In honour of Led Zeppelin being presented with a Polar Prize by the Royal Swedish academy of Music, I offer you a partial effort to explain the meaning behind Led Zep songs.

Before that, I’d like to pick a bone with the sloppy Swedish journalism displayed over the Led Zep polar prize. All of the Swedish papers I read spoke about “the tragic death of their guitarist, John Bonham in 1980”. Now, I’m sure Mr Bonham, being a consummate musician could probably play a guitar, but for pete’s sake, he was Led Zeppelin’s legendary DRUMMER. And considered one of the greatest drummers of all time. Now was it asking too much to go and check the facts?

If you are not a Zep fan, move along, there's nothing to see here.......



When I was in my late teens, I considered Led Zeppelin to be gods. I think most teens in the ‘70s went through that phase. We would quote lyrics left, right and centre and endlessly debate the meaning behind each of their songs. As far as we were concerned, Plant and Page were geniuses, deep thinkers, modern day philosophers and complete legends.

My father on the other hand thought they were long-haired, layabout gits. But then what do parents know?

I wonder now whether it was in fact deep thinking or was I simply mesmerised by the heavy guitars and the pounding rhythms. And of course stunned by Robert Plant's amazing hair. As an awkward, shy sixteen year old with dead straight, baby fine hair, I was in awe of his glorious, thick, curly locks. It was my dream to have hair like that and I still weep with the injustice of it all (much to my husband’s amusement). It’s so unfair.

But on to the songs! I’ll start with one very appropriate to me -Immigrant Song. And you should not miss the - Viking Kitten version of this one, which is priceless. Today I want to look with my forty-plus eyes at the lyrics that sent me into spasms of ecstasy at sixteen:

The hammer of the gods will drive our ships to new lands,
To fight the hoard, singing and crying: Valhalla, I am coming!

I can’t believe that I sang these lyrics out loud. Valhalla, I am coming? How did I not break into fits of laughter when I said those words?

On we sweep with threshing oar

What was I thinking? What did a quiet teen living in sunny Australia in the 1970s know about the icy forces of Norse mythology? Maybe I already knew back then that I’d end my days in the frozen north. I must be psychic.

Sure, they had plenty of songs that were about love and sex and subjects other than faeries and Norse gods. But those weren't the lyrics that we discussed. Those were not the lyrics we quoted as if they were the mantra of our life.

I sang The Battle of Evermore as if I was a storyteller. I felt the pain, the despair, the anguish. Oh, I was so deep and so in tune with my lyrical heroes.

Queen of Light took her bow,
And then she turned to go,
The Prince of Peace embraced the gloom,
And walked the night alone

You know, I had no idea what they were going on about. It just sounded good. It sounded like poetry. It sounded deep. In turn, I thought it made me sound scholarly and deep when I sat around ruminating about the Prince of Peace and his Queen.

My favourite song at one point was No Quarter:

The winds of Thor are blowing cold.
They're wearing steel that's bright and true

Maybe my Tolkien-drenched mind kept me from finding the lyrics to be amusing and a tad pretentious, like I do now. I was living in this outer realm, where hobbits existed and wars were fought between inhuman creatures. Plant knew that, he knew the mindset of the kids those days. And he played on it. Either that or he did a lot of acid.

Now, forgive me for this next part. I know that some of you consider Stairway to Heaven the Greatest Song Ever. I sure did back then. But please, look at these lyrics.

If there's a bustle in your hedgerow,
don't be alarmed now,
It's just a spring clean for the May queen.

One summer night, five of us sat on the open tailgate of a someone's mum's station wagon, parked in the last row of the old Hectorville Starline drive-in. For two hours, we discussed the meaning behind the lyrics to that song, spending an awful lot of time on the "bustle in your hedgerow" line. We each had a different interpretation of the song. We each took our own meaning from it. And that was deep, man. I mean, wow...they spoke to each one of us in a different way. How incredibly cool!

It was only years later that I realised the words probably meant nothing more than that Robert Plant read a lot of books. He strung some thoughts and words from his favourite novels together, mixed them in a blender and called it Stairway to Heaven. The mysticism was further eroded when Andrew Denton had each of his special guests do their own version of the song on one of his ABC shows – I think the pirate-shanty version and the Rolf Harris one finally did me in.

I still do listen to Led Zep regularly, and there are far, far better songs than Stairway to get my old school groove on to. After careful consideration, I'd have to say my favourite Zeppelin song is either Communication Breakdown or Kashmir, both for very different reasons. Though you can still find me playing air guitar to Black Dog every once in a while.

So, what's your favourite Zeppelin song?

And if someone can explain to me the line I saw a lion, he was standing alone with a tadpole in a jar, from Dancing Days, I'd much appreciate it.