“Page was the best thing about Zeppelin”
Jimmy Page lead breaks were rather simple. It was described to me thusly... trick 1, trick 2, trick 3, trick 2 (7 times), power chord, back to trick 1, then repeat the hook.
Page was a good hook mechanic tho.
Bonham was the drummer Zep needed
JPJ’s bass work and other instrumentation was delivered as only a seasoned studio musician could.
Plant had his moments.
Bowie... was okay
Elton... the yellow brick road release kicked some serious butt.
Richards was always gabby...
I’ve seen the Stones twice, personally I think they suck live.
I guess I always thought of Zep as a teenybopper version of The Who.
The technical competence of the players seemed like another CBS Records put on - like a hard edged Monkees.
The first album in ‘68 was OK; was really out there for the time. But they just sorta devolved into a money making operation concentrating on hits, using the stock riffs like you mentioned.
It’s all fun of course; Page had the right idea: he spent the whole time drunk/stoned/screwing, so it worked out for him. But not very musically significant.
A woman I once knew back in the late 70’s said the Stones sucked as musicians, but were great poets.
She might have been onto something.