Product Description

The author of the cult book "Techgnosis" writes about the big, big Led Zeppelin album. Featuring every heavy metal fan's favourite epic Stairway to Heaven, the huge sound of this album has set the template for rock. Also includes Black Dog and Rock 'n' Roll.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #223761 in Books
• Published on: 2005-04-28
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 177 pages

Review
"'A brilliant idea' The Times; 'Neat' Nick Hornby; 'Pocket-size books about favourite albums is a nice idea, akin to TV's Classic Albums and with an equal amount of care and attention.' The Guardian (Friday Review)"

About the Author
Erik Davis has been writing about music, subcuitures, and technoculture for fifteen years. His cult book Techgnosis: Myth, Magic, and Mysticism in the Age of Information (1998), was translated in five languages and has just been republished with a new introduction by Serpents Tail. He is a regular contributor to Wired, and lives in San Francisco.

Customer Reviews

Bonkers!
These little books are a great idea and make lovely companions to the albums in question. Most readers will have the album already, particularly so for such a monumental classic as Led Zep iv. Thus I think this must have been one of the most difficult ones to write in the series. What else can one say that is not known already? The approach is therefore original as I think it has to be, and I think it succeeds.

What's in it? At 177 pages this is possibly the thickest book of the series. The detail is staggering; there's a bit on the imagery of the cover, the science of recording, an interesting section on the physical concept of an album (as opposed to the digital download), and alot on Aleister Crowley and satan, and the obligatory backward messages hidden in "Stairway to Heaven"; we don't even reach track 1 until page 75 and then the author even discusses the gaps in between the tracks! It concentrates very much on things magical, pagan, phallic, mythical, and (middle) earthy (even the spelling of "Erik" conjures up visions of black magic!). Therefore we learn quite a bit about Page and Plant, but not much on the other two. Alot of it is frankly bonkers, but who cares, it is thoroughly entertaining and I devoured it!

Ugggghhhhhh!!!!!
Want to know what it was like during the recording sessions? What was the atmosphere like when Stairway to Heaven was being recorded? How did Sandy Deny get on with the group? What sort of guitar strings did Page use?

All these questions and hundreds more left totally unanswerd!

No, instead we have page after page of psudo-academic rubbish. For example, Erik is kind enough to point out that this album came out on vinyl, vinyl is analogue, analogy is key to magical practice, Jimmy Page is into magic. This is somehow significant enough to need half a dozen pages to explain and totaly ignores the equally remarcable coincidence that CDs are digital, digits are numbers, numerology is a key magical practice...

This is music writing at its worst: a music journalist who loves the sound of his own proes more than the music he's writing about. Avoid at all cost.

Oh dear......
Not much to say really apart from how utterly tedious this book was to read. I usually enjoy reading about how people are affected by great music but this was just nonsense and tells you nothing about how this great album came into being......a wasted opportunity.