Fantastic !! What a way to start the day.

Nice. Is that all you or a band?

Sonny always puts on a great show. Last time I saw him it was just him and Cindy Cashdollar playing dual slide guitars. That was cool but I prefer the shows with his band.

This came out the same month as Animals, January 1977. Quite a month. One of my favorite Bowie albums.

Yes indeed. I always really liked Hats Off and even way back when I thought it was such a different and interesting way to end an album, especially such a diverse album.

I would not call this one below underrated but it is one of my favorites.

That is excellent.

I think you are overthinking this. I, II, III, IV, Houses and Graffiti all sound completely different. I am not sure what you mean by the "fresh sound" they usually achieved? You Mean like Custard Pie, or Immigrant Song, or TSRTS, or The Crunge, The Ocean, No Quarter, Levee, what? Most of PG sounds dark and dreary compared to Houses, but is still killer and enough tracks have commercial appeal. If you look at Presence in it its actual context it had no broad commercial appeal and I can guarantee you that was not because of the mix. Back in the 70s people mostly listened on the radio, or on a cheap home stereo or on a cheap car 8 track. Nobody in the mass buying pubic thought about the mix. In the summer/fall of 1976 kids were buying Aerosmith Rocks, Wings Over America, Frampton Comes Alive, Heart, Bowie, BOC with Don't Fear the Reaper, Steve Miller Band, Foghat, Bad Company, Skynyrd, Fleetwood Mac, Boz Skaggs, Kansas (Wayward Son) and most of all BOSTON...etc. Every party I went to from the day Boston was released through all of 1977 prominently featured Boston BLASTING at least twice through a night. People mostly wanted good time music in 1976. People did not want to listen to For Your Life or Achilles Last Stand or NBFBM at parties. They would have liked the words to Candy Store Rock (if they wanted something raunchy like Custard Pie - but Custard Pie is so much better - as is Wanton Song) but that is about it - and it was too different at the time in terms of the style. Royal Orleans is funny if you know the story but it is odd in so many ways - it is not the mix. I don't care how this was mixed the album did not fit popular tastes at the time, and the time was the summer of 1976. Tea for One is incredible but so depressing. For Your Life? Antidrug message without being funny, and the music is so unrelentingly heavy. And those casual Zep fans on the fence waited for the live album in Sept - alot of us did not have enough money back then to buy every album we wanted. I knew alot of people who said the heck with Presence I am getting that double live album with the "hits".

When I listen to Presence, which is often, I think about what a genius Page was and how amazing the whole album/sound is. As others have noted above, Page knew what he was doing and he did everything for a reason. Every Zeppelin album sounds different. The production is a major part of the music and the overall impact, and that is a big reason Zeppelin is so interesting.

This would make a nice cover for a box set.

I hear you. Have you ever done a drums only cover of it? Everyone talks about the Perdie Shuffle but the middle section is amazing too.

What a great idea ! By the way love your drumming. Fool in the Rain awaits ?

The songs are all fantastic, thank you! I started sharing these all with friends and now they are sending me new ones before I know about them. Keep up the great work!!

Plant does Immigrant Song well for late 1972. As a bonus he does the haunting moans during the outro. He did not do that bit often live.

It is interesting how this tape sheds light on a comment in the new Dave Lewis book. On page 347 he reports of a fan letter to the paper saying that Zeppelin did not come back for an encore on Dec 4. Lewis says this was probably about Dec 3 since he notes that they played Heartbreaker after WLL on Dec 4. Indeed that is where the Dec 4 tape apparently ends, just after a few moments of the crowd chanting "we want more!" Now in this new Dec 3 tape we hear the crowd for about 5 minutes after WLL, before Immigrant Song (great fan scream as Immigrant starts). Then after Immigrant Song and Heartbreaker the crowd is chanting "we want more!" for about 5 minutes followed by about 3 more minutes of cheering and "Zeppelin!" chants. Finally the drums come back followed by the organ solo into Thank You. So it is possible that the fan letter was indeed about Dec 4. I have not heard any version of Dec 4 that goes much beyond the end of Heartbreaker.

Chants of "We won't go!" after WLL. Great scream from an audience member as Immigrant Song starts.

1955. Great album. On this track drums take over at 6:13