. I however really like CODA. Maybe after ITTOD anything would sound good, but after all these years I still like CODA.

[John M]

I can remember all the people who hated III when it came out - too different, not Zeppelin, etc.

Same comments back in the day about IV, about Houses, about Presence.  I don't get it.  Every album was very different and they were all amazing.  Fool in the Rain is a fantastic song - great lyrics and songwriting, amazing singing, superb drumming and piano, it rocks.  Jimmy's solo is out of this world, and his acoustic parts are in a different rhythm than the rest of the song - triplets against 4/4.  I was amazed that after everything they had been through they could still be so creative and moving forward.  Sure at the time I wanted to hear "Presence II" but Out Door still blows me away.  So much great stuff on that album.  

[76229]

On 26/06/2017 at 9:22 PM, jimtriantafyllou97@gmail.c said:

Don't shoot me, but I think Presence sounds tired as fuck. The history behind the making of the album is more interesting than the music in it. ALS and NFBM are certified classics, of course, while FYL is an underrated (albeit a tad repetitive) gem with a very nasty vibe to it, but the rest? Royal Orleans and Hots On For Nowhere are lightweight funk, not bad but certainly filler material, Candy Store Rock is one of the blandest, dullest rockers they ever recorded (and unlike the aforementioned two, its riff is really uninteresting and generic) and easily the weakest here, while the only use for TFO was to use some of its guitar licks for SIBLY on stage. Again, it's not bad (the guitar works at times is marvelous), but on the whole feels to be meandering. It is nowhere near as gripping and passionate as SIBLY or IGC.

Now feel free to lynch me

ITTOD isn't that bad, but Carouselambra and Hot Dog are cringe-worthy beyond imagination. I cannot even describe it. 

Coda is worthy only for Poor Tom, a song so cool it should have been on the third album instead of Hats Off. The two live cuts are available on DVD. The rest is flat, boring, generic hard rock. Zep were infinitely better than "Wearing And Tearing" and "Darlene". Really.

Royal Orleans "filler"? Have to disagree, imo it's one of Zeppelin's most underrated songs. I agree parts of that record sound tired though, with hindsight, it'd have been a better idea to take time off while Plant was recuperating.

 

Carouselambra may not sound like typical Zep but cringeworthy's a bit strong. The lyrics are great, but buried too far down in the mix, maybe because they were too close to home for certain band members.

[EaglesOfOneNest]

I really like ITTOD! It's not my favorite Zep album, but there are great songs on it, including Hot Dog and Carouselambra. As far as Presence goes, I agree with whoever said Tea for One is their least favorite Zep song. Pickings are slim on Presence, but Achilles and Nobody's Fault completely redeem the album. 

I think each album is a reflection of where they were mentally and spiritually at the time of recording. We all know the circumstances during the recordings of both Presence and ITTOD; the music reflects that. 

[SamoKodela]

I think it's quite agreeable that overall the songwriting chemistry was not as strong on the last two albums and also on Coda which had many ITTOD songs and some less good early ones. Band was also not as technically good anymore, although Bonzo certainly didn't decline and even added new styles to his playing, but Page and Plant certainly did while Jones was always solid. As Page's solo work proved he also started to lack ideas a bit by ITTOD, so it was not just him being less involved in terms of being less active, but also not as creative anymore.

But those albums were still full of quite Zeppelinish ideas and structures, even if many times these structures were not even guitar, but many times they were not as good as the early ones and overall the songwriting was not that good anymore, although it was probably better on ITTOD than on Presence, but many will still love Presence more because of a lot of Jimmy and a hard rocking Zeppelin approach!

[chef free]

Presence has the best of Page and Bonham, booze and dope took it away after that...

[IpMan]

12 hours ago, chef free said:

Presence has the best of Page and Bonham, booze and dope took it away after that...

Definitely the best of Page, he is a monster on Presence. However I would give the edge to ITTOD in regard to Bonzo just for FITR alone. His work on FITR is perhaps his finest work in the studio and one of the most complex drum patterns done which somehow does not sound like a complex drum tutorial. Bonzo is actually playing two different rhythms in two different times simultaneously. And no, it was not overdubbed. Amazing.

 

[The Dark Lord]

Totally agree with Lpman's assessment of the situation. Excluding Coda, for obvious reasons, I give both Presence and In Through the Out Door 10/10. Perhaps the fact that I participated in these albums at the time when they were released helps me to better understand their context within the broader musical landscape, but I wouldn't change a note on either.