Led Zeppelin

With Robert Plant on lead vocal and Jimmy Page on guitar, Led Zeppelin is one of the most iconic, legendary, and influential rock bands in musical history. Tales of their indulgence in sex, drugs, and excess have swirled for decades. In this definitive oral history of the band, Barney Hoskyns finally reveals the truth about Led Zeppelin, paring away the myths and describing what life was really like for four young men on top of the world, enjoying fame on a scale that not even the Beatles experienced as a touring live act. Through fresh new interviews with the surviving band members, close friends, their tour manager, and scores of other fascinating characters, Hoskyns provides deep insights into the personalities of the band members and chronicles the group's dramatic rise, fall, and legacy.

• Based on more than 200 interviews with everyone from Robert Plant, Jimmy Page, and John Paul Jones to road manager Richard Cole, their late manager Peter Grant, and many others central to the Zeppelin story
• Features striking photos of the band both on and offstage, many published here for the first time
• Takes a fresh look at Led Zeppelin's music, cultural significance, and legend, as well as the highs and lows of the sex, drugs, and rock and roll lifestyle on the road
• Analyzes the way the band wrote, arranged, and recorded, from how they created the stupendous sound and dynamics on "Dazed and Confused" and "Whole Lotta Love" to the group's folk-suffused acoustic side embodied in songs like "Friends" and "That's the Way"
• Written by Barney Hoskyns, contributing editor at British Vogue who is the author of the bestselling book Hotel California and the co-founder of online music-journalism library Rock's Backpages

Preface xiii

Personae Gratae xxiii

PART 1 ALL SHOOK UP 1

1 Surbigloom Blues 5

2 The Impenetrable Brotherhood 19

3 Walking into Stourbridge 31

4 The Freakout Zone 44

5 Happenings Fifty Years’ Time Ago 60

6 Turning to Gold 74

PART 2 IN THE LIGHT 85

7 Whatever Jimmy Wants 87

8 Atlantic Crossing 105

9 Like a Freight Train on Steroids 116

10 Every Inch of My Love 133

11 In the Misty Mountains 151

12 Stairwell to Headley 173

13 Heavy Friends 189

14 Trampled under Foot 208

15 When I Look to the West 226

PART 3 TWITCHY TIMES 241

16 Out of the Maelstrom of Mediocrity 245

17 Almost Infamous 273

18 Invocation of My Demon Brother 294

19 Turning into the Storm 316

20 A Powerhouse of Madness 338

21 Roundheads and Cavaliers 349

22 Does Anyone Remember Laughter? 371

23 Polar Opposites 379

24 Dinosaurs Rule! 396

PART 4 WEARING AND TEARING 407

25 Staggering from the Blast 409

26 The Swan Song 419

27 Jimmy’ll Fix It 427

28 Dark Days for a Cocksman 440

29 Mighty Rearrangements 455

30 What Was 471

31 And What Should Never Be 480

Author Interviews 491

Other Sources 497

Acknowledgments 511

Notes 515

Index 517