Led Zeppelin: Classic Or Dud?

Robert Christgau, a worthless tin-eared piece of shit since 1967.

Good god, what a moron.

I certainly think "psychedelic Uncle Tom" is more accurate than "just another Uncle Tom."

Imagine, as they say, writing this down.

Ugh at psychedelic uncle tom

well that's really gross.

lol that it was 'psychedelic' that the lawyers objected to tho

someone needs to kill him with their big fucking dick

Was driving around when "Your Time is Gonna Come" came on. What an impeccably produced, written and arranged song. It's incredible to me that anyone at the time, critics or otherwise, didn't catch that there was something special about this band. I'm sure some were caught up in the authentic bloooooze bullshit, but anyone missing that Zep was on another level even with the first album is like Xgau dismissing Hendrix as an uncle Tom, just fucking stupid.

Obv not defending Christgau's race-related comments but tbf, I do think that the critics, even Mendelsohn, were catching that there was something special about these artists - they just didn't like it and found it vulgar, crass, 'self-indulgent', etc. Even Mendelsohn recognized Page's virtuosity, although he hated what he did with it, and Bangs did observe that Zep's deal would ensure them lasting stardom, although "it doesn’t challenge anybody’s intelligence or sensibilities, relying instead on a pat visceral impact".

Interesting thought experiment to imagine yourself seeing these guys as new artists, with no legend or canonicity built up around them, where they're big with the kids and you're a mid-20s writer with a BA and a mission to critique pop music as a serious artform.

Yeah, but the notion of Bangs dismissing the band as "little more than pat visceral impact" is just it. There was *plenty* of pat visceral impact music of the era (and beyond), but this ain't it (obv.). The notion that anyone, even Bangs, would review Led Zep III and spend most of the piece backhandedly characterizing the album as more of the same- "my main impression was the consistent anonymity of most of the songs" - is just nuts. And true to form, the review does scan as largely bullshit, given all the good things he says about the album between the ad hominems. But I suppose that's kind of par for the course for Bangs.

(For anyone curious: https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-album-reviews/led-zeppelin-iii-112284/)

Yeah, even with my 1970 thought experiment, it's a little hard to imagine someone hearing Led Zeppelin as "a thunderous, near-undifferentiated tidal wave of sound". Even my parents could probably tell the difference between "Immigrant Song" and "Tangerine".

or "Friends"

what did they think of bands like Blue Cheer, Vanilla Fudge, et al

Bangs on "Friends:"

"Unfortunately, precious little of Z III‘s remaining hysteria is as useful or as effectively melodramatic. “Friends” has a fine bitter acoustic lead, but gives itself over almost entirely to monotonously shrill Plant breast-beatings. Rob, give a listen to Iggy Stooge."

LOL

Lester Bangs is a fucking idiot

I guess they really chose "the good stuff" when they compiled his first book, huh?

it's a little hard to imagine someone hearing Led Zeppelin as "a thunderous, near-undifferentiated tidal wave of sound".

I think it's a failure of reading comprehension to miss the fact that Bangs wasn't describing III as "a thunderous, near-undifferentiated tidal wave of sound" but was using this phrase - reported speech supposedly from a (doubtless ventriloquised) friend, describing their live show - to build up a boogeyman of their excess, which Bangs' review sought to confirm or deny. Like, the full quote reads thusly:

I’ve never made a Zep show, but friends (most of them the type, admittedly, who will listen- to anything so long’s it’s loud and they’re destroyed) describe a thunderous, near-undifferentiated tidal wave of sound that doesn’t engross but envelops to snuff any possible distraction.

I mean, it's not a glowing review, but is he really slating Zeppelin? He seems to love them in the same way he loves the bloody-minded garage stuff he praises in Psychotic Reactions:

What’s great about it, though, the Zep’s special genius, is that the whole effect is so utterly two-dimensional and unreal. You could play it, as I did, while watching a pagan priestess performing the ritual dance of Ka before the flaming sacrificial altar in Fire Maidens of Outer Space with the TV sound turned off. And believe me, the Zep made my blood throb to those jungle rhythms even more frenziedly.

I mean, he ends the review praising That's The Way, and even says he likes a lot of the acoustic stuff. It's not a pan! But I love Bangs and I love III and I have no need or expectation for him to love III because ultimately Zep aren't arcane or occult enough for him - he wants bombast cranked up to b-movie weirdness, he was never going to fit in on Zeppelin's private plane, that was never where his interest lay.

Also, this is dead-on:

“Since I’ve Been Loving You” represents the obligatory slow and lethally dull seven-minute blues jam

notm

which Bangs' review sought to confirm or deny.

Yes, I left out that context, true. So, then, did the review deny it? He precedes his paraphrase of his friends (who, unlike him, did go to see Zep as they "are the type who will listen- to anything so long’s it’s loud and they’re destroyed") with this:

The Zep, of all bands surviving, are today — their music is as ephemeral as Marvel comix, and as vivid as an old Technicolor cartoon. It doesn’t challenge anybody’s intelligence or sensibilities, relying instead on a pat visceral impact that will insure absolute stardom for many moons to come. Their albums refine the crude public tools of all dull white blues bands into something awesome in its very insensitive grossness,

which doesn't suggest that he finds much subtlety or nuance in their music. He is not saying they are worthless - although it's a stretch to say he loves them; he has a "love-hate relationship' with them - but seems to say that insofar as they succeed, it is on the level of sheer "pat visceral impact" and "insensitive grossness", which for those of us who DO hear subtlety and nuance there, is the questionable part.

He then goes on to review the album at hand:

Their third album deviates little from the track laid by the first two, even though they go acoustic on several numbers. Most of the acoustic stuff sounds like standard Zep graded down decibelwise.... In fact, when I first heard the album my main impression was the consistent anonymity of most of the songs

which, again, does not indicate to me that he sees much differentiation in the music. More than the fact that he is critical, which I had actually been defending if you read upthread, nor the writing style, which is good, I think it is this that is striking us as bizarre with regards to an album that features so much exploration of English folk music, as well as a heavy rocker like "Immigrant Song"; the blues jam "Since I've Been Loving You" that you mentioned; "Friends", with a quasi-Bollywood-esque string section. How does someone hear "Gallows Pole" or "Tangerine" as just a "grading down decibelwise" of "standard Zep" (idk - something like "Heartbreaker", maybe)?

The quote about the music making his blood throb while watching Fire Maidens of Outer Space was specifically about "Immigrant Song", which he singled out as the song that comes closest to standing out from the anonymity with "special outrageousness" (one of the songs that comes closest to working on the level of sheer visceral impact). He immediately follows it by saying: "Unfortunately, precious little of Z III‘s remaining hysteria is as useful or as effectively melodramatic. "

He does praise "That's the Way" but emphasizes that it's "the first song they’ve ever done that has truly moved [ him ]." The closest he comes to saying he likes the other acoustic stuff (after dismissing a couple of songs as generic to the point of being hard to "even hear" for a non-fan and slating "Since I've Been Loving You") is:

Much of the rest, after a couple of listenings to distinguish between songs, is not bad at all, because the disc Zeppelin are at least creative enough to apply an occasional pleasing fillip to their uninspiring material, and professional enough to keep all their recorded work relatively clean and clear

which is a bit backhanded and underlines again the generic, undifferentiated quality that he seems to hear in the band - he, as someone who reviews rock music for a living, needed a "couple of listenings to distinguish between songs). It is interesting, though, that despite these repeated suggestions, Bangs's own descriptions do make the songs sound pretty distinct from each other, but idk if there's enough there for me to read that as intentional self-undercutting irony.

He's definitely not as unrelentingly negative as Mendelsohn.

yiftach
1 day ago

mr Zeppelin, can you please reply to this comment? you are my favorite singer of all time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=10&v=lQG_Zu_7td0&feature=emb_logo

by the way
which one's Led?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQG_Zu_7td0

I guess the divide on Plant's voice has always been funny, it's not like it ever fully went away with listeners, though critics have kind of backed off their "lol ur voice sucks" comments. when I first got into Zeppelin, half of my friends kept telling me THEY HAVE TERRIBLE VOCALS, and while he occasionally grates when he gets nasally, he's always been one of my favs.

course one of these friends also claimed Billy Corgan was Chinese and told me when I was 11 that you got women pregnant by putting your finger ni their vagina so

And I thought Taylor Swift stans were bad.

Anyway, I actually appreciate that we have reviews from before the canonization (which came thanks to radio and fans, not critics) and was finding it interesting to imagine hearing Zep or Hendrix as new artists. I was just building on what Josh was saying about the curious nature of where some of the criticisms came from. It is almost refreshing in a way to read critics who hated his voice (although I like it). "Listen to Iggy" is kind of amazing! (I like Iggy too but I doubt he would deny that he was the more limited vocalist - it's definitely a statement of where Bangs came from, aesthetically.)xp

RS, hire some folk-rock writers.

reading early dismissive Kerrang reviews of things like Bathory, Voivod, and Sodom was interesting in a similar fashion (I think Oor Neechy shared it on FB).

listening to music that's relatively new and inventive (or doing something old in a new way) is often hard! you have no reference points, or the reference points you do have are more comfortable so sometimes you view deviations from them as "bad".

like when I first listened to Meshuggah, I loved them live, but I bought a cd and at first couldn't figure out how to listen to their music - "It's the same chord over and over, wtf!". since I was familiar with metal, but this was a subgenre of it that was alien to me.

i said it in another thread but there was one older metalhead who grew up with its emergence in the 80s and he listened to Meshuggah and he said "WHAT IS THIS SHIT? it sounds like their amps are turning on and off over and over again"

I also get why Sabbath kind of unfairly got labeled the "big dumb metal band" by many critics

If Lester Bangs was alive today (meaning, if he was the same age in 2020 that he was in 1969) he'd be the ideal Pitchfork writer - a dorky, semi-coherent twentysomething working through his personal life issues using record reviews as a frame.

Oh, completely. Bangs had a very explicit aesthetic, and you can see how he would love the pulpy stuff like WLL and Immigrant Song and be turned off by Since I've Been Loving You (which was always a firm skip for me, especially when I'd just started to dig Zeppelin as a teenager). We don't have to choose between Plant or Iggy, but it's no surprise where Bangs fell on that dichotomy, or that he preferred what Iggy did with his limited pallette.

I'd definitely say Bangs on III seems more qualified-ly positive than most rock crits of that era on Zep.

(xxxp to sund4r)

I also get why Sabbath kind of unfairly got labeled the "big dumb metal band" by many critics

Bangs was a fan, tho. He identified them as a Christian-rock band, ie scared shitless of the devil.

Bangs was a fan, tho. He identified them as a Christian-rock band, ie scared shitless of the devil.

Yeah, he wrote a really great story on them that's included in the second anthology of his work, Mainlines, Blood Feasts and Bad Taste.

Some of my favourite pieces of his are in that second volume - that piece he wrote about electric-era Miles music being all about pain.

The Zep III review specifically reads like an assignment that was foisted upon him. Like, maybe Mendelsohn absolutely refused to go back to that well, so they just thought at the last minute, eh, give it to Bangs. And Bangs probably hadn't thought that much about Zeppelin at the time, and possibly didn't even have that long to listen to this one, so crafted a snide review in keeping with the magazine's disdain, but at the same time was forced to concede its attributes, however much in passing and replete with backhanded undercutting, because Bangs, for all his faults, nonetheless had a pair of ears, and could recognize that III, of all albums, couldn't be dismissed the same way or quite as easily as its predecessors.

Xgau, for his own snide part, def. seemed to recognize that III was a big step forward (even if he is still fixated on The Blues):

"Led Zeppelin III [Atlantic, 1970]
If the great blues guitarists can make their instruments cry out like human voices, it's only fitting that Robert Plant should make his voice galvanize like an electric guitar. I've always approved theoretically of the formula that pits the untiring freak intensity of that voice against Jimmy Page's repeated low-register fuzz riffs, and here they really whip it into shape. Plant is overpowering even when Page goes to his acoustic, as he does to great effect on several surprisingly folky (not to mention folk bluesy) cuts. No drum solos, either. Heavy. B+"

I can't imagine putting on LZ III and not being just struck dumb by Immigrant Song and not mention it in a review

Just some anonymous blues rock, pat visceral impact, nbd, dime a dozen in 1970.

You shoulda heard Son House's songs about Norway...

Foghat's "Leif Eriksson Bop" was better

I challenge you to seriously distinguish between LZ and The Aynsley Dunbar Retaliation.

lol

FWIW, since it's always worth revisiting, here's Lenny Kaye's review of the fourth album:

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-album-reviews/led-zeppelin-iv-101608/

Needless to say, he also misses the mark with III, suggesting that IV somehow loses "the leaden acoustic moves that seemed to weigh down their third," but he at seems to at least get it.

It might seem a bit incongruous to say that Led Zeppelin — a band never particularly known for its tendency to understate matters — has produced an album which is remarkable for its low-keyed and tasteful subtlety, but that’s just the case here. The march of the dinosaurs that broke the ground for their first epic release has apparently vanished, taking along with it the splattering electronics of their second effort and the leaden acoustic moves that seemed to weigh down their third. What’s been saved is the pumping adrenaline drive that held the key to such classics as “Communication Breakdown” and “Whole Lotta Love,” the incredibly sharp and precise vocal dynamism of Robert Plant, and some of the tightest arranging and producing Jimmy Page has yet seen his way toward doing. If this thing with the semi-metaphysical title isn’t quite their best to date, since the very chances that the others took meant they would visit some outrageous highs as well as some overbearing lows, it certainly comes off as their most consistently good.

it is funny how that crew had sussed out the primordial stooges/glam/alice cooper/etc etc primordial ooze from which punk was going to spring, but they all seemed nearly blind to what was happening with hard rock and metal...seems like there was this conventional wisdom that "yawn Cream did it first" and everything that was happening in heavy rock was just a heavy blues ripoff

Yeah, I long wondered about the biases of rock critics and where they came from (something significant did change at the turn of the millennium, whatever words we want to use to talk about it) - is it just as simple as that heavy rock/'metal' and prog had a much more mainstream audience, and with a demographic that 20something writers wanted to distance themselves from?

I mean, there's also the stuff upthread about the unsavoury context of that mainstream-ness.

Didn’t Bangs also think kick out the jams was bogus but did a total 180 a few years later?

Here's his negative 1969 review: https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-album-reviews/kick-out-the-jams-252641/