Three poems about Led - Three

Since I've Been Loving You: is just a blues song about losing love.

I like Led Zeppelin. I like a lot of their songs, but these three are the ones that I personally find most resonant. The other thing that makes me like this band is that I can hear the excitement in them when they play. When you're playing right you disappear: you float free of yourself and of time, and when the song ends it is like suddenly waking from a dream and finding yourself in some place that is briefly strange and disorientating.


I think John Bonham got lost inside the music. I wonder why so many musicians turn into addicts, alcoholics and madmen? Is it because they're trying to extend the state they find when they're playing?

Who can explain this magic? Since I've Been Loving You is just a blues song about losing love, but...

But Jimmy Page plays one of the best guitar solos in rock in it. Listening to him playing here makes you realise what a load of absolute rubbish gets peddled as guitar solos in 99% of songs. It's not about flashiness. Neil Young does solos mostly involving about five notes that make me want to cry. It's about feeling and being true to yourself. There's a lot of flashiness in Pages' solo to be fair, but it comes out as a stream of consciousness rather than a guy trying to show off.








Since I've Been Loving You is just a blues song about losing love, but.... Robert Plant has sold the song to us along time ago. We have quietened down a bit in the final verse, knowing that the final onslaught is coming. He even warns us:

"Just one more, just one more..."

And then he let's go.

The whole band hits it's pained, heartaching note under his breaking moan in a roar and it raises the hair on your arms. How come certain combinations of notes rub us the right way and create a physical response?

Robert Plant makes me think that great singers are great actors. There must be a moment when they first record a song where the acting is intense and not forced; when they give their defining performance in the role. Later though, performing the song for the one thounsandth time it must all be about being a great actor.

Mind you, losing love is an easy thing to sing about. Every young man knows what that feels like.