10 Rock Bands That Completely Avoided The Sophomore Slump
4. Led Zeppelin II - Led Zeppelin
Led Zeppelin were in a bit of a strange state at the start of the British Blues Boom. With Jimmy Page fresh out of his stint in the Yardbirds, Led Zeppelin's debut was a firm enough declaration of power, from the hard rock clangor of Communication Breakdown to the full on experience of Dazed and Confused. Instead of waiting around while on tour, Zeppelin took to the road and came out with one of the templates for modern hard rock.
Completed almost entirely on the road, Led Zeppelin II still feels like a freewheeling good time from start to finish, as Robert Plant starts to gain more confidence in his blues wails on tracks like Whole Lotta Love and The Lemon Song. While you could tell that they were still working out the bugs on their debut, this is where Zeppelin starts to become seasoned pros, with John Bonham laying down some of the heaviest grooves imaginable on songs like Moby Dick and What Is and What Should Never Be.
That doesn't mean the album is one-note though, as some of the best songs are acoustic cuts like the loving tribute Thank You or the spectral journey of Ramble On. Whereas the first Zeppelin record was still a solid helping of blues rock, Led Zeppelin II is the unofficial document of the moment when the blues morphed into hard rock.