HAWAII, 1969
Led Zeppelin arrive in Honolulu on a Pan American 707 jet clutching the master tapes for Led Zeppelin II. Written on the road while the band toured the US amid a whirlwind of booze, drugs and groupies, it was recorded in multiple locations. The final record was mixed in 48 hours at A&R Studios in New York withEddie Kramer. It would become the biggest selling album of 1969 in the States, toppling Abbey Road from top spot on the Billboard Charts. Kramer later revealed that the famous echo sound in Whole Lotta Love was a mistake. “It was one of the biggest mistakes I ever made. We were in the middle of the song, and it comes to the break: ‘Woman…’ And you hear another one – well, one of the other vocal tracks was breaking through because we were using this funky old console. It wouldn’t allow me to turn the vocal off; I couldn’t get rid of it. Page and I looked at each other at the same time, and we grabbed a knob and threw a shitload of reverb on it. We laughed and said, ‘Let’s leave it’.”