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In Through the Out Door by Released15 August 1979RecordedNovember–December 1978Studio, , Length42:25 chronology
(1976)In Through the Out Door
(1979)
(1982) from In Through the Out Door "/"
Released: 7 December 1979

In Through the Out Door is the eighth studio album by the English rock band , and their final album of entirely new material. It was recorded over a three-week period in November and December 1978 at 's  in , , and released by  on 15 August 1979. In Through the Out Door was the band's eighth and final studio release to reach the top of the charts in America, and was the last released by the band before the death of drummer  in 1980.

The album is a reflection of the personal turmoil that the band members had been going through before and during its recording. For example, frontman  and his wife had gone through a serious car accident, and their young son, Karac Plant, died from a stomach illness. All four band members also felt weary of dealing with record companies and other associates. Despite this, the release wound up being a huge commercial success, particularly in the  (sitting at the #1 slot on 's chart in just its second week on the chart).

Background

The album was named by the group to describe its recent struggles amidst the death of 's son Karac in 1977, and the  the band took from the UK. The exile resulted in the band being unable to tour on British soil for over two years, and trying to get back into the public mind was therefore like "trying to get in through the 'out' door."

In contrast to previous Led Zeppelin albums, In Through the Out Door features much greater influence on the part of bassist and keyboardist  and vocalist , and relatively less from drummer  and guitarist . Two songs from the album—"" and ""—were the only two original Led Zeppelin songs that Jimmy Page had no part in writing. With the exception of "," a  based song credited to all band members (which was eventually released on the 1982 album, ), Bonham did not receive writing credits for any of the songs recorded at . This diminished input by Page and Bonham is attributed to the two band members often not showing up on time at the recording studio, with Bonham struggling with  and Page battling . As Jones said, "there were two distinct camps by then, and we [Plant and I] were in the relatively clean one."

Many of the songs were consequently put together by Plant and Jones during the day, with Page and Bonham adding their parts late at night. According to Jones, this was

…mainly because I had a new toy. I had this big new keyboard. And Robert and I just got to rehearsals early, basically. [...] With Zeppelin writing, if you came up with good things, and everybody agreed that they were good things, they got used. There was no formula for writing. So Robert and I, by the time everybody turned up for rehearsals, we’d written three or four songs. So we started rehearsing those immediately, because they were something to be getting on with.

Following the recording sessions at Polar Studios, the album was mixed at Page's personal studio at his home in . "", "" and "" were recorded during sessions for this album, but were dropped because of space constraints. All later appeared on Coda.

Packaging and artwork

The original album featured an unusual : the album had an outer sleeve which was made to look like a plain brown paper bag (reminiscent of similarly packaged  sleeves with the title rubber-stamped on it), and the inner sleeve featured black and white line artwork which, if washed with water, would become permanently fully colored. There were also six different sleeves featuring a different pair of photos (one on each side), and the external brown paper sleeve meant that it was impossible for record buyers to tell which sleeve they were getting (there is actually a code on the spine of the album jacket which indicated which sleeve it was—this could sometimes be seen while the record was still sealed). The pictures all depicted the same scene in a bar (in which a man burns a ), and each photo was taken from the separate point of view of someone who appeared in the other photos. The walls are covered with thousands of yellowed business cards and dollar bills. The photo session in a London studio was meant to look like a re-creation of the Old Absinthe House, in , .

The album artwork was designed by .  recalls the design in his book Eye of the Storm:

The sepia quality was meant to evoke a non-specific past and to allow the brushstroke across the middle to be better rendered in color and so make a contrast. This self same brushstroke was like the swish of a wiper across a wet windscreen, like a lick of fresh paint across a faded surface, a new look to an old scene, which was what Led Zeppelin told us about their album. A lick of fresh paint, as per Led Zeppelin, and the music on this album... It somehow grew in proportion and became six viewpoints of the same man in the bar, seen by the six other characters. Six different versions of the same image and six different covers.

And:

Did you ever notice you could affect the dust jacket by putting water on it? If you applied spittle to it or a bit of water, it would change color, like a children's coloring book we based it on. But we didn't tell anybody. I don't think Zeppelin told anybody, either.

In 1980, Hipgnosis were nominated for a  in the category of  for In Through the Out Door.

Release and critical reception Professional ratingsAggregate scoresSourceRating73/100Review scoresSourceRating7/104/58/107/10B+

The album was intended to be released before the band's twin , but production delays meant that it was released shortly after their performances at this event. Plant jokingly referred to the delays at times during the performance on 4 August.

The album went to No. 1 on 's chart in its second week on the chart. On this album's release, Led Zeppelin's entire catalogue made the  between the weeks of 23 October and 3 November 1979, an unprecedented feat. The album remained on the US top spot for seven weeks and sold three million copies by the end of September 1979. It is also the Led Zeppelin album that has been most weeks on the top of the charts (tied along with ). To date, the album has sold six million copies in the US.

In Through the Out Door divided contemporary critics and Led Zeppelin fans; some found its synthesizer-influenced music inevitable but forward-thinking while others felt the band had forsaken their heavy, fast sound. According to Jimmy Page biographer Martin Power, "predictably, in the wake of , In Through the Out Door received a rough ride from some critics, with Zep's veteran status in the music business now used as a stick with which to beat them."  reviewer Charles M. Young said Page's diminishing creativity resulted in little good material to work with for Plant, whose lyrics Young found inane, and Bonham, whose drumming was viewed as heavy handed. This brought to the forefront the keyboard playing of Jones, whom Young said "functions best behind Page, not in front of him". Chris Bohn from  said "the impressionable first play" of the record "had everyone in the office rolling around laughing", while accusing the band of being "totally out of touch" and "displaying the first intimations of mortality". By contrast,  journalist  argued that the album was "no epitaph", believing its "potential points of departure" deserved further listening.  also wrote positively of the record in , observing the usual "lax in the lyrics department", but regarding the album as the group's best since  (1973). He said "the tuneful synthesizer pomp on side two confirms my long-held belief that this is a real good art-rock band", while "the lollapalooza hooks on the first side confirms the world's long-held belief that this is a real good hard rock band."

Following the album's release, Plant, Page and Bonham all expressed reservations about the record. In 1990 Plant stated:

In Through The Out Door wasn't the greatest thing in the world, but at least we were trying to vary what we were doing, for our own integrity's sake. Of all the [Led Zeppelin] records, it's interesting but a bit sanitised because we hadn't been in the clamour and chaos for a long time. In '77, when I lost my boy, I didn't really want to go swinging around—"Hey hey mama say the way you move" didn't really have a great deal of import any more. In Through The Out Door is more conscientious and less animal.

In a 1998  magazine interview, Page was asked about the paradigm shift of the album's composition and style:

GW: I thought maybe you were losing your enthusiasm for the band.

Page: Never. Never. In fact, Bonzo [i.e. drummer John Bonham] and I had already started discussing plans for a hard-driving rock album after that. We both felt that In Through the Out Door was a little soft. I was not really very keen on "". I was a little worried about the chorus. I could just imagine people doing the wave and all of that. And I thought, 'That is not us. That is not us.' In its place it was fine, but I would not have wanted to pursue that direction in the future.

In the same interview Page explained that in juxtaposition to the previous  album, John Paul Jones was inspired to create new material from his recently purchased  synthesizer, and he was "...working closely with Robert, which was something that had not happened before."

Page said in 2004, "we wanted, after In Through the Out Door, to make something hard-hitting and riff-based again. Of course, we never got to make that album." He is also quoted as saying "It wasn't the most comfortable album. I think it was very transitional... a springboard for what could have been.

In Through the Out Door was Led Zeppelin's final album to be released while all the original members were still living. Drummer  died the next year on 25 September 1980.

Track listing

All tracks written by , , and , except where noted.

Side oneNo.TitleWriter(s)Length1."" 6:532."" Jones Plant 4:133."" 6:104."" Page Plant 3:18Side twoNo.TitleWriter(s)Length5."" 10:346."" Jones Plant 5:537."" 5:29