Reviews

Led Zeppelin - "In Through The Out Door" Platinum Drums | John Bonham - Drum Transcriptions

Details

Written by Bart Elliott

Led Zeppelin: In Through the Out Door Platinum Drums draws from more than 30 years of documentation, interviews, and recorded footage. This drum transcription book delivers unprecedented accuracy, with vintage Zeppelin photographs and historical forewords by Guitar World magazine’s editor-in-chief, Brad Tolinski, that chronicle the history of one of classic rock’s greatest bands. This songbook series includes accurate drum transcriptions that will help drummers learn the genius behind John Bonham’s iconic grooves and fills. Drum notation keys are also included.

In Through the Out Door is the band’s eighth studio album and the final appearance of drummer John Bonham before his untimely passing. Released in 1979, the album showcases the band's “poppier” side, and thus performed extremely well on numerous charts worldwide, as well as reaching Multi-Platinum status in three countries. Titles include: "In the Evening" • "South Bound Saurez" • "Fool in the Rain" • "Hot Dog" • "Carouselambra" • "All My Love" • "I'm Gonna Crawl".

Led Zeppelin: In Through the Out Door Platinum Drums is now available for $19.99 each. Also available are albums I-V from the Led Zeppelin Platinum Drums catalog. Pick up your copies at a local music retail store, or buy them today through the Drummer Cafe.

REVIEW

In Led Zeppelin: In Through the Out Door Platinum Drums, the book starts out with a historical forward from Guitar World magazine's Editor-in-Chief, Brad Tolinski, complete with vintage Zeppelin photographs; nice.

While the Platinum Drums transcription series continues to have some of the best published John Bonham transcriptions to date, the "unprecedented accuracy" claim just doesn't meet my standards or the standards I've set for my own John Bonham transcriptions.

Several examples of notation mistakes I found:

• "In The Evening" is missing a number of Kick drum notes, such as the AND of ONE in measures 3 and 11. In measure 26 of the transcription, the Floor Tom is missing on the AND of TWO, which occurs in unison with the Snare drum (which was notated).

• "I'm Gonna Crawl", which is written in 6/4, is missing the ghosted Snare triplet figure in the fourth bar of the first verse (transcription measure 20). The drum fill which occurs in the middle of the guitar solo, transcription measure 83, in that beat six is not a triplet figure on the High Tom, but rather a single quarter-note on the Floor Tom.

I didn't take the time to check every transcription in the book, just the two I've already mentioned previously and found errors in, plus "Fool In The Rain" which appears to be accurate.

Despite the glitches and few mistakes I found, I still recommend this drum transcription series to all Led Zeppelin fans and those wanting to further study the drumming styles of legendary drummer, John Bonham.