Led Zeppelin "What is and What Should Never Be"

Like "I Can't Quit You Baby," "What is and What Should Never Be" is one of those rare Led Zeppelin songs where the lyrics start before the music kicks in - "Black Dog" would follow this style on Led Zeppelin IV. It's one of the earliest Zeppelin originals where the lyrics tell a story, further developing their lyrical themes of mythical storybook romance and adventure. "What is and What Should Never Be" is one of their most classic tunes, a radio staple to this day and my personal favorite song of all time.

What makes it great? John Paul Jones's legendary bass line for starters. This is one of those songs that made people turn their heads and take note of Jones, realizing that he was not your usual rock bass player but an accomplished musician who could arrange rock melodies as well as he could play them.

"What is and What Should Never Be" has a tremendously well-balanced contrast between light and shade. The song starts with a dreamy tone layered with distant guitar strumming, featherweight percussion, and background ambiance before it explodes into a series of heavy power chords before dissolving slowly back to the shadows. The slide guitar solo is especially numinous, layered upon John Bonham's echoed rim shots, Page's own clean strumming and Jones's famous bass line.

And the ending, oh what an ending. As the power chords explode back and forth between stereo speakers and the gong crashes the band kicks into one of their best pure hard rock jam sessions. It is absolutely essential to hear this song through headphones. I can't express how important this is! If you have not sat down and listened to the Led Zeppelin catalogue through headphones then you have missed out on a truly magnetic experience. There is no other moment in the band's musical history that exemplifies this more than the last moments of "What is and What Should Never Be." The ending puts the song over the top and made it one of their most classic numbers and is one of the only rock and roll tunes where the drummer can get away with hitting a gong.

The live version on How the West Was Won simply rocks and shows how the Led Zeppelin concert was an extension of their studio work. They made no effort to go on stage and make their songs sound exactly like the studio recordings, but to bring them to life. The studio recordings serve as a mere blueprint for their live music which was structured but limitless. Coordinated but spontaneous. Tight but loose.

Both the live and studio versions of "What is and What Should Never Be" have everything that made Led Zeppelin a great hard rock band. When I heard my three year old girl singing "way up high in the sky" I knew that a song that has been relevant for forty years will probably be around for at least forty more.