Album Of The Month For February: Now And Zen

In 1985, Robert Plant reached a crossroads in his career.  His album Shaken 'N' Stirred tanked and he needed to bolster his sets on its supporting tour with songs from his 1984 project The Honeydrippers.  After a one off at Live Aid with Jimmy Page, John Paul Jones, and Phil Collins as Led Zeppelin, he briefly considered a comeback, however plans were nixed after a failed post-Live Aid appearance.  Robert took a few years off, only contributing to Jimmy Page's solo effort Outrider with vocals on one track "The Only One".  Finally in 1988, he returned to the spotlight as he released his first album in three years.  Although his songs still kept much of the computerized sound of his early work, this album sounded more natural than his first three releases.  He also brought back more of the bluesy sound from his Zeppelin years and introduced a middle eastern influence.  With this album, Robert resurrected his career and found a new sound for the next few years.

Release Date: February 28, 1988
Highest Billboard Chart Position: 6

Track Listing
1. Heaven Knows
One of two #1 hits on the record, "Heaven Knows" starts with a computerized sound leading to a hard drum beat.  It showcases Robert's rediscovered love of middle eastern music and also returns to a more natural format, although synthesized sounds still dominate the song.  Jimmy Page plays guitar on this one and helps Robert get back on track.

2. Dance On My Own
Another synth beat starts out this track, however the songwriting sounds more like Robert.  With a touch of rockabilly, Robert crafts a fairly standard rock song with a 1980s sound.

3. Tall Cool One
The other #1 song from this album included pieces that Zeppelin fans waited for years to hear: Robert accepting his previous work.  It includes samples of "Whole Lotta Love", "The Ocean", and "Custard Pie" along with Jimmy on guitar.  Before this album, he never played Zeppelin songs on tour and all but denied his existence in the band.  "Tall Cool One" signaled a return to old Robert, again writing a song with a little bit of rockabilly and blues involved.  The song was featured in a Coke ad based off of the music video.

4. The Way I Feel
At this point in the album, Robert pretty much combines his newer (well, kind of original) songwriting techniques with those of his previous solo efforts.  This sounds like a song that could easily appear on In Through The Out Door, although it is a bit more synthesized.

5. Helen Of Troy
This song is trapped by the sound of the era.  With all the new technologies and the preference for the high screeching guitar, this song sounds a little too much like hair metal.  Robert hated that term and certainly wouldn't want to create a hair metal song.  The synthesizer kills what could be an excellent piece of the album.

6. Billy's Revenge
The only track on the album void of heavy synths gets much of its influence from rockabilly like much of Roberts work in the late 1980s/early 1990s.  The guitar sounds good with Roberts voice without the computer sound and his songwriting really shines through.  He slowly moved toward making more songs that sounded like this over the next couple of albums.

7. Ship Of Fools
A standard Plant ballad, "Ship Of Fools" is almost a poor man's "In The Mood" and sounds awfully similar to "Like I've Never Been Gone" off of his first album Pictures At Eleven.  With a easy guitar guiding the song, Robert goes into his usual Western cultural reference that he had all but abandoned in his early solo work.  It was featured on the final two hour episode of Miami Vice, which gives it some 80's culture props.

8. Why
The most computer driven sound comes from this song and seems almost like a throwaway.  The lyrics aren't too complicated and the music seems fairly standard.  Not much to say about this one.

9. White Clean And Neat
Another very computerized track, Robert flexed his "I'm still not that connected to Led Zeppelin" muscles and produced another ho hum track.  It included an odd sample that just doesn't make sense so Robert didn't really finish off the original album strong.

10. Walking Towards Paradise (Bonus CD track)
This track, found on CD versions and the Nine Lives box set, is under the same vein of "The Way I Feel", except a little bit more upbeat and original.  It includes a lot of synthesized sounds, however the songwriting seems to be highlighting Robert's strengths rather than being too outside of the box.

Interesting Fact: Even though the album revived Robert's struggling career, he does not really seem to like it today.  He said in an interview with Uncut in 2005 that he could "hear that a lot of the songs got lost in the technology of the time."