In an alternate dimension, where monsters reside and spirits take a break from life, Led Zeppelin are an average band.
Here on what’s known as planet Earth, I can turn on Stairway to Heaven in nearly any location (save the driver’s seat or, probably, in brain surgery) and find myself, by the time John Bonham busts into the track, in the supine position with a smile on my lips, my envelope eyelids adherent by a thin line of tears, bopping head, foot in full sway, the entirety of my insides chewing 5 gum.
That’s the power of Led Zeppelin.
The English language may not have sufficient words to describe their enchanting prowess. (Though, perhaps, we could find plenty floating on the gaseous air of the Oracle of Delphi) Their ability to conjure the cosmos hasn’t remained undefined not for lack of trying; many a tongue and finger longed for and grappled at the new locution to explain what us mere mortals only pretend to be capable of: magick.
When I first fell for them, as is with any great love, I did not have any idea that they were performing this on me. All I felt cognisant of was that I was powerlessly young and they were an emotional explosion, a thundering crash of a band. They sweated sex, they bent reality by preserving practices nearly decayed by the Science Age. They were complete charmers of my human psyche, awakening me to the energetic possibilities of reaching beyond my physical existence and being able to feel and touch, hear and see what’s out there for the first time in my life ever.
They weren’t shy about it ("I am a traveller of both time and space"), the awareness of this only entrenches one further along the palm of their outstretched hand, waiting to grasp. Nothing can prevent the listener from joining them onto the celestial plane besides themselves.
Led Zeppelin is mankind’s best attempt at using music to pull someone into that undead Plutonian, eighth realm, vortex of sex, drugs, subconscious, demons, desire, and passion.
And I stand firmly by that.