Led Zeppelin 384

At their best, cover albums have a strange way of galvanizing an artist by returning to the songs that inspired them; the artists can find the reason why they made music in the first place, perhaps finding a new reason to make music. Robert Plant's Dreamland – his first solo album in nearly ten years and one of the best records he's ever done, either as a solo artist or as a member of Led Zeppelin – fulfills that simple definition of a covers album and goes beyond it, finding Plant sounding reinvigorated and as restless as a new artist…

Rolling Stone Magazine released a list of "500 Greatest Songs of All Time" in November 2004. It represents an eclectic mix of music spanning the past 50 years, and contains a wide variety of artists sharing the spotlight. The Rolling Stone 500 was compiled by 172 voters comprised of rock artists and well-known rock music experts, who submitted ranked lists of their favorite 50 Rock & Roll/Pop music songs. The songs were then tallied to create the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

The romantic comedy Singles, in part a homage to director Cameron Crowe's hometown of Seattle, was released at exactly the right time (summer 1992). Nirvana's Nevermind had symbolically knocked Michael Jackson off the top of the album charts at the beginning of the year, and the underground buzz about Seattle bands like Alice in Chains, Soundgarden, and Pearl Jam was beginning to find its way past circles of indie aficionados and open-minded hard rock fans and into the mainstream. Singles helped crystallize the idea of the "Seattle scene" in the mainstream public's mind, and it was also one of the first big-selling '90s movie soundtracks (it went platinum and reached the Top Ten) to feature largely new work from contemporary artists. The soundtrack's strength was the way it was so firmly rooted in place – where future soundtrack extravaganzas simply contrived to gather as many big-name acts as possible, Singles focused specifically on Seattle-area music (quite logically, given the film's plot and setting), which gave the album the feel of a cohesive document.

Remember when, in the 1980s, the hard rock landscape was littered heavily with Led Zeppelin impostors? The apex of this so-called movement was probably 1987 through 1989, when metalheads were treated to such popular Zep-like releases as Whitesnake's self-titled commercial breakthrough and Bonham's The Disregard of Timekeeping. But possibly tops on the "Zep disciple" list were Kingdom Come, with their debut album Kingdom Come and single "Get It On," which were big hits. Their subsequent albums failed to perform as well (guess fans realized that one Zep was enough), but Kingdom Come singer Lenny Wolf has persevered and stuck to his guns throughout the years by fronting various lineups of the band.

On Mighty Rearranger, the core of the band Robert Plant showcased on 2002's Dreamland – and named the Strange Sensation – is a full-blown expanded lineup that shares the bill with him. Guitarists Justin Adams and Skin Tyson, drummer Clive Deamer, keyboardist John Baggot, and bassist Billy Fuller help Plant give listeners his most musically satisfying and diverse recording since, well, Led Zeppelin's Physical Grafitti…

Years after any remaining U.S. interest in Lenny Wolf and his Robert Plant sound-alike voice had vanished, the singer and his "band" Kingdom Come (really just a solo vehicle for Wolf) continued to release material marketed mostly in the frontman's German homeland…

This album was the debut of Uriah Heep, an English band that would become one of the Titans of the '70s heavy metal sound. Despite their eventual hard-rocking reputation, Very 'Eavy… Very 'Umble finds the band trying on different stylistic hats as they work towards finding their own sound…