Led Zeppelin's music has thrilled generations of rock fans. Arising from the blues-rock movement of the late 1960s, it quickly expanded into something enormous, more potent and more dazzling than anything that had been heard before. They were a simply monumental musical experience, a meeting of brute force and intelligence with a riot of differing influences, from folk to funk, filling out the textures of a formidable repertoire.

But what were 'The Houses of the Holy'? Where was the Stairway to Heaven'? Which strange encounters led to such classics as 'Kashmir' and 'Tramples Underfoot'? This book reveals the roots and origins of the songs on all eight of the band's celebrated studio albums, together with all the stories behind material released after Zeppelin's break-up in 1980, including Unledded: No Quarter and the BBC Sessions album.