The 1976 album John Paul Jones called Jimmy Page’s “high point” with Led Zeppelin
The debate of which Led Zeppelin album deserves to be regarded as their best is often one fraught with contention.
There’s little disagreement over whether they’re four of the finest musicians to have ever graced the canon of rock music, and it’s hard to ignore the almost telepathic level of musicianship that was held between them, but deciding where they were at their strongest is something that divides both staunch fans and casual listeners to this day.
Both Led Zeppelin and Led Zeppelin II are records that offer up the rawer and bluesier edges of the band’s work, while III and IV see the band begin to delve further into progressive rock territory. Houses of the Holy then takes a left turn and becomes a lot more downcast but throws in more psychedelic, folk and funk influences than before. Physical Graffiti, the group’s sixth record, has it all and more.
A sprawling double album, Physical Graffiti is a record people have a hard time denying the excellence of, but at the same time, can be daunted by its vastness. The first half has two of the record’s most sprawling and ambitious tracks in ‘In My Time of Dying’ and ‘Kashmir’, both of which showcase the band sounding complete and largely playing as a unit alongside other highlights such as opener ‘Custard Pie’ and the decidedly funky ‘Trampled Under Foot’.
That sense of scale is both the album’s greatest strength and its most intimidating feature. Rather than refining their sound into a single, cohesive statement, Led Zeppelin seemed intent on showcasing every corner of their musical identity, almost as if they were determined to prove there was no style they couldn’t master.
It also reflects a band operating at the peak of their confidence. By this point, Zeppelin no longer needed to chase trends or second-guess their instincts, allowing them to embrace the excess that comes with a double album and turn it into something that feels less like a collection of songs and more like a complete archive of their creative powers at the time.
The second half of the album takes more time to showcase the group as individuals, most notably Jimmy Page and Robert Plant. For greater portions of this half, the bass and drums are pushed further back in the mix, although John Paul Jones often shows up on organ to add flourishes to Page’s masterful guitar work.
Speaking to Uncut in 2008, John Paul Jones discussed the highs and lows of Led Zeppelin’s output and the members’ relationship with one another. When questioned about their bond when writing certain records and which album was “the best place to hear Jimmy Page in his various guises,” he responded, “I’m a big fan of Physical Graffiti. I’m a big fan of all of it, to be honest. But that is quite a high point.”
With songs such as the Page solo effort ‘Bron-Yr-Aur’ showcasing his folk-adjacent finger-picking style, the epic ‘Ten Years Gone’ which cycles through many moods and closer ‘Sick Again’ having a classic rock stomp as seen on the band’s earliest work, there’s clearly something for fans of all of the guitarist’s different modes.
As for Page and Jones’s relationship beyond songwriting during the period, Jones was a little more hesitant to say they were particularly close. While he revealed that Page and Plant would often travel together outside of working together, Jones “had more of a professional relationship, I suppose, with Jimmy. I saw him on the road, basically. I didn’t see him much between tours and studios.”
The duo may not have been best friends outside the studio and on stage, but it’s evident that whatever they had in their professional lives together worked perfectly well and generated some of the most iconic albums that rock music has ever heard. Both played their part in bringing the very best out of the other.
And for the record, Led Zeppelin IV is their best album.
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