Rocks In The Attic #114: Led Zeppelin - ‘Led Zeppelin II’ (1969)

This album to me sounds like summer. I remember listening to this vinyl copy - one of my Dad’s - putting it onto tape, and then buying it on CD not long after. I always think Zeppelin’s brand of rock is quite rich - in that in most cases it’s a high level of musicianship and substance, over catchiness and pop hooks - but their second album is instantly listenable. I’d recommend it as a way-in to Zeppelin, over anything else they recorded, including their arguably superior fourth album.

I must have bought the record on CD during school holidays, as I have a really clear memory of walking up the hospital every day (I think to see my Dad who was in there for an operation), and I would listen to this on my Technics portable CD player all the way up to the hospital, and all the way back home. I think it sounds like summer to me because of this very association. That couple of weeks must have come in the middle of a hot spell - a rarity in an English summer.

It’s incredible that this record was released in 1969. It has 70s rock written all over it, but it comes from the tail end of that earlier decade. It’s also fantastic proof that a great album can be produced out of pressure, and on the road, with the band stealing studio time whenever and wherever they could to put this together.

Hit: Whole Lotta Love

Hidden Gem: The Lemon Song

Rocks In The Attic #84: Led Zeppelin - ‘Led Zeppelin’ (1969)

Although this is only (only!) the 84^th entry in the Rocks In The Attic blog, this is actually the 100^th disc I’ve reviewed, taking into account all the double- and triple-albums that I’ve wrote about so far.

A few weeks ago I covered the Truth album by Jeff Beck - released prior to this debut by Led Zeppelin, and an album Jimmy Page must have had at the front of his mind when planning and arranging this.

This was a very cheap album to make. Zeppelin’s manager Peter Grant paid for the 36 hours of studio time himself, and then sold the tapes to Atlantic Records. A studio cost of just £1,782 led to the record grossing more than £3.5 million. Not a bad return for a record company.

If I had to choose one album over the other, I’d go with Zeppelin’s debut, only because the songs fit together that little bit better. Led Zeppelin and Truth are very similar though. They even share a cover - You Shook Me - but the majority of the songs could be interchangeable. Both albums have soulful vocals, by Robert Plant and Rod Stewart respectively. The guitar work on each album (both players are ex-Yardbirds) is of a higher quality than most players at the time (and more in line with the likes of Hendrix and Clapton); and the bass is top-notch (by John Paul Jones on Led Zeppelin, and future Rolling Stone Ronnie Wood on Truth).

The real point of differentiation is the percussion. There’s nothing wrong with the drums, by Mick Waller, on Jeff Beck’s album. They keep time, as they should. But they’re not a patch on Bonzo’s debut. The opening track on Led Zeppelin - Good Times Bad Times - could almost be renamed How To Play Drums by John Henry Bonham. You can ignore everything else about that song and just concentrate on the drums - they are the very definition of a perfect drum track.

Hit: Dazed And Confused

Hidden Gem: Black Mountain Side

Rocks In The Attic #78: David Bowie - ‘Space Oddity’ (1972)

This is a strange album - considered by many to be the first proper Bowie album, this was originally released as David Bowie in 1969, before being repackaged with a different title and released with a different cover in 1972. I have that version - the one with Bowie looking stoned with spiky orange hair on the cover.

I remember being taken to Rock Circus by my parents when I was 8 or 9. Rock Circus was a museum, in Picadilly Circus (hence the name), run by the same people who do Madame Tussauds. Alongside the usual eerie-looking waxworks was a room set up like a small theatre. We took our seats and the first act was Bowie himself doing Space Oddity. In a spacesuit. Revolving around the stage, going upside down and such. Obviously this was just a waxwork, but it looked pretty good - enough to forever stamp that song onto my brain. I think, if memory serves, that Bowie was then followed by The Beatles doing Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, and maybe With A Little Help From My Friends. Or maybe The Beatles opened for Bowie, I can’t quite remember.

This isn’t a fantastic album. There are flashes of brilliance, but overall it’s full of hippie nonsense and only a tentative sign of things to come.

Hit: Space Oddity

Hidden Gem: Memory Of A Free Festival

Rocks In The Attic #59: Jr. Walker & The All Stars - ‘Greatest Hits’ (1969)

Another one of my Dad’s (I think). This one’s a Tamla Motown record, and features the singles of Jr. Walker & The All Stars - a very overlooked artist in the Motown canon - released between 1965 and 1969.

It’s incredible how well known their debut single Shotgun is. It’s one of those soul songs you’ve heard a million times, in films and television especially, but you might not know who performs it. Many of the songs are driven by Walker’s saxophone, but there’s something very Steve Cropper about guitarist Willie Woods, and his licks are as funky as anything.

Hit: Shotgun

Hidden Gem: Cleo’s Mood

Rocks In The Attic #47: Blind Faith - ‘Blind Faith’ (1969)

In terms of album covers, this has to be up there with the worst. Not only is it a photograph of a topless 11-year old girl (who is now a massage therapist in London), but this has been badly superimposed onto another image of a pastoral landscape, which clashes with the futuristic “spaceship” that the girl has in her hands. Thankfully the music inside is much better.

I’ve never been a huge fan of Cream because Jack Bruce’s vocals can be pretty annoying. Here you get Steve Winwood’s vocals (and keyboards) on top of Clapton’s guitar playing, and Ginger Baker on drums. It’s not the greatest album in the world - falling somewhere between late-60s psychedelia and early-70s rock - but it was a stepping stone nonetheless for Clapton.

Hit: Well All Right

Hidden Gem: Can’t Find My Way Home

Rocks In The Attic #35: The Rolling Stones - ‘Through The Past, Darkly (Big Hits Vol. 2)’ (1969)

Out of all the records in my collection, this is probably the worst in terms of condition. The actual disc is fine, but the sleeve - the original gatefold octagonal design - has completely fallen apart. On a normal gatefold album you’re going to get twelve inches of hinge - on this sleeve, because it’s octagonal, not square, the hinge is six inches long, and probably stopped being a hinge a very long time.

The thing is, I think I bought the record in this condition. I’m getting much better these days at only buying records where the sleeve is in as good a condition as the vinyl. I’m still not perfect, but I’m getting better. I should really have held out to try and find this in a better condition - although that would probably mean finding the record in the reissued standard square sleeve.

But my decision to buy this was probably influenced by the fact that I was DJing regularly at the time. And to have this record in your DJ bag is extremely useful. It has my four of my favourite Stones singles - Jumpin’ Jack Flash, Honky Tonk Women, Street Fighting Man and Let’s Spend The Night Together - all on one disc.

Hit: Jumpin’ Jack Flash

Hidden Gem: 2,0000 Light Years From Home

Rocks In The Attic #20: Fleetwood Mac - ‘The Pious Bird Of Good Omen’ (1969)

Gotta love the Mac. I bought this album at some fair on Beech Road park in Chorlton. I think it was during Beech Road festival - and probably on the same day (or during the festival another year), Willow bought Bruce Willis’ The Return Of Bruno. I think I got the better deal.

Just like John Mayall, I could listen to Fleetwood Mac all day and not really notice. It seems so natural to me - I must have been a bluesman in a former life or something. I don’t have much of a thing for country blues, but English blues from the beat explosion of the sixties really speaks to me.

This album is a compilation of the band’s first four singles (and their B-sides), plus two tracks from the Mr. Wonderful (1968) album, and another two tracks from another blues artist Eddie Boyd, backed by Fleetwood Mac.

One of my favourite things to happen at work is for one of the girls in the office to put my iPod on the stereo, choose Fleetwood Mac, and then play all their songs on shuffle. They’re expecting songs off Rumours (1977), but my iPod is heavily weighted towards the 1960s version of Fleetwood Mac. The better version, that is.

Hit: Albatross

Hidden Gem: Need Your Love So Bad

Rocks In The Attic #19: The Band - ‘The Band’ (1969)

Who can’t love this album? Surely it’s impossible. To me, this and its predecessor Music From Big Pink (1968) are like Rubber Soul and Revolver - two back-to-back classics with mostly interchangeable songs. Or Toys In The Attic and Rocks for Aerosmith fans.

I think I prefer Music From Big Pink as it sounds ever so slightly rougher around the edges. That album sounds like a bunch of guys who had a great idea of making an album, this one sounds much more like they’re hitting their stride.

Levon Helm, the band’s drummer, died not too long ago and it was nice to see a wealth of respect paid to him from the music world. There was a documentary about him playing at the Auckland film festival last year which I couldn’t get to see, but I’ll hopefully get to see it one day.

Hit: Rag Mama Rag

Hidden Gem: Jawbone