First, a few ground rules and an explanation:

There will be no mention of child pornography or swordfish, drug and alcohol abuse or both bands’ recent penchant for whoring themselves to the highest bidder.

Kenny Jones is off limits as well, so too Roger Daltrey’s flowing locks and buckskin fetish.

The term “Moon the Loon” will not be making its usual appearance.

There will be no references to Robert Plant as “that blonde tranny from Zep.”

Finally, The Song Remains the Same shall be stricken from the critical record, as well as any and all of Led Zeppelin’s hyperindulgent pseudomystical bullshit.

Ok.

As much as Beatles and Stones fans, Who and Led Zep devotees love to lock horns and trade insults over who was the best, blah blah blah. I usually don’t bother entering into the fray because, to me, there’s no point. No contest. The ‘Oooooo are in an entirely different league than Zep.

My decision has been reached primarily through comparison of the period between 1969 and 1972, though not necessarily referenced in specific, whereby both bands reached their pinnacle of creative expression coupled with a fierce live act — arguably, in Led Zeppelin’s case, but a simple fact for the Who.

My decision has been reached objectively, if not scientifically.

Although it bears mention that I am a Who fan. The only Led Zeppelin album I truly enjoy is Led Zeppelin I and even then it’s only “Good Times, Bad Times” and “Communication Breakdown” — coincidentally the only Led Zeppelin songs I’ve bothered to learn how to play on guitar as sloppily and half-assed as good ole Led Zep were often capable themselves.

It’s not that Jimmy Page was/is a lousy guitar player. Quite the opposite — no one can deny the man had chops. Of course he swiped all his best riffs from old blues records, but that’s beside the point. By 1969, Pete Townshend was a master of harnessed chaos, capable of seamlessly interspersing feedback squall with interludes of shimmering beauty, thus channeling the warring facets of his personality directly through an SG and a Hi-Watt stack. This instrumental mastery also happened to coincide with the flowering of Townshend’s compositional skills, regardless of one’s opinion on the Rock Opera phenomenon that followed (with apologies to the Pretty Things) Led Zeppelin could have never made something as audacious as Tommy — it was simply above and beyond their aesthetic cache of leaden blues based rawk.

John Bonham was a pretty good drummer, though. He was no Keith Moon, but he was alright.

John Paul Jones vs. John Entwistle? That other guy in Led Zeppelin against the best bass player in rock and roll history? Please.

Which leaves the vocalists. Singers, if you will. Both had a tendency to prance and preen about in frilly little numbers, but really, Roger Daltrey could have kicked Robert Plant’s ass with one arm tied behind his back, whilst hopping about on one leg. But I suppose this isn’t a ‘most testosterone wins’ sort of affair; vocally, I much prefer Daltrey’s singing to Plant’s histrionics. I won’t even bring up the latter’s penchant for middle-school D&D lyrical content. Oops, I guess I just did.

Further, Nickelback and Wolfmother are the musical heirs to Led Zeppelin — and they both suck; Most of the people you hated in high school? Led Zeppelin fans.

Ask the average member of the average shitty suburban whiteboy pseudofunk jam band which band they prefer: Led Zeppelin nine times out of ten.

My decision is final.