Originally Posted by Terrapin_Station

"Album-oriented" FM radio took over by the early 70s. It was what was influential and what everyone was listening to--including school kids, middle class suburban families who weren't completely square, etc.

And those magazines were all glossy affairs that were found on every magazine rack--from book stores to drug stores, convenience stores, airport gift shops, etc. They were everywhere. If you had been between, say, 9 years old and university age during the 70s, and you were in the US and at all interested in popular music, there would have been no way you wouldn't have been familiar with those magazines. (The majority of my teen years were during the 70s, by the way.)

The idea that Led Zeppelin was at all an "underground" group is very ridiculous, and seems to be primarily sourced in people noticing that Rolling Stone magazine didn't care for them very much early on, compounded with a strange belief that Rolling Stone was somehow the arbiter (or at least a sole accurate reflection) of popular culture.

Rolling Stone was more fringe than magazines like Hit Parader and Circus in the 70s--which coincidentally wasn't helped by the fact that for most of the 70s, Rolling Stone was still printed on larger-format newsprint, so it was a pain for stores to stock, because the magazines tended to get messed up, easily torn, etc., by people looking at them. But also Rolling Stone during that era was trying to court an older demographic with a bit of an intellectual bent--they regularly ran long political features and so on. At that point Rolling Stone was basically aiming at hippies, people who were at that time in their 20s through their 30s, say, and who wanted to stay in touch with popular culture rather than just drop out and keep listening to their Country Joe and the Fish and Incredible String Band albums over and over.

Those other magazines were aiming towards the hippies' younger brothers and sisters, or just the first post-hippie generation in general, who were trying to establish their own identities. Since I became interested in music at a very young age, and I was part of a family of music-lovers, I kind of straddled both generations.

It was only later in the 80s/early 90s that Rolling Stone started moving away from that angle, becoming more of a "shallow" pop-oriented magazine, and only in the mid to later 90s that they started running their endless "Top 100/200 whatever" issues.

Originally Posted by Chula Vista

Underground in the fact that is was word of mouth that caused them to grow so quickly. They didn't play any US TV, were not featured in any of those rags until the early 70s, and they got no, or only negative, mainstream press.

I'm not saying they were an underground group. I'm saying their initial audience growth was a word of mouth thing.

Originally Posted by mord

Actually, I like you a lot, Nea. That's why I treat you like ****. It's the MB way.