The Rover

Physical Graffiti, 1975

The second track on Physical Graffiti had been largely recorded three years earlier, during sessions for Houses Of The Holy at Stargroves in Hampshire, although its roots stretched back even further, to Page and Plant’s songwriting trip to Bron-Yr-Aur in 1970.

That it fitted perfectly on to Physical Graffiti said much about that album’s gloriously loose, grabbag approach. Sandwiched between Custard Pie’s Godzilla-sized blues funk and the electric gospel of In My Time Of Dying, it offered a moment of effortless cool, Plant playing the role of mystic wanderer on top of some of Page’s most inventive and restless guitar work.

Like much of the album, the peculiarities of the production gave it a fuzzy sound that would have had listeners at the time checking for fluff on their stylus. But by this point in their career, Zeppelin were beyond such earthly concerns as perfect clarity. Whatever forces they were channelling had made them unstoppable. De