DU Album of the Day: Led Zeppelin - Physical Graffiti

[LynneSin]

I know it's an even day and gratious probably has something planned (he can post it tomorrow). But it's my birthday damnit and I'm going to pick the album and of course I'm going to pick the very best album possible.

Thirty years ago today a cute boy I liked requested "Kashmir" for me in honor of my 16th birthday. Ever since then "Kashmir" is my official birthday song.

So here is my song sung by my favorite singer

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And for those of you who would like to sing along

Oh let the sun beat down upon my face, stars to fill my dream
I am a traveler of both time and space, to be where I have been
To sit with elders of the gentle race, this world has seldom seen
They talk of days for which they sit and wait and all will be revealed

Talk and song from tongues of lilting grace, whose sounds caress my ear
But not a word I heard could I relate, the story was quite clear
Oh, oh.

Oh, I been flying... mama, there ain't no denyin'
I've been flying, ain't no denyin', no denyin'

All I see turns to brown, as the sun burns the ground
And my eyes fill with sand, as I scan this wasted land
Trying to find, trying to find where I've been.

Oh, pilot of the storm who leaves no trace, like thoughts inside a dream
Heed the path that led me to that place, yellow desert stream
My Shangri-La beneath the summer moon, I will return again
Sure as the dust that floats high in June, when movin' through Kashmir.

Oh, father of the four winds, fill my sails, across the sea of years
With no provision but an open face, along the straits of fear
Ohh.

When I'm on, when I'm on my way, yeah
When I see, when I see the way, you stay-yeah

Ooh, yeah-yeah, ooh, yeah-yeah, when I'm down...
Ooh, yeah-yeah, ooh, yeah-yeah, well I'm down, so down
Ooh, my baby, oooh, my baby, let me take you there

Let me take you there. Let me take you there


Oh and last time I was in NYC:

[hifiguy]

1. LZ's masterpiece.

"Trampled Underfoot" "Kashmir" "In My Time of Dying" "In the Light" "The Rover"

Nuff said.

[gratuitous]

2. I'd post a response to this thread-jack

But I didn't know how to spell:

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Oh, and happy fucking birthday.

[OmahaBlueDog]

3. As a whole, it's probably my favorite Zeppelin album

It doesn't have the straight-on raw power of the 1st and 2nd albums, and it doesn't have the monster hits of the 4th album (excepting Kashmir), but it's really their masterwork.

What's also amazing is that part of the album is purely original, but parts of it were castoffs from the 4th and 5th albums. This leads to one of R & Rs great nomenclature oddities: the song Houses of the Holy is not on the album of the same name -- it is instead on the album Physical Graffiti.

From Wikipedia:

Because the eight tracks extended beyond the length of a conventional album, it was decided to include several unreleased songs which had been recorded during the sessions for previous Led Zeppelin albums. The instrumental "Bron-Yr-Aur" was recorded in July 1970 at Island Studios, London, for Led Zeppelin III. It was named after Bron-Yr-Aur, a cottage in Gwynedd, Wales where the members of Led Zeppelin spent time during the recording of Led Zeppelin III. "Night Flight" and "Boogie with Stu" were recorded at Headley Grange and "Down by the Seaside" at Island Studios, all for Led Zeppelin IV. "The Rover" and "Black Country Woman" were recorded at the same sessions as "D'yer Mak'er" at Stargroves using the Rolling Stones Mobile Studio in May 1972. "Houses of the Holy" was also recorded in May 1972, but at Olympic Studios. The group's fifth album, Houses of the Holy, took its title from this song despite the decision not to include the song on that album. Page explained:

We had more material than the required 40-odd minutes for one album. We had enough material for one and a half LPs, so we figured let's put out a double and use some of the material we had done previously but never released. It seemed like a good time to do that sort of thing, release tracks like "Boogie With Stu" which we normally wouldn't be able to do... [T]his time we figured it was better to stretch out than to leave off.[5]

According to engineer Nevison, the decision to expand the album to include songs from previous sessions was not part of the original planning:

I never knew that Physical Graffiti was going to be a double album. When we started out we were just cutting tracks for a new record. I left the project before they started pulling in songs from Houses of the Holy and getting them up to scratch. So I didn't know it was a double [album] until it came out.[6]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_Graffiti