The debut album by the mighty Led Zeppelin; a record that was the start of so much. Astoundingly, this collection of songs was recorded in just 36 hours and cost £1,782 to make. It was funded by Jimmy Page, who also produced it, and the band’s manager, Peter Grant. With this record, Zeppelin didn’t invent Hard Rock, but they perfected it. They fused Blues, Folk and Rock, writing 5 of the 9 songs, with the remaining being interpretations and their own reworkings of classic Blues and Folk songs.

When I was 15 years old I had a guitar teacher who was never ready for our lesson on a Saturday morning. Often when I’d show up he was still sleeping. He’d sit me in his teaching room as he showered and every week he’d pop the same record on. The album started with a massive riff before segueing into a little drum interlude played exclusively on cymbals after one minute seventeen. One morning, I’m sure after a particularly heavy night, my teacher emerged just as the album started playing for the second time. The little bit with the cymbals started and he started air drumming in the geekiest way you could imagine, telling me that this was the greatest drum solo of all time. “The greatest?” I wondered. “How could it be the greatest? There are no massive drum fills, what is he talking about?” I can still see his scrunched-up face as his hands flailed about. The song, ‘A Whole Lot Of Love,’ the drummer, John Bonham, and the album, this one!

Often considered by critics as their artistic peak, ‘Physical Graffiti,’ is the sixth album by Led Zeppelin in as many years. It’s just astounding to think that the band was still managing to output such a volume of music in such a short space of time. Originally intended as a single album the band had recorded 8 songs which spilled over into 3 sides of an LP. Instead of cutting the tracks, many of which ran over 6 minutes, the band decided to add an extra side, making it a double album, by using outtakes from previous sessions and albums.