Maybe it’s because I’ve got a subwoofer in my car.

I’ve got no idea what’s going on with the weather in L.A. It’s Memorial Day weekend and it’s RAINING! Contrary to what Albert Hammond said, it does rain in Southern California. But never in May. It’s all gray, it feels like a fall day. When I got in the car it was like I was on the Post Road in Connecticut, in November, with winter just around the corner. About the same time of year that "Led Zeppelin II" was ubiquitous.

Actually, it was October when the album came out. I drove up to Korvette’s and bought it the day it was released. And played it incessantly. I’ll never forget our dog Muppsy chewing the cover…I STILL haven’t forgotten my little sister for that! (It was her dog…)

Sure, we knew "Whole Lotta Love" from the radio, but my favorite track on the album was "Living Loving Maid (She’s Just A Woman)". It started off on a tear, and maintained the intensity. But I know every lick of that album, from squeezing the lemon to bringing it on home. To the point where I couldn’t listen to it for years. It was like I copied it into my mental hard drive and it was in my memory forever. But in the spring of ’75, living in a condo in Mammoth Lakes, I was subjected to the album once again, beside "Physical Graffiti". It was all Zeppelin all the time. And with distance, I was reminded of how marvelous the overplayed "Led Zeppelin II" truly was.

At this point in time, I’d say my favorite cut is "Thank You". Maybe because of the exquisite Tori Amos cover. What happened to Tori? Did she believe her own hype, that she was a genius, and just float off into the stratosphere? She ultimately burned the fans who made her, like me. I bought that EP for so many people… With her great cover of "Smells Like Teen Spirit" too…

But, as I turned on to Wilshire Boulevard this morning, our new radio station in L.A. started playing "Ramble On". What a pleasant surprise. Usually AAA stations are too hip to lean back on the classics. If they only excised the term "World Class Rock" from their repertoire, I might almost believe… Well, if they got rid of the commercials too.

So I’m driving in this fall weather not far from the beach and John Paul Jones is dancing ALL OVER THE TRACK! Oh, Bonzo’s percussion is inviting, magical. Robert’s bringing us to Mordor. Jimmy’s adding lightning. But "Ramble On" is all about the underpinning, John Paul Jones’ bass. It’s like he’s a human pinball machine, bouncing off the bumpers. He’s playing the melody. It’s like a game of Brickbreaker on your BlackBerry. My head is nodding up and down with each note.

I’m thinking of how Robert and Jimmy toured without him. I think that was about the money, but if you don’t hate your fellow band members after years together, then you probably have no hatred for your siblings either. You’re thrown together in tight quarters for years, enduring, with no real choice. You see everybody in their worst moments, your own worst moments. But, it’s the disparate personalities that make a great band. Don Felder might have pissed off the Gods, but he did write the music for "Hotel California", the Eagles’ greatest number. Zeppelin is nothing without John Paul Jones. And John Bonham for that matter.

I was reminded of the Ox. John Entwistle was just as important in the Who. As was Keith Moon. You can’t get session players to cut this stuff. It comes from the inspiration, the tightness, the knowledge of playing with the same people day after day, FOR YEARS!

We don’t have to rewrite the history of Led Zeppelin. Legend may have it that the critics hated the band, certainly after the first album, but no one was paying attention to the writers, everybody knew Led Zeppelin was a cut above. Superstars. Giants amongst men. My favorite Zeppelin cut is "Ten Years Gone". I’d rather listen to "Your Time Is Gonna Come". But with a great act, one of your favorite acts, the secondary tracks, the ones deep in the albums, that you thought were just part of the mix, rear their heads years later and reinforce how fucking great the band truly was.