Led Zeppelin 5: Houses Of The Holy

Two years—an eternity in those days—after the apex of “Stairway To Heaven”, here was another weird-looking cover and eight more songs that cover a gamut of styles, adding a few more along the way. Houses Of The Holy takes up the challenge of The Follow-Up, and succeeds in spades.

The fanfare of “The Song Remains The Same” lasts for what seems like minutes, then Plant comes in like he’s coming off a hit of helium. It winds up again towards the end, and ends on that great unresolved chord just hanging there. Which leads us into “The Rain Song”. This one is absolutely gorgeous, from end to end—the guitars, vocals, fake strings. It’s not uncommon to have an out-of-body experience when listening to this, with absolutely no stimulants or chemicals. Then with a “blang-a-dang-a-dang” it’s “Over The Hills And Far Away”, which starts like that, then picks up with a fury. Tons of hair metal anthems would open just like this, just so the guitarist could then toss the acoustic stage right when he’s through with it. The theme surfaces again at the end with a harpsichord, and everything is perfect. Then it’s off to James Brown territory with “The Crunge”, an incredibly stupid, yet endearingly catchy song. (Allegedly the band wanted to include a chart with dance steps for this song, and it’s too bad they didn’t.)

“Dancing Days” starts side two in a similar way to Zoso, with an almost psychedelic theme and words about flower power. The siren-like sections are just nifty. “D’yer Mak’er” is a hit single ‘50s parody halfway between reggae and ska that shouldn’t work but does. (It’s near the top of the list of rock songs that either no one knows the name or mispronounces it when they do. Such is the mystique of Zeppelin.) “No Quarter” continues the Viking motif from earlier albums, with nightmarish keyboards and a guitar solo that’s almost an afterthought and buzzes right through the middle. “The Ocean” has a trademark riff, echoey drums and a universal lyric, but the best part of the song—outside of the telephone ringing and squeaky kick pedal enhanced by CD technology—is the exhilarating doo-wop ending. And despite all the other musical homages and pastiches on this album, this is their first album to end without a straight blues tune.

For the first time they actually gave one of their albums an actual title, but even if they did call it Led Zeppelin V it would be fitting. (And while the title isn’t printed anywhere on the stark and mysterious cover, at least they stopped the Chicago method before it got silly.) Lyrics for all the songs are included, though they’re not always correct. But if this was the follow-up to the smash hit, they didn’t disappoint. The band was only getting better. (The mildly chintzy Deluxe Edition offers alternate versions of every song save “D’yer Mak’er”; the most striking differences are heard in the vocal-less mixes of “The Song Remains The Same”, “Over The Hills And Far Away” and “No Quarter”.)

Led Zeppelin Houses Of The Holy (1973)—4½
2014 Deluxe Edition: same as 1973, plus 7 extra tracks