You wouldn't think there's much in common between prog-rock outliers Led Zeppelin and syrupy Scandi pop group ABBA, yet there is: Zep recorded tracks for their album “In Through The Out Door” at ABBA's Polar Studios. According to legend, after meeting at the Stockholm recording studio, ABBA's Benny and Bjorn took Robert Plant on a night out to a local sex club. ¹⁾

Prior to his breakthrough with Led Zeppelin, Jimmy Page dabbled in the dark arts and even ran an occult bookshop and publishing firm, The Equinox Booksellers and Publishers on London's Kensington High Street. The four symbols on the fourth album's sleeve were supposed to be Satanic symbols. ²⁾

Before forming Zeppelin, each member of the band had a solid reputation as a session musician. As a result, when it came time to sign their first album deal with Atlantic, they were able to negotiate an unprecedented $200,000 advance as well as nearly entire writing rights to their music. ³⁾

The partying of Led Zeppelin is legendary. For example, have you ever heard the tale of how they once booked six floors of the Andaz West Hollywood Hotel in Los Angeles for their entourage and pals, staging a drug-fueled orgy while drummer John Bonham drove a motorcycle along the hotel corridors? ⁴⁾

Zeppelin made some significant audio advances. Jimmy Page's usage of reverse echo, as heard on “Whole Lotta Love,” for example, was groundbreaking at the time. Of course, Page played it down: “I'd just been in the studio twisting nobs.” ⁵⁾

Zeppelin had their own special plane, the Starship, by 1973. It cost $30,000 to lease and included a bar with a built-in keyboard organ, a video library and a shower area. The plane was also used by Deep Purple, the Rolling Stones and Peter Frampton. ⁶⁾

Jimmy Page, a well-known early adopter of Gibson's double-necked guitar (Gibson EDS-1275), reportedly needed more than one. ⁷⁾

According to televangelist Paul Crouch in 1982, if you play the “bustle in your hedgerow” portion of Zep's “Stairway To Heaven” backward, you can hear subliminal Satanic undertones. “You must have a lot of time on your hands to even consider that people would do that,” Robert Plant responded. ⁸⁾

In 2012, Robert Plant admitted to the Guardian that he had pretended to be an NME journalist in order to gain entry to a festival in Marrakech. “I said I worked for the NME. And I could get up to the front with my recorder, and there were a lot of fantastic Berber rhythms,” he continued.⁹⁾

According to a former bandmate, Hendrix disliked Led Zeppelin, claiming the band “borrowed” from other bands. ¹⁰⁾

The Who's man is rumored to have given Zep their name. Moon and Who bassist John Entwistle recorded the instrumental “Beck's Bolero” with Page, John Paul Jones and Jeff Beck in May 1966. The song turned out good, and they discussed creating a new band. Moon reputedly predicted that the band would fail like a lead balloon, hence the name “Led Zeppelin.” ¹¹⁾

There aren't many bigger Tolkien fans than Zeppelin, whose songs “The Battle of Evermore,” “Ramblin' On” (with references to Gollum and Mordor) and “Carouselambra” were all odes to the Lord of the Rings. ¹²⁾

Earlier that year, John Paul Jones announced the formation of a new band, Minibus Pimps, in partnership with Norwegian ambient musician Deathprod. ¹³⁾

Zep's stubborn unwillingness to produce singles helped to establish the concept of “AOR:” album-oriented rock. ¹⁴⁾

This is the amount of time it took Zep to develop and produce their debut album after founding in 1969. The band barely spent 30 hours in the studio. ¹⁵⁾