Led Zeppelin IV

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Studio album by Led Zeppelin
Released	November 8, 1971
Recorded	December 1970 – March 1971 at Headley Grange, Hampshire, with The Rolling Stones Mobile Studio; Island Studios, London; Sunset Sound, Los Angeles. Mixed at Island Studios, London; Olympic Studios, London.
Genre	Hard rock Folk rock
Length	42:38
Label	Atlantic
Producer(s)	Jimmy Page, Peter Grant
Professional reviews
All Music Guide link Robert Christgau (A) link New Musical Express October 2, 1992 p. 29 Q July 1994 Rolling Stone (Favorable) December 11, 1971 p. 63
Led Zeppelin chronology
Led Zeppelin III (1970)	(1971)	Houses of the Holy (1973)

is the fourth album by English rock band Led Zeppelin, released on November 8, 1971. It has no easily expressed official title and is commonly referred to as Led Zeppelin IV. Atlantic Records catalogues have used the names Four Symbols and The Fourth Album, and it is also variously referred to as Untitled, Runes, Sticks, Man with Sticks, Four and ZoSo (after the appearance of the first character or symbol printed on the LP label). Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page frequently refers to the album as Led Zeppelin IV in interviews, while singer Robert Plant thinks of it as "the Fourth Album, that's it." The album is one of the best-selling albums in history, with over 23 million units sold in the United States alone. Estimates for worldwide figures usually top 30 million units.

[edit] Overview

The album was recorded at Island Records's newly opened studios in Basing Street, London, around the same time as Jethro Tull's Aqualung, and at Headley Grange, a remote Victorian house in East Hampshire, England, as well as Sunset Sound in Los Angeles, CA

After the lukewarm, if not confused and sometimes dismissive, critical reaction Led Zeppelin III had received in the autumn of 1970, Page decided that the next Led Zeppelin album would not have a title, but would instead feature four hand-drawn symbols on the inner sleeve and record label, each one chosen by the band member it represents. "We decided that on the fourth album, we would deliberately play down the group name, and there wouldn't be any information whatsoever on the outer jacket," Page explained. "Names, titles and things like that do not mean a thing."^[1]

These symbols are the official title of the album, and Atlantic Records initially distributed graphics of the symbols in many sizes to the press for inclusion in charts and articles. The album was one of the first to be produced without conventional identification, and this communicated an anti-commercial stance that was controversial at the time (especially among certain executives at Atlantic).

Led Zeppelin IV remains a perennial favorite on classic rock radio and features "Stairway to Heaven", one of the most famous and popular rock songs ever recorded. This was the band's third consecutive U.K. chart topper, and it reached #2 in the U.S., lasting 259 weeks on the chart there. During the track's 35 years of existence, its combined radio airplay in the United States alone has totaled over 50 years^{[citation needed]}.

In 1998, Q magazine readers voted Led Zeppelin IV the 26th greatest album of all time; in 2000 "Q" placed it at #26 in its list of the 100 Greatest British Albums Ever. In 2003, the album was ranked number 66 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. It is #7 on Pitchfork Media's Top 100 Albums of the 1970s. A 2005 listener poll conducted by Toronto classic rock station Q107 (CILQ) named Led Zeppelin IV the #2 best classic rock album of all time. In 2006, the album was rated #1 on Classic Rock magazine's100 Greatest British Albums poll; that same year it was voted #1 in Guitar World 100 Greatest Albums readers' poll and was ranked #7 in ABC media's top ten albums.

[edit] The symbols

The four symbols on the cover of Led Zeppelin IV, representing Jimmy Page, John Paul Jones, John Bonham, and Robert Plant (from left to right) respectively.

Although the symbols that form its title (and the album itself) are sometimes referred to as "Runes", only the middle two are runes. The other two are sigils.

Each member of the band chose a personal emblem for the cover. Left to right, their members and meanings:

• Jimmy Page's symbol is generally refered to as "ZoSo", though its symbols have nonalphabetic connotations. It was designed by Page himself.^[1] It is thought that the symbol is derived from a sixteenth century treatise by mathematician and occultist Girolamo Cardano, where it is used to represent the planet Saturn for purposes of magic. Page is a Capricorn, a sign ruled by Saturn, and the Z-like symbol is distinctive as a common astrological mark for Saturn. The oSo portion is similar to the alchemic symbol for mercury, also associated with Saturn. In cabalistic or hermetic study, knowledge seekers look to the god Mercury (Hermes) for guidance and light, more or less the scene that unfolds in the drawing on the inside cover of the album and subsequently acted out by Page in the concert film The Song Remains the Same. This part of the symbol is strikingly similar to the Lucifer script ciphered by Aleister Crowley in his book The Equinox. The symbol also bears a strong resemblance to characters of the "alphabet of the Magi", a seventeenth century text used exclusively for fashioning magical talismans. What it means personally to Page is unknown, as he has never publicly revealed its meaning. His interest in Aleister Crowley, however, is widely known. The guitarist owns many of Crowley's original manuscripts and other effects, including (until the mid-1980's) Crowley's former home on Loch Ness, Boleskine House. In the 1970's Page owned the occult bookshop The Equinox in London, also an enterprise for publishing rare manuscripts.
• John Paul Jones' symbol is a single circle intersecting 3 vesica pisces (a triquetra). Taken from a book of runes, it symbolises a person with confidence and competence.^[1] However, Jones claims it represents an exorcism (said to irritate the occultist Page).^{[citation needed]}
• John Bonham's symbol, the three interlocking rings, represents the trinity of mother, father and child. It could also depict an aerial view of a drum kit. It does in fact represent the pagan idea of trilogies and trios, and, more commonly, is a Christian symbol for the Trinity. In the 1990 Bonham tribute radio special, "It's Been A Long Time", son Jason Bonham stated that the symbol was chosen as a representation of man, woman, and child. Jones's and Bonham's symbols fitting together -- one to the other inside out, inverse images -- is no accident. In any good rock band, particularly in Led Zeppelin, the bassist and drummer form interlocking parts of a rhythmic whole.^{[citation needed]}
• The symbol for Robert Plant is the Egyptian feather of Ma'at, representing truth, justice, fairness and writing, encapsulated by an unbroken circle representing life.^[1]

There is actually a fifth, smaller symbol chosen by guest vocalist Sandy Denny representing her contribution to "The Battle of Evermore"; it appears in the credits list on the inner sleeve of the LP, serving as an asterisk.

[edit] Album songs

The album included examples of hard rock, such as its first cut, "Black Dog", and quiet moments such as "Going to California", an acoustic song inspired by Joni Mitchell and featuring delicate mandolin figures played by Jones. "Four Sticks" showcased Bonham's heavy drumming (Bonham reportedly used two drumsticks in each hand, giving the track a rolling, symphonic effect) and the relentless riffs of Jimmy Page. "The Battle of Evermore" is the only Led Zeppelin song to feature a guest vocalist, Sandy Denny of Fairport Convention.^[2] This song and the playful "Misty Mountain Hop" include lyrical references to J. R. R. Tolkein's The Lord of the Rings (director Ralph Bakshi had wanted to use music from Led Zeppelin in his 1978 animated film adaptation of the book, but was unable to get the rights^[3]). Along the way to constructing movements of what Page called "light and shade," Led Zeppelin created some of their most enduring, definitive music: "Rock and Roll", "When the Levee Breaks", "Black Dog" and especially "Stairway to Heaven".

"Black Dog" opens the affair, announcing itself with an overtly sexual, reverberating, gutteral wail from Plant, then crashes into the whiplike tail of a classic Page riff, which chases the unique time signature of a stomping beat from Bonham. The title of the song came about, supposedly, because a stray black dog had been loitering about the studio during the recording. Christian researchers offer another theory. While the song hits the surface as a sexual come-on in overdrive, it is more an invocation of sorts: The Chienne Noire, or Black Dog, was the name of an occult club in Somerset Maugham's "The Magician," a novel in which the protagonist, Oliver Haddo, was modeled after Aleister Crowley.

Folk and metal are fused together in the eight-minute, suite-like "Stairway to Heaven", which became a massive album-oriented rock FM radio hit despite never being released as a single. "Stairway" has been controversial due to unsubstantiated but insistent claims of "satanic" backmasked messages, not to mention Page's undeniable influence on some of the frontwards lyrical imagery and symbolism, though it is generally regarded as Plant's breakthrough writing as a lyricist. The song features three distinct movements: a slow acoustic introduction, a more up-tempo acoustic middle section, and an electric finale marked by an iconic guitar solo. In 2005, the readers of Guitar World magazine voted Page's "Stairway to Heaven" guitar solo the greatest solo of all time.^[4]

"Rock and Roll" is a tribute to the early rock music of the 1950s but with a heavy metal twist, featuring John Bonham's classic drum introduction and Jimmy Page's driving 12 bar riff. Recently (as of 2006), the song has been used prominently in Cadillac automobile commercials--one of the extremely rare instances of Led Zeppelin's surviving members permitting the licensing of their songs.^[5]

concludes with an altered version of a Memphis Minnie/Kansas Joe McCoy blues song, "When the Levee Breaks". Led Zeppelin's version opens with a drum beat, which has been sampled for use in many modern rock and rap releases.^[6] The distinct resonance of the drums in the song was achieved by recording them in a stairwell at Headley Grange, a former poorhouse in Headley, East Hampshire. The stairwell echoed at exactly half the tempo of the song, adding a false hit between each beat.

[edit] Album cover and inside sleeve

The tower block on the back cover is of Butterfield Court in Dudley, England (not the now demolished Prince of Wales Court, as is sometimes incorrectly stated). Butterfield Court can be seen, owing to it being 20-stories high and on top of a ridge, 25 miles away in rural Worcestershire and Shropshire and on a clear day, over 45 miles away in Wales. A contemporary image of Butterfield Court can be seen here [1]

The painting on the front of the album showing an old man carrying a bundle of sticks, was apparently purchased from a junk shop in Reading, Berkshire by a Led Zeppelin roadie (Jimmy Page has stated it was bought by Robert Plant)^[7] and affixed to the internal, papered wall of the partly demolished house for the photograph to be taken. 'The man with the sticks on his back' can also refer to the biblical Cain, who, in legend was said to have ended his journeys on the moon contributing to the image on the face of the moon. Film critic Robert Ring has also suggested that the picture might be a reference to the 1920's witchcraft documentary Häxan: Witchcraft through the Ages. In the film, there is a similar-looking witch, and inside the bundle of sticks are body parts from a thief hung on the gallows (Trivia section, "Häxan", Classic-Horror). This would be fitting, given Page's interest in hermetic studies. The house and surrounding area in the picture are by Butterfield Court in the Eve Hill area of Dudley; the use of Eve Hill may be an in-joke ["Ev-il"] by the band.

The typeface for the lyrics to "Stairway To Heaven", printed on the inside sleeve of the album, was Page's contribution. He found it in an old arts and crafts magazine called Studio which started in the late 1800s. He thought the lettering interesting and got someone to work up a whole alphabet.^[8]

[edit] Track listing

[edit] Side one

1. "Black Dog" (Page/Plant/Jones) – 4:55
2. "Rock and Roll" (Page/Plant/Jones/Bonham) – 3:40
3. "The Battle of Evermore" (Page/Plant) – 5:38
4. "Stairway to Heaven" (Page/Plant) – 7:55

[edit] Side two

1. "Misty Mountain Hop" (Page/Plant/Jones) – 4:39
2. "Four Sticks" (Page/Plant) – 4:49
3. "Going to California" (Page/Plant) – 3:36
4. "When the Levee Breaks" (Page/Plant/Jones/Bonham/Memphis Minnie) – 7:08

[edit] Credits

• Led Zeppelin:
  • Jimmy Page - Acoustic guitar, electric guitar, mandolin, producer, remastering, digital remastering
  • Robert Plant - Vocals, harmonica
  • John Paul Jones - Synthesizer, bass guitar, keyboards, mandolin, recorders
  • John Bonham - Drums
• Ian Stewart - Piano on "Rock and Roll" (uncredited)
• Sandy Denny - Vocals (Track 3)
• Peter Grant - Executive producer
• George Chkiantz - Mixing
• Andy Johns - Engineer, mixing
• George Marino - Digital remastering
• Graphreaks - Design coordinator
• Barrington Colby Mom - Inside illustration (The Hermit)

[edit] Charts

Album - Billboard (North America)

Singles - Billboard (North America)

[edit] Cultural references

Side A of the album was made somewhat infamous as make-out music in the film Fast Times at Ridgemont High, in a scene which Damone says to Ratner, "When it comes to making out, whenever possible, put on side one of Led Zeppelin IV." Ratner later commits a slight gaffe, by playing (Physical Graffiti's) "Kashmir".

[edit] See also

• The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time

[edit] References

1. ^ ^{a b c d} The Straight Dope: What do the four symbols on Led Zeppelin's 4th album mean?
2. ^ Song Facts
3. ^ Ralph Bakshi, as quoted on the official Bakshi forum
4. ^ About Guitar, 100 Greatest Guitar Solos, accessed September 10, 2006
5. ^ Rock and Roll Dropped from Cadillac advert
6. ^ Artofmix.com
7. ^ Brad Tolinski and Greg Di Bendetto, Greg, "Light and Shade", Guitar World, January 1998.
8. ^ Brad Tolinski and Greg Di Bendetto, "Light and Shade", Guitar World, January 1998.

[edit] External links

• Led Zeppelin IV at MusicBrainz
• Jimmy Page's Symbol - Solved