Tuesday Top Ten: Favorite Led Zeppelin Songs

Tonight I'm going to see Robert Plant in a relatively small venue (The Riv here in Chicago), and I'm predictably pretty excited.  In honor of this blessed occasion, I'm going to repost my Top Ten Led Zeppelin Songs, which I originally posted way back in May 2009, when my now-eight-year-old, Daughter, was still technically abortable.  Back then, you could make and embed playlists for free on several sites, which I can't do anymore (thanks, Obama).  However, I have supplanted the playlist with YouTube videos of each song.  With that, here is my post from nearly nine years ago, with a couple updates when necessary and a slight change in the order -- though the songs remain the same.  And that's how you drop a Zeppelin pun, motherfuckers!

There comes a point in every man's life where he discovers Led Zeppelin. It's usually around junior high, potentially earlier if you have a cool older brother who lets you borrow his records, or potentially later if you have an older sister who listens to Cyndi Lauper and will be pregnant by the time 1987 rolls around. Either way, you discover them, and then it's over -- meaning your pre-Zeppelin existence. From then on, you love them. They are probably the ultimate guys' rock band: blues-influenced, pounding drums, killer guitars, a wailing front man, sexually charged lyrics, mystical lyrics, banging groupies with fish. And any self-respecting classic rock station has a daily "Get the Led Out" block of Zeppelin songs, which you can't really say for any other group.

One of the worst days of my life came my senior year of college when an unnamed coed named Jessie left the passenger door of Blackura (my '89 black Integra) unlocked over night. In a shoebox on the floor in the back seat, I had a bunch of tapes, including every single Zeppelin album. The thieves did not take my Oakleys, nor did they take any Cream, Hendrix, or Doors tapes. No, they took every one of my Zeppelin tapes, except for the two that sloppily fell to the floor as they were trying to escape. To punish Jessie, I forced her to spend the rest of her life with me.

Zeppelin obviously has a lot of great songs, and narrowing my favorite down to ten was as difficult as forgiving Jessie (i.e., it has taken nineteen years). Here are my ten favorite songs, with the album from whence they came in parentheses (and because I love you, I included the honorable mention on the mix):

Just missing the cut: "Ramble On" (II); "Bron-Y-Aur Stomp" (III); "Tangerine" (III); "Misty Mountain Hop" (IV); "The Ocean" (Houses of the Holy); "Houses of the Holy" (Physical Graffiti); "Nobody's Fault But Mine" (Presence); "Fool in the Rain" (In Through the Out Door)

10. "How Many More Times" (I).
This is a badass song. You're not sure where it's going for the first 30 seconds, and then Bonham just starts sounding like a heard of elephants, and Robert Plant kicks it in, explaining that whoever he's singing about is consistently ungrateful.


9. "Travelling Riverside Blues" (Box Set).
This is a great cover of a Robert Johnson song, which the band recorded in 1969 (but didn't release). There is also a version on the BBC Sessions double CD. Jimmy Page's slide guitar sounds otherworldly (and I kind of mean that literally), and the whole "squeeze my lemon til the juice runs down my leg" thing means the guys must appreciate homemade lemonade.


8. "Bring It On Home" (II).
This one starts out slow and bluesy, and it almost lulls you to sleep. Then, at about 1:44, BAM! What an awesome guitar riff.


7. "Good Times Bad Times" (I).
I've always loved this song. Well, not always, but at least for the past 27 or 28 years. What a heavy song for 1969. As this was the first song off of their first album, it was the first thing tons of people ever heard by Zeppelin. And with that, heavy metal was born.


6. "Over the Hills and Far Away" (Houses of the Holy).
What a great song, starting off with an acoustic intro, and then building up with anticipation until sonic orgasm is reached with the chorus.


5. "Your Time Is Gonna Come" (I).
I don't know how I forgot about this one on my list of Top Ten "Fuck You" Songs, but it should probably be up there. It starts with some strange church organs, lulling you into a false sense of security before unleashing some hate on a woman who done somebody wrong. "You been bad to me woman, but it's comin' back home to you."


4. "What Is and What Should Never Be" (II).
It starts off all slow and trippy, the busts into the chorus like John Bonham into a liquor cabinet.


3. "Hey Hey What Can I Do?" (B-side to the single version of "Immigrant Song"; also on the Box Set).
This is a very sweet song about a whore.

2. "Out on the Tiles" (III).
This is an underrated Zeppelin nugget about hanging out on tiles and such.


1. "When the Levee Breaks" (IV).
I've sung this song's praises before, and I will likely do so again.  It's been my favorite Zeppelin song for nearly three decades.  The unmistakable drum beat, driving guitars, fuzzed-out harmonica, and wail of Robert Plant adds up to seven minutes of blues-soaked awesomeness. It feels like you're in an unrelenting rain storm in the Mississippi Delta in the late '20s.