Swan Song by Elin Hildebrand

Marshalling their strength after the dark interlude of Presence – a period that extended far after its 1976 release, with the band spending a year in tax exile and Robert Plant suffering another personal tragedy when his son died – Led Zeppelin decided to push into new sonic territory on their eighth album, In Through the Out Door. A good deal of this aural adventurism derived from internal tensions within the band…

Created at a time of intense turmoil for Led Zeppelin – they scrapped a planned international tour in the wake of Robert Plant's car accident in Greece in August 1975 – Presence is a strange, misshapen beast of a record that pulls upon its own tension. With Plant somewhat on the sidelines – he recorded many of the vocals while in a wheelchair – Jimmy Page reasserted himself as the primary creative force in the band, helping steer Presence toward a guitar-heavy complexity, perched halfway between a return to roots and unfettered prog…