Track Listing

1. Achilles last stand
2. For your life
3. Royal Orleans
4. Nobody's fault but mine
5. Candy store rock
6. Hots on for nowhere
7. Tea for one

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3893 in Music
• Released on: 1997-08-25
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Original recording remastered
• Dimensions: .21 pounds

Amazon.co.uk Review
Presence is one of Led Zeppelin's more overlooked albums, languishing in the monstrous shadow of its predecessor, Physical Graffiti. It's more noted in Zeppelin mythology for the circumstances in which it was recorded, in double-quick time with vocalist Robert Plant's leg in plaster after a car accident. The lack of time does show--much of the album feels like generic heavy rock, bigger on volume than variety. It's worth the price of the album, however, for the ten and a half minute long "Achilles Last Stand", a crashing, galloping epic with John Bonham sounding like he's eschewed drumsticks in favour of tree trunks--and "Nobody's Fault But Mine", a Blind Willie Johnson blues standard regenerated with a 3000-watt boost by Jimmy Page. Led Zeppelin's contribution to rock was primarily physical--raising its heat and density levels, heightening its sensual force. --David Stubbs

CD Description
Led Zeppelin's seventh album, PRESENCE, is a straight-aheadrocker, that has much more of a "live" feel than some of their previous recordings. Gone are most of the big productionflourishes, and in their place the big power trio + vocals sound that made Led Zeppelin such a popular concert band.
The opening "Achilles Last Stand" is a driving, up-tempo rocker, while the closing "Tea For One" is a slow, Chicago-style blues, featuring Plant's moaning vocals and Page's alternatingly sweet, and frenetic solos. Elsewhere, "Royal Orleans" mixes delta blues with Indian music, "Hots On For Nowhere"is a stop-time boogie, and "Candy Store Rock" is heavy metal rockabilly.

Customer Reviews

Weak in the beauty of Presence
On the majority, Zeppelin aficionados will forever single out "IV" and "Physical Graffiti" as being the landmark Led Zeppelin albums. Indeed they are, but "Presence" is my personal favourite. OK, it doesn't have the musical range and diversity of "Physical Graffiti" but I feel this Zep album is the most consistent in content. It is a true hard rock album with no frills - every member plays a blinder (as per usual), but most notably Page and Bonham. "Achilles Last Stand", "For Your Life", "Nobody's Fault But Mine" and "Tea For One" (chilled blues at its best) are the absolute stand out tracks for me. "Presence" is the true back-to-basics Zeppelin. I highly recommended this album to anyone.

A consumate work
If its successor could arguably be the John Paul Jones album, then 'Presence' is the Jimmy Page album. Plant, Jones and Bonham perform to their usual high standards, but it is the guitar work which dictates the pace and direction of this often overlooked Zeppelin album. Zeppelin fans were used to Plant's vocals duelling with Page, as in the thrust and counter-thrust of 'Black Dog', or dominating songs as in 'Since I've been loving you'. On 'Presence', however, the contributions of Plant et al comply with (and wonderfully, too) the riffs and sequences that Page drives this album with. The opener, 'Achilles Last Stand' is a monumental track, Plant's vocals sitting comfortably atop the fluent and galloping guitar patterns. The stand out track is 'Nobody's Fault But Mine'. The riffs are evocative, punctuated by the pounding, tightly played rythms and interwoven with Plant's vocal. Zeppelin as a unit do not get much better than this. The closing track, the beautiful 'Tea for One' has all the ingredients to be a show-stopper, but once or twice just seems to drift and lose its way a little. 'Presence', while not as diverse in its content as other offerings, is a consumate piece of work and worthy of its place in the Led Zeppelin legacy.

Sounds better now than I remember at the time...
I was and still am a fan of Led Zeppelin's music. Over the years, the story behind these times for the band have been published and it seems that the touring, drink/drugs (Nobody's Fault But Mine) and sheer loneliness (Tea For One) had really got to them. This, coupled with Robert Plant's broken leg/ankle effectively backed them into a corner. The result was this album.

At the time, I didn't care much for the "screaming" production of the original (UK) LP ("presence" indeed in HiFi speak...), but the years and the release on CD have seen this body of work mature almost out of all recognition.

Not an album to listen to casually (not much of their work is, to be fair). The more you put in, the more enjoyment you'll get in return.

I'm wondering also whether the "pared to the bone", harder style in this collection of tracks would have been a template for the eighties? Sadly, we'll never know...

A worthwhile buy, with some treasures contained within...