The first Zeppelin album feels less produced, more in the room, so the double-tracking is less obvious. But by the time you get to 1971 and the fourth album, the production is massive. What do you feel was different then in the production sound?
I was acquainted with John Paul Jones’ playing as a session player, but John Bonham, with his approach to the drums and the dazzling technique that he had, the overall sound of his drums was unlike anybody that I’d heard before. It was so musical, because he knew how to tune his drums. So I knew instinctively what I wanted to do with Led Zeppelin that was unlike anybody else. I wanted to have the full stereo picture, the placing of the instruments.
And guitar-wise?
The first album was totally based around the Telecaster. And that’s what it was – just a Supro [Coronado 1690T] amp, [a Sola Sound Tone Bender] overdrive, an Echoplex [EP-3 tape delay] and a Vox wah-wah. So it’s really very minimal and it’s not going through different amps, just this one amplifier. So it really goes to show with all the tones just how much there was that you could get out of one guitar. And that’s basically what it was that I had. I wasn’t using the Black Beauty or anything like that. And as it went on, the second album was clearly going to be all about the Les Paul guitar. But again, it’s a large stereo picture of everything that’s going on, whether it’s panning of things or positioning or whatever, or where things come in or go out, what’s tracked and what isn’t tracked.
Things were moving very fast for you and the band at that time.
The first album was done in a very short time. The second album was done while we were on the road in America, although we were coming backwards and forwards to England, so it’s got all the energy of touring.
That energy was evident in the big rock numbers such as Whole Lotta Love and Heartbreaker, but the second album also had subtler songs such as Thank You and Ramble On…
The first two songs that I had for Led Zeppelin II were Whole Lotta Love and What Is And What Should Never Be… II is almost like turning a coin, isn’t it? One side to the other as far as textures and moods…
Dazed And Confused was just one of many epic tracks in the Zeppelin catalogue – alongside Stairway To Heaven, Kashmir, Achilles Last Stand…
It was part of the overall thing from the first album. Part of it goes back to what I said about singles. With Whole Lotta Love, that was clearly going to be the track that everybody was going to go to, because that riff was so fresh and it still is. If somebody plays that riff it brings a smile to people’s faces. It’s a really positive thing. But I knew with Whole Lotta Love that there weren’t going to be any edits. I insisted that they kept the middle section in it, which of course they didn’t like, but they had to do it. So I thought, well, if you just keep making the numbers longer and longer… [Laughs] They’re not going to make them singles! I did think that in a mischievous way. But there was another reason to make them longer and longer – there was more to say in them. Then again, it could be argued the other way. Good Times Bad Times is really short, as far as minutes and seconds, but there’s just so much that goes on in that. It is what it is. Sometimes you have shorter statements. Sometimes you need longer to get across what you’re doing.
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