They might have been the band that toppled The Beatles off their perch as the world’s most exciting and commercially viable outfit, and had a dab hand in rock getting heavier and more expansive, but Led Zeppelin weren’t the infallible rock gods some fans might have you believe.
There’s no doubt that the quartet were an excellent coming together of some of their era’s sharpest musical minds and that, despite the cultural faultlines that may have existed between West Midlands natives, Robert Plant and John Bonham, and middle-class Londoners, Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones, when you put the four of them in a room together, their collective din had the power to transfix in even the ways that The Beatles could never unlock.
Although the quartet did much to advance rock music, they weren’t impervious to criticism. Whether it be the fact that they not-so-subtly ripped off their heroes or some of their highly dubious off-stage antics, like every band of such stature, Led Zeppelin were not artistically bereft of the odd blemish. This reality also applies to their original musical creations, and outside of the occasions they shamelessly pilfered ideas from their idols, they released a mass of songs that pale in comparison to their highlights.
Sometimes they could be trying too hard, thinking they were being funny when they weren’t in others or elsewhere, just outright creepy; the Led Zeppelin discography is littered with tracks they should never have released for various reasons. Therefore, we’ve listed five that the British icons should have thought twice about letting see the light of day.
Songs Led Zeppelin should never have released:
‘Sick Again’
Led Zeppelin will never be able to escape their sordid reputation regarding the ‘groupie’ scene of the 1970s. Allegedly, some band members were associated with the “baby groupies”, the young, vulnerable teenage girls who hung out with some of the era’s biggest stars – men who were much older – and had relationships with them.
This, matched with the lyrics of ‘Sick Again’ from 1975’s Physical Graffiti, are vomit-inducing. Plant sings: “Said you dug me since you were thirteen / Then you giggle as you heave and sigh.” While that is absolutely gross, the following portion adds a sinister dimension to it all: “One day soon you’re gonna reach sixteen / Painted lady in the city of lies”.
Plant later claimed that he wrote the song because he felt sorry for these young girls, which may well be the case, but it doesn’t make the moanded lines: “I’m the one you want / I got to be the one you need” feel any less uncomfortable.
‘Royal Orleans’
Plant and Led Zeppelin were no strangers to questionable lyrics. According to Jones, the lyrics of ‘Royal Orleans’, from 1976’s Presence, were a manifestation of the frontman’s homophobic attitudes in his younger days, which he attributes to his sheltered upbringing in the West Midlands. Although the song features a tight groove, Plant’s mocking of Jones for allegedly going to bed with a drag queen and accidentally lighting his hotel room on fire does not wash today.
Worsening the blow, Jones says the story isn’t even true. “Oh, that was Robert in his usual homophobic manner,” the bassist asserted in 2001. “Everybody knew who those [drag queens] were. They were friends of Richard [Cole]’s. And yes, we knew they were transvestites. We were friends… But Robert was a bit provincial.” He also concluded that the singer was “a bit homophobic in those days”.
‘Hot Dog’
Led Zeppelin were no strangers to playfully trying to emulate the works of others when they weren’t plain ripping them off. This can be found in the James Brown-esque funk of ‘The Crunge’ from Houses of the Holy, and, in a much less enjoyable instant, ‘Hot Dog’ from 1978’s In Through the Out Door. The late 1970s was a strange time for the band; as new forms emerged, the world changed, and they tried to keep up, leading to this record, the last before Bonham’s death in 1980, featuring many different styles.
While meant to be jocular and an ode to the group’s long-time love of old-school country, ‘Hot Dog’ is a strand-out oddity on a record brimming with peculiarity. While Jones delivers some energetic barrelhouse piano, guitar hero Page’s tone is complete garbage and sounds cheap, with Bonham’s drumming incredibly boring and lacking any of his customary imagination. Not only this, but Plant’s vocals are majorly grating, and the lyrics aptly horrendous, featuring uncomfortable lines such as “I took her word, I took it all” and “I took her love at seventeen / A little late these days it seems”.
They should have kept it within the four walls of their rehearsal space. It’s desperate stuff.
‘Carouselambra’
I said In Through the Out Door was varied. While the band might have taken it back to their rudimentary roots on ‘Hot Dog’, on ‘Carouselambra’, they delved into another extreme. While you can forgive the band for the record to an extent because of Bonham’s hardening alcoholism and band leader Page’s heroin addiction, this left room for Jones to add more of his instincts to the milieu, which could have saved it. However, while he had been crucial to some of their finest tracks like ‘Black Dog’, this was not the case with ‘Carouselambra’, a genuinely awful cut.
It becomes apparent quickly what the flaws with this unnecessarily long 10:28 song are. One is the length, and another is the serious lack of substance. Still, the main gripe is that the keyboards, while cutting-edge at the time, sound horrendous today. They appear incredibly tacky, exacerbated by the fact that the rest of the group are extremely lousy in their respective roles.
‘Bonzo’s Montreaux’
This is an absolute stinker. Bonham confirmed himself as a legendary drummer with the recorded version of ‘Moby Dick’ found on Led Zeppelin II. It crystallised his genius fusion of hard rock fury with temperate jazz technique. Yet, trying to follow it up with ‘Bonzo’s Montreux’, recorded in September 1976 at Mountain Studios in Montreux, Switzerland, was a terrible idea.
Not released until 1982 on Coda, with the band ending upon the drummer’s sad passing two years prior, its inclusion might have felt like a fitting way to honour their late friend, but Page’s heavy use of effects on this drum solo is maddening. The guitarist’s use of the novel Eventide Harmonizer to create a steel drum effect makes for a very weird and even laughable listening experience that indicates just how ridiculous classic rock bands have become and why punk emerged as a reaction.
