Led Zeppelin: Led Zeppelin II [ATLANTIC]

Why you'll love it

Led Zeppelin II knocked the Beatles' Abbey Road off No. 1 in the US and became the band's first chart-topper on both sides of the Atlantic. "Whole Lotta Love" and "Heartbreaker" basically wrote the hard-rock rulebook.

This edition

• Single LP, 9 tracks
• Atlantic pressing of the 1969 album
• Produced by Jimmy Page, engineered by Eddie Kramer

About the album

Led Zeppelin made their second album on the run, cutting it in studios across England and North America between tour dates in 1969, and somehow that frantic, road-tested energy only made it stronger. Jimmy Page produced, a young Eddie Kramer engineered, and the result is the band's heaviest, rawest and most riff-driven record: blues stretched until it snapped and reassembled as something louder and wilder.

"Whole Lotta Love" is the obvious landmark, with that seismic riff and its swirling psychedelic breakdown, but "Heartbreaker" (and Page's famous unaccompanied solo), the Tolkien-touched "Ramble On," the slow-burning "What Is and What Should Never Be" and John Bonham's drum showcase "Moby Dick" are every bit as essential. It knocked Abbey Road off the top of the charts, and it's never really stopped being played loud since.

Also at Kops: more Led Zeppelin on vinyl · browse Rock

Tracklist

Listen

On Atlantic, a reissue of the 1969 album.