No artist fits the description “album rock” better than Britain’s hardest-rocking electric blues band, Led Zeppelin. The band boast a back catalogue of albums which would become the envy of every other long-playing musician out there. That includes The Beatles and The Rolling Stones, by the way.
Zeppelin famously shied away from releasing singles. Their studio albums spoke for themselves. The first six of them are all absolute classics, from their debut record to their 1975 behemoth Physical Graffiti.
Each of these landmark albums showcases the band’s musical development and profound understanding of the blues and folk traditions. Let’s not forget the raw, unadulterated primal energy the band brought to their music, too, along with some of the best musicianship ever put on record. Guitarist Jimmy Page and drummer John Bonham, in particular, are candidates for the best to have ever picked up their instruments.
Out of all Zeppelin’s albums, though, one stands above the rest. That is to say, one of the band’s records is significantly more popular than the others, and we have the numbers to prove it.
The best and the best-selling?
Led Zeppelin’s best-selling LP is also their most acclaimed, appearing near the top of dozens of all-time best album lists. According to music critic aggregator Acclaimed Music, it currently ranks as the 33rd most acclaimed album of all time.
The album we’re talking about is Led Zeppelin IV, which built on the new direction the group had taken on their previous record while featuring some of the first genuine heavy metal tracks ever recorded. There’s guitar-shredding opener ‘Black Dog’, Little Richard-lifting headbanger ‘Rock and Roll’, and epic blues slow-burner ‘When the Levee Breaks’.
Its centrepiece is arguably Zeppelin’s high watermark and one of the best pieces of music to come out of the 1970s. ‘Stairway to Heaven’ has the scope of a classical symphony while mixing folk and metal in a way no other song has done before or since. Ethereal yet monumental, poignant yet pulsating, the track sends us straight up the stairway of its title and tumbling back down again, gently bringing us back to earth before it’s done.
According to official sales figures worldwide, Led Zeppelin IV has sold over 30million copies. Estimates put the real figure closer to 40million. The overwhelming majority of these sales have come in the United States, where the album has gone a whopping 24 x platinum.
American listeners clearly enjoy Zeppelin’s take on their own blues and folk traditions. In turn, dozens of US rock and metal bands have been inspired to forge their own paths by the musical innovations of Page, Plant, Jones, and Bonham.