Another album replay set list for my Saturday show. The three records I’m playing – Black And Blue by The Rolling Stones, In Through The Out Door by Led Zeppelin and Drama from Yes – all came to mind thanks to chats with friends the past week or so.

The Stones and Zep albums, released in 1976 and 1979, respectively, came up in a discussion about albums that may not have been necessarily well received critically upon release but have seemed to stand the test of time and in the view of some, and also in so-called retrospective reviews by journalists, have risen in stature.

There’s the Stones, “auditioning guitar players” as Keith Richards termed Black And Blue. It was recorded in sessions stretching, in various stints, from late 1974 to early 1976 before its April, 1976 release and featured various guitarists including eventual Stone Ron Wood after the departure of Mick Taylor. What resulted was a brew of rock, funk, soul, disco and reggae helped along by the presence, among others, of keyboardist Billy Preston who contributed live and in studio to various Stones projects during that period, and percussionist Ollie Brown. The departed Taylor was on record as saying he enjoyed the album.

Then Zeppelin, in relative tatters with Robert Plant still mourning the death of his young son and Jimmy Page and John Bonham in the throes of drug and booze addiction, releasing a somewhat uncharacteristic, keyboard-heavy album. That’s due in large measure to the influence of bassist/keyboard player John Paul Jones, a noted if perhaps underappreciated session player along with Page in the early 1960s, who co-wrote six of the seven songs on the album, previously unheard of for anyone outside the Page-Plant songwriting duo.

And then there’s Drama, the out of left field in terms of personnel Yes album from 1980 featuring members of The Buggles of Video Killed The Radio Star fame when Trevor Horn (lead vocals, replaced longtime Yes singer Jon Anderson) and Geoff Downes (keyboards) replaced Rick Wakeman. I got talking about it, and Yes in general, when a friend mentioned he was going to see Yes on a bill with Deep Purple coming up in August and we agreed that Drama is a damn fine album. It’s one of my favorites by Yes, I don’t hear much difference between Horn’s vocals and Anderson’s, but that’s not even really the point because I like the almost metallic sound of the record, particularly its opening track, the 10-minute epic Machine Messiah. And the rest of it. So, here you go, three interesting albums for a Saturday morning.

The Rolling Stones – Black And Blue

1. Hot Stuff
2. Hand Of Fate
3. Cherry Oh Baby
4. Memory Motel
5. Hey Negrita
6. Melody
7. Fool To Cry
8. Crazy Mama

Led Zeppelin – In Through The Out Door

1. In The Evening
2. South Bound Suarez
3. Fool In The Rain
4. Hot Dog
5. Carouselambra
6. All My Love
7. I’m Gonna Crawl

Yes – Drama

1. Machine Messiah
2. White Car
3. Does It Really Happen?
4. Into The Lens
5. Run Through The Light
6. Tempus Fugit