The early days (1968–1970)

The New Yardbirds
The beginnings of Led Zeppelin can be traced back to the British blues-influenced rock band The Yardbirds. Page joined The Yardbirds in 1966 to play bass guitar after the original bassist, Paul Samwell-Smith, left the group. Shortly after, Page switched from bass to second lead guitar, creating a dual-lead guitar line up with Jeff Beck.

Following the departure of Beck in October 1966, The Yardbirds, tired from constant touring and recording, were beginning to wind down. Page wanted to form a supergroup with himself and Beck on guitars, and The Who's rhythm section - drummer Keith Moon and bassist John Entwistle. Vocalists Donovan, Steve Winwood and Steve Marriott were also considered for the project. The group never formed, although Page, Beck and Moon did record a song together in 1966, Beck's Bolero, which is featured on Beck's 1968 album, Truth. The recording session also included bassist-keyboardist John Paul Jones, who told Page that he would be interested in collaborating with him on future projects.

The Yardbirds played their final gig in July 1968. However, they were still committed to performing several concerts in Scandinavia, so drummer Jim McCarty and vocalist Keith Relf authorised Page and bassist Chris Dreja to use the Yardbirds name to fulfil the band's obligations. Page and Dreja began putting a new line-up together. Page's first choice for lead singer, Terry Reid, declined the offer, but suggested Robert Plant, a Birmingham singer he knew. Plant eventually accepted the position, recommending a drummer, John Bonham from nearby Redditch. When Dreja opted out of the project to become a photographer—he would later take the photograph that appeared on the back of Led Zeppelin's debut album—Jones, at the suggestion of his wife, contacted Page about the vacant position. Being familiar with Jones' credentials, Page agreed to bring in Jones as the final piece.

The group played together on record the first time on the final day of sessions for the P. J. Proby album, Three Week Hero. Proby recalled, Come the last day we found we had some studio time, so I just asked the band to play while I just came up with the words. ... They weren't Led Zeppelin at the time, they were the New Yardbirds and they were going to be my band.

The band completed the Scandinavian tour as The New Yardbirds. One account of the band's naming, which has become almost legendary, has it that Keith Moon and John Entwistle suggested that a possible supergroup containing themselves, Jimmy Page, and Jeff Beck would go down like a lead balloon, a term Entwistle used to describe a bad gig. The group deliberately dropped the 'a' in Lead at the suggestion of their manager, Peter Grant, to prevent thick Americans from pronouncing it as leed.

Grant also secured an advance deal of $200,000 from Atlantic Records in November 1968, then the biggest deal of its kind for a new band. Atlantic was a label known for its catalogue of blues, soul and jazz artists, but in the late-1960s it began to take an interest in progressive British rock acts, and signed Led Zeppelin without having ever seen them, largely on the recommendation of singer Dusty Springfield. With their first album not yet released, Led Zeppelin made their live debut at the University of Surrey, Guildford on October 15, 1968. This was followed by a U.S. concert debut on December 26, 1968 (when promoter Barry Fey added them onto a bill in Denver, Colorado) before moving on to the west coast for dates in Los Angeles, San Francisco and other cities.

In July 1969 Led Zeppelin was the headliner of the Schaefer Music Festival in New York City's Central Park, along with The Byrds, Chuck Berry, Fleetwood Mac, Miles Davis, B.B. King, The Beach Boys, Frank Zappa and Patti LaBelle.


Led Zeppelin (the first album)
Main article: Led Zeppelin (album)
Shortly after their first tour, the group's eponymous first album was released on January 12 1969. Its blend of blues, folk, and eastern influences with distorted amplification made it one of the pivotal records in the creation of heavy metal music. However, Plant has commented that it is unfair for people to typecast the band as heavy metal, since about a third of their music was acoustic.

In an interview for the Led Zeppelin Profiled radio promo CD (1990) Page said that the album took about 36 hours of studio time to create (including mixing), and stated that he knows this because of the amount charged on the studio bill. Peter Grant claimed the album cost ?1,750 to produce (including artwork). By 1975, the album had grossed $7,000,000.

Led Zeppelin's album cover met an interesting protest when, at a 28 February 1970 gig in Copenhagen, the band was billed as The Nobs as the result of a threat of legal action from aristocrat Eva von Zeppelin (a relative of the namesake creator of the Zeppelin aircraft), who, upon seeing the logo of the Hindenburg crashing in flames, threatened to have the show pulled off the air.


Led Zeppelin II
Main article: Led Zeppelin II
In their first year of existence, Led Zeppelin managed to complete four U.S. and four UK concert tours, as well as find time to release their second album, entitled Led Zeppelin II. Recorded almost entirely on the road at various North American recording studios, the second album was an even greater success than the first and reached the number one chart position in the U.S. and the UK. Here the band further developed ideas established on their debut album, creating a work which became even more widely acclaimed and arguably more influential. It has been suggested that Led Zeppelin II largely wrote the blueprint for 1970s hard rock.

Following the album's release Led Zeppelin made several more tours of the United States. They played often, initially in clubs and ballrooms, then in larger auditoriums as their popularity grew. Led Zeppelin concerts could last more than three hours, with expanded, improvised live versions of their song repertoire. Many of these shows have been preserved as Led Zeppelin bootleg recordings.


Led Zeppelin III
Main article: Led Zeppelin III
For the composition of their third album, Led Zeppelin III, Jimmy Page and Robert Plant retired to Bron-Yr-Aur, a remote cottage in Wales, in 1970. This would result in a more acoustic sound than previously exhibited by the group (and a song, Bron-Yr-Aur Stomp, misspelled as Bron-Y-Aur Stomp on the album cover, which was a complete remake of Bert Jansch's song The Waggoners Lad). Strongly influenced by folk and Celtic music, the album revealed a different side of the band's versatility.

The album's rich acoustic sound initially received mixed reactions, with many critics and fans surprised at the turn taken by the band away from the primarily electric compositions of the first two albums. Over time, however, its reputation has recovered and Led Zeppelin III is now generally praised. It has a unique album cover featuring a wheel which, when rotated, displayed various images through cut outs in the main jacket sleeve.

The album's opening track, Immigrant Song, was released in November 1970 by Atlantic Records as a single against the band's wishes (Atlantic had earlier released an edited version of Whole Lotta Love which cut the 5:34 song to 3:10, removing the abstract middle section). It included their only non-album b-side, Hey Hey What Can I Do. Even though the band saw their albums as indivisible, whole listening experiences—and their manager, Peter Grant, maintained an aggressive pro-album stance—some singles were released without their consent. The group also increasingly resisted television appearances, enforcing their preference that their fans hear and see them in person.

The album finishes with “Hats Off To (Roy) Harper”, a track dedicated to their influential contemporary, Roy Harper, that both honours Harper’s work and acknowledges the bands’ roots in acoustic music.