Without a doubt, AC/DC. I honestly rate Led Zeppelin as a horrible, horrible band, and can't think of anything about them that doesn't make my stomach turn, except for Bonham's drumming sometimes.

Robert Plant (and Roger Daltrey for that matter, though the Who weren't nearly as awful as Zeppelin) really set the bar high for how damned irritating a singer can be. Led Zeppelin = endless bullshit guitar solos, proto-cock rock shrieking, tiresome and unexceptional "bluesy" garbage, and some of the worst lyrics to ever be bleated out. Seriously. Every song need not be about either fucking or Hobbits and other fantastical crap. I can't fathom people taking this band seriously, yet they do.

The worst thing I can think of about AC/DC is that when they play live, there are often too many extended guitar solos, which I hate. Other than that, they are a fine, fine band. No showoffy wanking on the records (that I can remember), no Dungeons and Dragons goblin lore bullshit.

Edited to fix a punctuation error...

i am surprised more people do not find this to be hard

zeppelin is certainly miles more pretentious than ac/dc has ever been capable of being

but they were also an incredible, incredible band much of the time

i think i might pick ac/dc, but then i think about john paul jones' bass playing on 'heartbreaker' or the one drum fill in 'kashmir,' or any one of about 1,000,000 of page's riffs, and then i cannot decide

If you relegate this to the 'desert island', it becomes a little bit easier

I can only think of a handful of AC/DC songs I'd want to hear more than a couple of times, but the Zep albums have a wide array of sounds/songs that I enjoy, each for different reasons (bass part, drum fill, guitar riff etc etc). More variety, too. If you count some of the Zep live albums (esp How The West Was Won) or that DVD that came out around the same time, they win, hands down.

desert island, i pick ac/dc. so i guess i pick ac/dc.

johnnyshape wrote:You get to choose one or the other. Not both. One or the other. When you choose one, the other is written out of history like in some horror short story. Choose wisely. Choose correctly.

on this basis, i have to choose zep. while ACDC are arguably a great band, i think their style of rock is so incredibly generic and not particularly creative, so that if they were written out of history, it wouldn't really be the biggest deal... i think their contribution to the overall landscape of rock n roll is a lot less unique than LZ's. take for example the style of drumming that is so key to ACDC... isn't that bonham's style? while every great drummer owes something to bonham, i don't really think many owe much to what's-his-face. y'know?

so based solely on the fact that ACDC's music is so very generic, i would say if we're talking about blinking someone out of existence, it has to be them.

toomanyhelicopters wrote:what's-his-face.

Phil Rudd, for fuck's sake. Tattoo that name on your forehead. or maybe just your hi-hat wrist.

zeppelin. stupid thread.

AC/DC.
Led Zeppelin are pretty much responsible for all that is pompous, bloated and overblown in rock music.
Bonham ruled, but then they killed him.

hip priest wrote:AC/DC.
Led Zeppelin are pretty much responsible for all that is pompous, bloated and overblown in rock music.....

pompous, overblown rock music?....not AC/DC?:shock:


....You're kidding, right?

like the ramones and motorhead, ac/dc is a one trick pony. however, it's a real good trick. at times I have often wondered if they knew they were writing the fattest riffs possible that would become the dna of all after (back in black etc.).
zep, on the other hand, had a much bigger scope and a few more tricks. there are bands i like more than zep, but i do think in terms of image, music, ego, money, tall tales, music, concerts, posturing, bullshit, hilarious concert film, charachters and swagger they are the greatest rock band of all time. the fact that they quit before it got too far off the rails certainly works in their favor.

ps, unlike a lot of folks, i actually liked some of the tunes off of that albini recorded album. i wanted to hate it, but i think its better than presence.