Led Zeppelin: The Greatest Rock Band Of All TIme

I was not supposed to like Led Zeppelin.

I definitely was not supposed to like Jimmy Page, much less make him my personal guitar hero.

After all, this was a band that embraced hard drugs, heavy drinking, groupies willing to do anything (if you know what the Mudshark incident is, I need say no more), and the occult.

The occult -- now that should make any band off-limits for a self-respecting, fairly conservative Ohio teenager. These occult practices just weren't the pagan Spring rituals that happen in San Francisco either. Rumors spread quickly when lead singer Robert Plant's young son, Karac, tragically passed away from a stomach virus. The rumors? There were many, but they all seemed to revolve around the notion that lead guitarist Jimmy Page made a pact with Satan, and Karac was the sacrifice. If it sounds ridiculous, well, there were people who bought into it. My oldest sister being one of them.

And Page's interests in the occult have been documented at least hundreds of times throughout the years. This was a man who at one time owned an occult bookshop and publishing house. He even purchased Boleskine House -- the mansion once owned by Aleister Crowley, perhaps the most notorious occultist in history.

I hadn't heard many Led Zeppelin songs until I was 15 years old, and by then they were disbanded for about six years. Their pinnacle work was recorded at least ten years prior to that. By today's standards, at that point in time, Led Zeppelin was nostalgia at best.

So, no, I wasn't supposed to like Led Zeppelin -- and the reasons get a little more complicated.

When I was in eighth grade, my Health teacher shared with our class "examples" of subliminal and hidden messages in Rock music. The first example he gave was the logo for Heavy Metal singer Ronnie James Dio turned upside down. Right side up, it's evident that it's an old English font spelling his last name. But when turned upside-down, to more than a few people, it appears as "Devil".

Seeing that he had our attention, our Health teacher played an audio tape of a presentation by a McCarthy-like religious motivational speaker. The speaker's name was John Muncy, and we listened to this over the next several days. In hindsight, I think our Health teacher was pushing an agenda. The entire focus of John Muncy's presentation was revealing hidden messages -- both backwards and subliminal -- in popular music. To him, Led Zeppelin and Jimmy Page were the equivalent of what Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein were to George W. Bush.

Many of you may know about the infamous claims regarding a couple of Led Zeppelin songs: If you play a portion of "Stairway To Heaven" backwards, supposedly the phrase "My sweet Satan" is heard. Even scarier, when "The Battle Of Evermore" is played backwards, at one point, some claim to hear "I am the Bible, would you please spit on me? So funny...." I have to admit, when I heard these on the audio tape, I was able to pick up on them.

On a side note, Muncy also "revealed" hidden messages on recordings and album artwork by artists such as Electric Light Orchestra, Pink Floyd, The Eagles, The Beatles, John Lennon and Yoko Ono, Queen, and Cheap Trick (!).

I forget why I decided to listen to Led Zeppelin, but it came even after finding out about all this. Like most people who bought their first Led Zeppelin album, I bought what's best known as Led Zeppelin IV (although the album does not have an actual title). The first track that kicks off the album is "Black Dog", and it was unlike anything I had ever heard before. The start-and-stop structure certainly kept me intrigued, and I wanted to hear more. "Rock And Roll" alone was worth the price of admission, and it was only the second track on the album.

Believe it or not, it wasn't "Stairway To Heaven" that made me a full-fledged Zeppelin fanatic. It was the final track, "When The Levee Breaks". The greatest drum sound and riff of all time played by John Bonham is what pulled me in. (Oddly, it wasn't the first time I heard that riff. A year or two earlier, I had owned the Beastie Boys' License To Ill and they sampled the same beat on "Rhymin' And Stealin'".) "Levee" is still a masterpiece. From the ballsy harmonica to the space-age slide guitar, it's the track every teenage guy wanted to have playing in the background when he was "doin' the nasty" with his girlfriend. I finally felt like I understood what Damone was saying in Fast Times At Ridgemont High when he told Ratner, "When it comes down to making out, whenever possible, put on side one of Led Zeppelin IV". Except I learned there were two things wrong with that piece of advice:  First, "Levee" is on side two. Second, the song being played immediately in the next scene (to show that Ratner was too eager to follow Damone's advice) was Zeppelin's, but it wasn't from Led Zeppelin IV.

After listening to Led Zeppelin IV more than a few times, I was hooked. A few weeks later, I bought Led Zeppelin II. This was the album that not only made me a die-hard fan of Jimmy Page's guitar playing, but it also inspired me to take playing the guitar more seriously. For me, the riff to "Whole Lotta Love" was revolutionary. It may be the only guitar riff that, to me, sounds even heavier over time. The brief solo should not be overlooked, either. With Page's superhuman guitar string bends and perfect phrasing, it was the perfect way to cap off the song's psychedelic, orgasmic interlude.

And then there's "Heartbreaker". This is one of the few Page riffs I've never quite mastered, but just about everyone I know who has wanted to learn it has done so. The killer riff notwithstanding, had there ever been a previously recorded song that featured an unaccompanied guitar solo in the middle? That moment in Rock history got more than a few would-be guitar heroes to get off their asses and begin some serious woodshedding. In fact, it was a live performance of this song that served as the genesis for Eddie Van Halen to create his famous two-handed hammer-on technique.

Eventually, I ended up owning all of Led Zeppelin's albums on CD and without question, my favorite is Physical Graffitti. I consider it not only Zeppelin's ultimate musical statement, but the greatest Rock album of all time. Putting together a double-album that can not only keep the listener captivated, but wanting to listen to it all over again right after hearing all fifteen tracks from beginning-to-end is a talent reserved for a chosen few. Just about every track is a high point: The rock-solid but funky guitar riff of "Custard Pie", the James Brown-inspired "Trampled Underfoot", Page's majestic acoustic guitar showcase of "Bron-Yr-Aur", the in-your-face "The Wanton Song", Celtic folk meets Delta blues in "Black Country Woman", and what the band members consider their finest moment, the exotic and hypnotic "Kashmir".

As a guitar player, there are four guitarists who have made the biggest impact on my playing and my style. But it was Jimmy Page who made me realize that what could be accomplished with six steel strings and 22 frets was limitless. Several years before discovering Led Zeppelin, I had pretty much given up on guitar. My Dad was good enough to buy me more than one when I was just a young kid, but I never took lessons. As a result, they just kind of sat around the house. But thanks to Jimmy Page, I became inspired to pick one up again and make something of it. It's also because of him that I realized the best way to make progress with it is by listening.

The ultimate praise I can bestow on Led Zeppelin is that they proved Rock music can be worthy of the acclaim and high regard that's usually reserved for the works of Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, and Handel.

Oh, and by the way, John Muncy also claimed in the presentation that when John Bonham passed away, it was in Page's mansion -- the same one once owned by Aleister Crowley. The inference was that demonic forces were responsible for Bonham's death. While it is true that John Bonham did pass away at Jimmy Page's residence, it was in the Old Mill House that Page purchased from actor Michael Caine. The only demons that played a part in Bonham's death were his own personal ones. A career alcoholic, he began what would be his last day on Earth consuming four quadruple vodkas and then continued to drink heavily throughout the day. The cause of Bonham's death was vomit asphyxiation, not ritual sacrifice.

The backwards messages? I guess there's a possibility they are legitimate -- but they could just as much be the results of the power of suggestion from a religious zealot, as they are the sinister intentions of an evil Rock band.

As far as the rumors pertaining to the "Karac sacrifice" that I referred to at the beginning of this post, if there was even the slightest bit of truth to them, then Robert Plant is the most forgiving person in history. The band stayed together a few years after the tragedy, and even after the members called it quits, Page and Plant would appear on each others' solo outings. They would also eventually team up to record new material; the most noteworthy being their MTV Unplugged special Unledded, which set ratings records and was a career benchmark for both.

So, no, I wasn't supposed to like Led Zeppelin or Jimmy Page. But this is one case in which I'm glad that I didn't let others decide what was best for me.

From Left to Right:   Jimmy Page, John Bonham, Robert Plant, John Paul Jones