# Deep Tracks - Led Zeppelin - "Houses of the Holy" - Choose your favourites...



## Guest (Aug 14, 2018)

*Deep Tracks - Led Zeppelin - "Houses of the Holy" - Choose your favourites...*

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Please *choose up to five selections* for this particular poll.

On all polls created if you click on the number of votes following the song title the username of all voters and their chosen selections will appear.

The tunes themselves will be found below the poll itself as links rather than as embedded videos due to bandwidth issues for those who wish to reacquaint themselves with a tune that may have receded a bit too far into the past to be remembered with the clarity that came when they were first released...

Next up is - Led Zeppelin - "Houses of the Holy"

""Houses of the Holy" is the fifth studio album by the English rock band Led Zeppelin, released on 28 March 1973 by Atlantic Records. It represents a turning point in musical direction for the group, who had begun to record songs with more layering and production techniques, in contrast to the simpler rock music heard on earlier albums.

This album was a stylistic turning point in the lifespan of Led Zeppelin. The composition and production used on the album lay foundations which would be used again on subsequent releases. It avoided the heavy style of "Led Zeppelin II", the acoustic-oriented "Led Zeppelin III" and the classic rock status of the fourth album.

The cover art for Houses of the Holy was inspired by the ending of Arthur C. Clarke's novel Childhood's End. The cover is a collage of several photographs which were taken at the Giant's Causeway, Northern Ireland, by Aubrey Powell of Hipgnosis.

Like Led Zeppelin's fourth album, neither the band's name nor the album title was printed on the sleeve. However, manager Peter Grant did allow Atlantic Records to add a wrap-around paper title band to US copies of the sleeve that had to be broken or slid off to access the record.

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Jimmy Page has stated that the album cover was the second version submitted by Hipgnosis. The first, by artist Storm Thorgerson, featured an electric green tennis court with a tennis racket on it. Furious that Thorgerson was implying, by means of a visual pun, that their music sounded like a "racket", the band fired him and hired Powell in his place. However, Hipgnosis went on to produce the album artwork for Led Zeppelin's subsequent albums "Presence" and "In Through the Out Door".

This was Led Zeppelin's final studio release on Atlantic Records before forming their own label, Swan Song Records, in 1974, which would be distributed by Atlantic. It was also the only Led Zeppelin album that contained complete printed lyrics for each song.

Upon its release, the album received some mixed reviews with much criticism from the music press being directed at the off-beat nature of tracks such as "The Crunge" and "D'yer Mak'er".

Gordon Fletcher of Rolling Stone, on release, called the album "one of the dullest and most confusing albums I've heard this year", criticizing every song and comparing them to the band's previous work. However, the album was a commercial success and topped the UK charts and spent 39 weeks on the Billboard 200 albums chart including two weeks at number one (their longest stint since Led Zeppelin III).

In 2012, the album was ranked #148 on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time."

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houses_of_the_Holy

Your commentary on any and every aspect of the album and especially any memories reawakened as a result of the poll is welcomed.


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## Guest (Aug 14, 2018)

"The Song Remains The Same" -










 - (Live Video)

"The Rain Song" -










 - (Live Video)

"Over The Hills And Far Away" -










 - (Live Video)

"The Crunge" -






"Dancing Days" -






"D'yer Mak'er" -










 - (Live Video)

"No Quarter" -










 - (Live Video)

"The Ocean" -










 - (Live Video)


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

The boys were at their peak with this one, although Plant's vocals sound weird on this record. I usually listen to the live album for the selections from this one. Many years ago I re-tuned my guitar and learned the Rain Song.


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

Oooh...Led Zeppelin in 'knockabout humour' alert - back then I imagine some of the more one-eyed Zep nuts must have raised their eyebrows not just at the 'joke' tracks, but at the comparative lightness of the album's mood in general.

For a bunch of white boys _The Crunge_ is a passable James Brown pastiche, but the clumpy _D'yer Mak'er_ is a total turkey.

_The Rain Song_ and _No Quarter_ are two of their finest songs, _The Ocean_ is a great stomper in the Zep tradition and the rest of the album passes muster.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

"In 1206, the Birkebeiners set off on a dangerous journey through treacherous mountains and forests, taking the now two-year-old Haakon Haakonsson to safety in Trondheim. Norwegian history credits the Birkebeiners' bravery with preserving the life of the boy who later became King Haakon Haakonsson IV, ended the civil wars in 1240 and forever changing Northern Europe's history through his reign." From Wikipedia.

_No Quarter_, in the usual muddled way that rock musicians dealt with historical themes as their generation rediscovered Romanticism, evokes a hodge-podge of images from the Fenno-Scandian past. At least in my mind they do. I think of the Russo-Finnish wars of just before and during WWII, when silent ski-mounted troops armed with garrote and knife took on the Soviet invader. I think also of the hurried, secret 1940 mission to smuggle the Norwegian royal family out, one step ahead of the Wehrmacht. And of the Birkebeiner rescue of the child Haakon, spiriting him through the silent snow-filled forests and mountains. Zep must have still been on a Viking/North Woods kick when they recorded _No Quarter_ for Houses.

As I've hinted before, Romanticism is periodically discovered/rediscovered by subsequent generations in popular music, and often results in some striking songs. Perhaps a future thread....


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## Merl (Jul 28, 2016)

No Quarter but I prefer the live version. More balls.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

Merl said:


> No Quarter but I prefer the live version. More balls.


Larger balls? Or more of them?


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## philoctetes (Jun 15, 2017)

Loved this album when it was released, now I dislike it for the same reasons, too pop. This is where they went silly going for the "mass market" IMO. But Dancing Days remains a favorite just because it's so darn happy, and it also seems to presage a taste of punk... Houses of the Holy (the song) seems like a sibling to Dancing Days. I guess they couldn't put both on the same album.

#2 I suppose would be the Rain Song... Plant's lyrics are just so spongebrain tho...

Please pardon my negativity. LZ WAS my favorite band, along with Tull and Yes, at one time, soo so long ago...

I think my first jazz show was Rahsaan Roland Kirk at the Catamaran in San Diego, not long before he died. After he wheeled himself on stage and played the first song his first words were to laugh that nobody in the audience could get tickets for the hot show in town that night, which was Led Zeppelin at the Sports Arena, where I'd seen them on their last tour following Graffitti. Presence had not impressed me so by this time I could laugh at Rahsaan's joke with no regrets at all. Watching him play three instruments at once with one good hand is something I will never forget...


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

> Philoctetes: "Please pardon my negativity. LZ WAS my favorite band, along with Tull and Yes, at one time, soo so long ago..."


I come across this world-weary "I've Moved On...." refrain often here in the Nonclassical forum. Older but Wiser, etc. I must be in a tiny minority--maybe never grew up--but my musical tastes are ahistorical; I never shed my skin and emerge as a new creature. I liked LZ, Tull and Yes then, and I like them now. Old friends who can still make me dance and sing.


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## philoctetes (Jun 15, 2017)

Well that got personal too fast. Apparently evolution in judgment about one Zepp album makes me world-weary, how profound. No more pardons asked again!


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

philoctetes said:


> Well that got personal too fast. Apparently evolution in judgment about one Zepp album makes me world-weary, how profound. No more pardons asked again!


Yes. My remark was a statement of my own personal continuing enthusiasm for three groups, triggered by your non personal, dry, Olympian announcement of your passage to another plane .


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## philoctetes (Jun 15, 2017)

Never said I was even weary of Zepp in general, in fact I still enjoy I-IV and PG a lot. Meanwhile, in those 50 years since I bought Zepp's 1st LP, I've discovered other music that I missed or ignored back then. 

Never claimed to be Olympian either. I am only at fault of judging, ranking, having favorites, and changing my mind. A lot happens in 50 years, and eventually we move on for good.

It's true popular music is often a stepping stone for access into other genres. I can appreciate that without having to be forever devoting my time and money to it when there is so much music and so little time. And I personally have more important things to do than feud about it.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

^^^^Agreed.........


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## philoctetes (Jun 15, 2017)

I'll just indulge in memories, because this one has many... taking it home the day it came out, onto the turntable, then came the upset expectations, "where's that confounded bridge", but then a few more listens and I was In the Light - ... I recall friends having the same initial reaction, some never adjusting, and yeah Rolling Stone slamming it thoroughly. 

I gotta say that Side 1 is actually very good but ends with a cringe, ha.


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

An excellent album, one of their finest, I disagree that it sounds more pop than earlier efforts, I think it is one of their most experimental albums. 

Listen to the first two tracks off album IV and compare to the first two tracks on this album, to me its clear there is way more mainstream appeal on those 2 opening tracks on IV. The Song Remains the Same and The Rain Song challenge the listener more and are two of their most artistic, intricate songs. This album is quirky and weird. 

Admittedly The Crunge and Dyer Mker aren't quite up there for me with the rest of the album, but I admire the experimentation and they add variety. The Ocean is perhaps the most conservative typically Zeppelin sounding song on the record, catchy and hard rocking. Dancing Days is a unique, oddball track, catchy yet with a strange chord progression (a hard combination to master). It is a more original song than Houses of the Holy (I like both songs). My 5 picks = The Song Remains the Same, The Rain Song, OTHAFA, Dancing Days and No Quarter.


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